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By Bernie Lincicome
Scripps Howard News Service
NEW YORK, NEW YORK -- I just want to get the rules straight. Do I have to write everything twice, such as Yanks win! Yanks win!, which they will in five, by the way, if anyone beyond two of the several
boroughs gives a hoot, gives a hoot? We out-of-towners are not
familiar with the regulations of the Subway, Subway Series, assuming
trains run in two directions, though not directly between the Bronx
and the Queens. I have tried to make that trip, and let me tell you it
can't be done without asking for help, which, in New York, New York,
is like asking for a clean place to step.
"Excuse me, sir, is this Grand Central Station?"
"Fuhgedaboudit."
They really do talk like that here and invariably punctuate such
pleasantries with hand gestures, using an economy of fingers.
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I warned that this could happen, if you recall, and I clearly blame the St. Louis Cardinals and Seattle Mariners for letting the side down, the side being the mountains and the prairies and the ocean white with foam, the America of song and sunsets. |
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Not that that local memories stretch back 44 years without visual
aids. Almost anyone who was around to see the Yankees beat the
Brooklyn Dodgers in 1956 now lives in Boca Raton, Fla.
This is really as strange to New York, New York, as it is to the
rest of us, which does not prevent the smug assumption that, as the
Mets used to declare, this is baseball as it oughta be.
Someone tells me that at least it is not a Series between the
Braves and the Indians, teams that give offense to Native Americans.
And I say, this Series gives offense to all other Americans.
I warned that this could happen, if you recall, and I clearly blame
the St. Louis Cardinals and Seattle Mariners for letting the side
down, the side being the mountains and the prairies and the ocean
white with foam, the America of song and sunsets.
It is their fault the world in the World Series has been reduced to
an underground ditch, and proud to be there with T-shirts and ball
caps and banners proclaiming the special conceit impossible for
anyplace else, save Chicago.
Other than the obvious alliteration, I wonder how the subway was
chosen as the link between the teams when the most obvious connection
would be The Dented Yellow Taxi Series, unless you actually need a
yellow taxi. For anyone who will be able to afford tickets, the
Stretch Limo Series would be more to the point, including the
ballplayers.
But subway it is, a place of suspicion and fear and special aromas.
All that matters to New York, New York, is that it gets to play
itself, the only worthy opponent. It can already plan its victory
parade.
"The usual place," said Mayor Rudy Giuliani, "the Canyon of
Heroes."
That's just the sort of arrogance that browns off the rest of us.
One thing the Subway Series has done is eliminate the natural search
for Cinderella. She lives out there with a lawn and patio furniture,
and no arguments in favor of the Mets, no matter how many slippers
they try on.
"Their payroll is at least $30 million more than ours," assessed
Mets third baseman Robin Ventura. Talk about the rich calling the
prosperous flush. Either one of these teams (the Yankees $110 million,
the Mets $80 million) could pay for all of the teams in Canada, as
well as Minnesota, practically the same place.
All the usual measurements do not apply when considering which team
will win a Subway Series. Better pitching. Timely hitting. More astute
managing. Who can know? The place to get the answer is, it occurs to
me, the subway itself.
I venture down into Grand Central Station, the only intersection of
the two lines that go to the stadiums. I choose the No. 7, made famous
by John Rocker as a train of misfits and unemployables, as opposed to
the No. 4 to Yankee Stadium, frequented by lawyers and stockbrokers,
an even more scary lot.
The No. 7 bolts out of the darkness under the East River into the
fresh sunlight of the residential brick pile that is Queens, still
nine stops from Shea Stadium, when a scrawny, edgy, young man kneels
in front of me, eyes phlegmy, hands folded in prayer.
"Stake me to a meal," he pleads. "I'm 24 years old, I'm sick and
I need some food. Even a dying man deserves to eat once a day, doesn't
he?" Passengers used to this sort of thing edge away, pull their
newspapers closer to their faces, check their watches. I give him a $5
bill.
He tucks the money inside a zippered pocket of his ratty jacket and
before proceeding down the car on his knees, looks back at me, winks
and says, "Yankees in five."
I've made an investment, you see, you see.
Bernie Lincicome writes for the Denver Rocky Mountain News.
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