Being a New York Yankees fan isn’t all champagne and caviar. Sure, we get to bask in the glow of those 27 tremendous championship seasons, and cheer for our future Hall of Famers like Aaron Judge. Opinion But we know that at least half the opponents’ fans think we’re elitist snobs and hate our guts simply because of the Yankees’ long record of success and swagger. Jealousy is a terrible trait. I became a New York Yankee fan during the 1960 season, when I was five years old. I was watching the “NBC Game of the Week” with my dad, and I asked him which was the best baseball team.  Without hesitation, my dad replied, “The New York Yankees.” I liked the sound of that, because I was born in upstate New York. My family only stayed there for six months, but I think a native New Yorker should root for the home team. I followed my team as it won the American League pennant and went to the World Series against the Pittsburgh Pirates. The Yankees were the favorites until Bill Mazeroski hit his miracle home run to win the game and the title. I did what any 5-year-old would do when his dreams are stomped on: I cried, cried and then cried some more. We were robbed! My parents assured me that it wasn’t the end of the world, but it felt like it. Oct. 13, 1960 was a day of infamy. My confusion about how this tragic loss could have happened was amplified when I learned that for my maternal grandmother — a die-hard Pirates fan — Mazeroski’s heroics were one of the happiest moments in her life. Why wasn’t Grandma Connie cheering for the best team? But soon there was another season, then 64 more for me. I remained loyal, even making it through the wretched early 1970s when CBS owned the team and it sucked. Then along came new owner George Steinbrenner, feisty manager Billy Martin, and star players like Reggie Jackson, Catfish Hunter and Dave Winfield donning Yankee pinstripes. It was a magical era for the franchise. Baseball has been a lifelong fascination for me, watching skilled athletes playing one of the most challenging sports in the world. How can a hitter get his bat on a ball that’s crossing the plate at 103 miles per hour? No matter how many games you watch, from contests between the worst teams to classic games with the best vs. the best, there’s always a chance that you’ll see some breathtaking acrobatic catches or monumental blunders that have never happened before in Major League Baseball history. I’ve heard many people say baseball is a boring sport that they wouldn’t waste their time on. I take pity on them. They don’t know what they’re missing. The strategies employed by managers can be seen by fans as genius moves or a chapter from “Baseball for Dummies,” depending on who they’re rooting for.  Faced with tough decisions like who starts on the mound, which bench players enter games at critical moments, and when to give a pitcher the hook and go to the bullpen, good managers don’t typically have long careers with one team. A World Series appearance means little to team owners if it’s followed by several years of mediocrity or one catastrophic season.  Even if you don’t care who wins, nothing beats a sunny day at a ballpark with family, friends and total strangers communing over a sport with a thrilling history that is ever changing.  The debut of technology in major league parks this year that gives pitchers, catchers and hitters limited opportunities to challenge ball or strike calls has generally been viewed favorably by the players and fans, and it helps us understand the difficult jobs umpires have consistently getting it right. But it’s the players themselves who stand out the most. In all my years watching my team, I think the play Derek Jeter made in the 2001 American League Division Series that staved off elimination for the Yankees against the Oakland Athletics is one of the most unforgettable moments in Yankees’ history.  How Jeter streaked across the diamond from his shortstop position to catch a long relay that went over the heads of two defenders and make a back-hand flip to the catcher for the out was one for the ages. For sheer offensive drama, it’s hard to beat little-known Bucky Dent’s unlikely blast over the Green Monster in Boston’s Fenway Park in 1978 to start the Yankees’ come-from-behind win in a thrilling tiebreaker for the American League East Division crown. It was like a 99-to-1 long shot winning the Kentucky Derby. The Yankees have appeared in only one World Series since beating the Philadelphia Phillies in 2009, when the Los Angeles Dodgers won four of five games in a 2024 shellacking. In the mid-1980s, I unabashedly used my position as an editor at the Wyoming Eagle in Cheyenne to score a media pass to a Yankees game in Kansas City against the Royals. It was the first time I watched a Yankees game in person, but the things I remember best occurred off the field. As a kid, I read an inspiring biography of former Yankee shortstop Phil Rizzuto three times. Imagine my delight decades later when I saw Rizzuto, who became a Yankee sports announcer, walk into the press box and regale us with some of his great stories. In the clubhouse after the game, I remember seeing one of my favorite Yankee managers, Lou Piniella, celebrating the win alone, sitting behind his desk eating a huge plate of spaghetti. I wished I had my camera. To top off a great night I was able to talk to Don Mattingly, the star of the game and a future manager, though not with the Yankees. But one of my fondest baseball memories was at a 2001 Associated Press convention in Wisconsin, watching Milwaukee/Atlanta Braves legend Hank Aaron hold court at a stadium news conference.  Many years ago, as a teen in Florida, my grandparents took me to a spring training game where “Hammerin’ Hank,” who smashed 755 dingers in his MLB career, hit a massive home run. Several decades later, here was Aaron dazzling an audience of journalists with stories of wit and wisdom from his career. He stayed far longer than any of us expected him to, gladly signing autographs and posing for photos. When he flashed his trademark smile, it literally made a room full of newsmen and women act like kids, worshipping a baseball icon who embodied everything we love about the sport. And he wasn’t even a Yankee. The post How I became a New York Yankees fan and lived to brag about it appeared first on WyoFile . ...read more read less