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Hey Manuel, no team can own Big Apple

Shaun Powell

July 1, 2008

According to my exhaustive and complex study, the highest percentage of Yankees-haters live in Boston, for reasons you may understand.

And where do you suppose the second-highest percentage live? Well, right here in New York, for reasons that Mets manager Jerry Manuel, who's pretty new around here, doesn't understand yet.

You see, contrary to the informal study done by Manuel and the conclusion he reached over the weekend, the Yankees do not own New York, because the Yankees are severely despised in generous parts of New York. Manuel only has to venture outside his office in Queens and ask to see a show of hands. He can find anti-Yankees on a fair share of streets in Brooklyn, or get cut by lots of sharp anti-Yankees stares on Long Island, or get trampled in Midtown Manhattan by boots made for walking on Yankees, and even open a closet or two in the Bronx and find a few Yankees- haters hiding in there, too.

But don't take this as an assault on the Yankees. It's not all about them, or against them.

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Fact is, nobody owns New York, a place too big, too complex and too divided to be claimed by any of the teams who say they "represent" all of us around here.

That's the beauty and curse of being a sports fan and sports team in New York, where loyalty runs differently in the same neighborhoods, the same city blocks and even the same households. No team is embraced by everyone.

Well, actually, the Red Holzman and Pat Riley Knicks came pretty close to having a monopolizing hold on the emotional well-being of all New Yorkers, but the Knicks get a different kind of reaction these days.

Our newspaper and others can do all the scientific studies and consult all the focus groups and polls they want, in an ambitious if not desperate attempt to get a better grip on the sports pulse and mentality in these parts. But it's pretty simple. There are folks in New York who'll die for the Yankees and there are folks in New York who wish the Yankees would just die. Same goes for the Mets and Jets and Giants and Islanders and Rangers.

One day, plenty of love will be expressed for the Knicks when they finally straighten up, if only by default; there's no other basketball team for which to root. But until then, New York would rather not be exclusively owned by any team, thank you very much.

This much is true: The Yankees do own the media around here because of their star power, their history and their habit of creating drama and winning games. That doesn't necessarily translate into owning the town, because if nothing else, the mere sight of the Yankees winning and reaching the playoffs and celebrating only fans the flames of hatred even more.

Also, make no mistake: The Yankees draw 4 million-plus at Yankee Stadium not necessarily because they have twice as many fans as the Mets, but because Yankee Stadium is a cathedral and one of the top tourist attractions in the city. You can look it up: Shea Stadium isn't listed among the "must-see" stops in the guidebooks. The Circle Line ships don't pass by, and neither do the double-decker red buses.

Nobody flocks here from Sheboygan to soak up the atmosphere in the blue and orange seats in the decrepit building by the junkyards. They're heading to the Bronx to see where Ruth once played, not where Armando Benitez once pitched.

New York is the only sports city in the country with two of everything, and because of that, there's fiercely divided loyalty. If you love the Mets, the mere sight of the Yankees is required to make you become really, really queasy. And vice versa. No fan of the Giants in his right mind would ever develop a soft spot for the Jets. And let's not put a Rangers fan and an Islanders fan in the same room and lock the door. Well, on second thought, just for fun, let's do it.

Anyway, New York isn't owned. New York is rented, and only by those who win.

Such is the state of sports around here. Somehow, even with all the hate and love, sports fans manage to live with one another. Just like New Yorkers.