What is it About New York?

What an awful night. Now I know how Tigers fans felt earlier this week. Squandering numerous chances, not being able to close out, and then watching the home team celebrate a ridiculously ecstatic walk-off win.

I wish that was a rock instead of shaving cream being shoved in his face...

I've lived in New York for seven years now and I haven't been to one game at Yankee Stadium where the Twins actually won. I apologize to everyone in Minnesota if in fact I'm the jinx. If by some miracle we get to game 5 I think I would turn down field level seats at this point just to test my theory.

On a positive note, I made it out of Yankee Stadium alive. I had to take the Subway up by myself since my friend was already there waiting for me, and crossing Babe Ruth Plaza in my Aguilera jersey with a bright red Twins cap was one of the scarier moments of my life with several already drunk Yankee fans walking steps behind me yelling "Hey Aguilera! You suck! Go home you f*ggot!" (Those are some of the nicer things they said to me... it's a real self-esteem boost going to the Bronx FYI.)

Thankfully my friend was waiting for me on the other side of Babe Ruth Plaza because he's a nice Yankees fan and I thought I'd be safe. Unfortunately he wasn't wearing any team apparel so he just got lumped in with me.

Our seats were in the upper section past first base. Sadly, that's where a lot of raucous fans usually make their home. Including the Marlboro Man:

This video he apparently is still sober... The guy on his immediate left was there too and he was even more vocal. He was directly across the aisle from us and I had to lean tot he side when the camera would catch him so I didn't make it on the Jumbotron at the stadium. One poor Twins fan made the mistake of jumping in front of the Marlboro Man when he was rocking out on the Jumbotron and waving his Twins cap in Marlboro's face. That was not a good idea. A chorus of boos, chants of "Asshole! Asshole!" and people throwing their drinks ensued. Somebody tried to knock his hat off his head down into the lower levels. Security had to usher him out for his own safety. It kind of helped divert some of the focus from me at least.

My friend Tim and I found a somewhat safe haven in the bar behind homeplate for the 5th inning. We went to meet my boss there (he was at the game on our company seats with his family), and he bought us all a drink. It's a weird thought to realize you're paying over a hundred dollars for a seat to the game and you're standing in a bar at the stadium watching the game on TV and drinking a $15 dollar vodka tonic. So we didn't stay in the bar too long...

I don't want to paint a horrible picture of all the Yankees fans there. We sat immediately next to an old man and his two daughters in their late 20's who were season ticket holding Yankee fans and had grown up in the Bronx. They were the some of the nicest people I ever met. They loved my Homer Hanky and chatted with me about the Twins and were awesome people.

There were some extremely drunk fans right behind us who found my Aguilera jersey funny and kept chanting "Christina Aguilera" as their fight song to me. After the Yankees tied it up off Nathan they hit the back of my head  and spilled some of their drink on me and I still don't know if it was intentional or not. One of them did pat me on the shoulder the next inning and said that he didn't want to give me too much of a ribbing, he thought having an classic Aguilera jersey was actually pretty cool, and he shook my hand after the game. So despite finding them obnoxious I can't dislike them too much.

I hate to say it but as obnoxious as those Yankees fans can be, most of them there did know their team really well and were completely passionate about it. I actually have to respect them a little bit. I still don't particularly like them, but I do respect them.

I made it home on the train OK although I did get a chorus of boos on the way back across Babe Ruth plaza, and one fan in my subway car kept harassing me about Brett Favre, because, apparently, he assumes I actually like Favre. (Hint: I still don't.)

Anyway, hopefully the Twins can mount a miraculous comeback. But even if they don't, we at least get one more baseball game, and one more postseason game nonetheless!

Also, I called in after the game on Seth Stohs' nightly podcast. He and John Bonnes were hosting and I got to give my report from being at Yankee Stadium. Check it out! And if you aren't already listening to their podcasts you should start! Seth has been hosting every night during the Twins' amazing run and the discussion and analysis is great -- we're extremely blessed as fans to have such amazing writers and bloggers covering so many aspects of our team so utilize them!

I'm off to Cape Cod for the weekend with Boston Dan. We're going to a Bruins/Islanders game tomorrow night and watching some baseball out at his place on the Cape for Columbus Day weekend. I'll post if I can, but if not I'll be back next week! Go Twins!