To appreciate Jeter, you must suffer Michael

Date: April 22, 2007
Time: 16:40
Place: Yankee-town

I grew up in north-east Queens, in an apartment complex populated largely by displaced Brooklynites. This was hard-core Mets territory. The Mets were born the year after I was so by the time I became aware of baseball, my contrarian nature dictated that I must become a Yankee fan. This was a tough time to be a Yankee fan, around 68-69. The Mets would take the World Series, while the Yankees completed one of the fastest disintegrations of a team conceivable prior to free agency. Mantle, Maris, Ford, Howard, Kubek, and even Tresh may as well have been Civil War generals by the time I understood baseball.

Apart from their clearly drug-addicted first baseman Joe Pepitone, the woes of the Yankees of this era were personified by their second baseman and shortstop, Horace Clarke and Gene Michael. I'd seen both make 3 errors in a game, but at least Clarke could bat his weight. Michael couldn't, despite being notoriously thin. Worse was the fact that they held on to him for about 6 years of consistently putrid performance.

I was out enjoying the marvelously clement weather just before and noticed a lttle kid wearing a Jeter shirt. He is truly fortunate to be living in this marvelous age where the Yankees have a shortstop worthy of the high calling of "Yankee".