Earlier this week, the New York Mets swept the New York Yankees in their first regular season "Subway Series" of the season. It was the first such time that this has happened since 1997, when regular season inter-league play between National and American League teams began, and even though I am no die hard sports follower, I am a Yankees' fan and I just had to respond when some of my friends felt the need to gloat on Facebook after the sweep had been completed.
I learned a long time ago not to get too involved with sports. I loosely follow all four major sports: baseball, football, basketball and hockey (my favorite!), and when I was much younger I used to be a super duper die hard like many sports fans, catching every single game and never missing a beat. But I eventually learned that living and dying with a team is not a good way to live. First of all, it's a passive activity, where a person watching the game has no control over its outcome, and when you do live like this, you're moods tend to elevate and deflate, consequentially, after wins and losses. Also, when you find yourself not being able to miss a game, you tend to miss out on a lot of other things that life has to offer.
That being said, I still follow sports, catching games when the mood strikes me, but the only thing I do on a semi-regular basis is check out the box scores to see how my team is doing. Of course, being a Yankee fan, I wasn't happy about the outcome of the week's series, but I wasn't going to go into a depression because of it. Then I checked my Facebook page...
Mets own this town!!!
Anytime they beat the hated Yankees is a huge barrel of fun for me!
I love how Yankee fans are crying that the Mets beat there AAA team.Well boo freakin hoo they had to field a team like most of the MLB without a 20 million dollar player at each position.for once they could not buy a win.
These are just some of the many,, many comments made by Met fans, and I'm sure there are many more like this that I hadn't seen. Now I don't have any problem with Met fans celebrating. They have all the right to...but when you have to disparage the Yankees in doing so, well that's another story. I already know, and have seen this week, their answer to my complaint: well we're doing it because of Yankee fans. Okay, then, I understand if you're gloating in the faces of Yankee fans who do the same thing, but I am not one of them, and besides, isn't that a little childish?
To me, it's a classic example of little brother-big brother envy. The Yankees are probably the most storied sports franchise ever, and even with their 27 World Championships (most recently in 2009), there have been countless times that they've been in the running for the championship and didn't make it. The Mets, on the other hand, have won two World Series titles and are rarely in the mix to win it all. So sure they have a reason to celebrate, but not to gloat. Currently the Yanks are in 2nd place, only one game out of first, and the Mets are in 4th, and ten and a half games out. Here was my FB answer for those gloaters:
Okay, now I'm not trying to pick a fight or anything, but I've seen enough posts from Met fans gloating over their sweep that I had to say something. Ok, congrats Mets. You beat the Yankees 4 times in a week, but PuHleese!!! All that gloating just exudes your envy because you know that if the Mets were to win the Series every year from now, we'd mostly be dead by the time they ever reach the Yankees' success.
So okay, yeah, congratulations to the Mets. And to the Met fans who choose to gloat like they won the World Series, I say see you in October?
The Empire State Building in blue and orange after the sweep
