I was very happy to see Sheffield traded for prospects this offseason. I liked Randy Johnson, but I didn’t mind seeing that deal either.
Given how things have gone with U.S. Steel in recent years, rooting for the Yankees is now sort of like rooting for Halliburton.
The basic pull for most Yankees fans is the ability to feel like a winner by rooting for a winner, so naturally they have continued popularity.
If Yankees fans really supported the underdog, there’d be more than a subtle groundswell to give Colter Bean a chance for an extended period. True, his relief appearances for the big club this year were less than awesome, but it’s not like the bullpen in general has been hot stuff.
I do thank the Yankees for bailing on their Triple-A affiliate Columbus (OH) and moving to that toddling town, Scranton. Now I can root for the hometown Columbus Clippers* without gagging.
*the Clippers’ won-loss record at the moment is comparable to that of the Yankees, even though they are now the Triple-A farm club of the Nationals. 
I grew up in the South Bronx and spent my youthful summers as a Bleacher Creature. I used to watch the Yanks on the radio.
Even now, when watching a whole baseball game is like watching paint dry on a humid day, I still will stop to watch the Yankees bat. Which is good because watching the pitching is painful.
Didn’t Posada, Jeter, Riviera and Williams come up through the Yankee minor leagues? Still, George has a habit of paying good money for old has-beens. Ah well, so is the life of a Yankee fan. You take the good with the bad.
Sorry, but Mets fans were not rooting for the MFYs even then. If they wanted to root for the MFYs under any circumstances, they would be MFY fans.
Bull Shit, thanks for ignoring my post and some easy facts. Yes, Yankee fans like to win, but most Yankee fans also root for teams that have little success. Should 2nd, 3rd, 4th and even 5th generation Yankees fans stop rooting for their team because it is too successful? WTF is that crap. Are their front-runners out their rooting for the Yankees? Of course, but most fans pick up their fandom from their family. The Yanks are the oldest and most popular team in the largest metro area in the country. Winning does breed fans, the history of the Yanks add to sense of connecting to the past. The fact that no one alive can remember the Yanks not playing in NY helps. So the Yanks have more fans than any other team, it is not just because they have the highest payroll. There is a lot of tradition.
Do you remember how lowly the Yanks were in the late sixties and early seventies? Do you recall how little the team cost Steinbrenner? Do you recall the joke of seeing Martin hired and fired until it was a complete embarrassment? The fact that George traded away all of our prospects in the Eighties for aging All-Stars?
Despite all this George managed to turn this team into the most valuable franchise in the US by far. We are in the middle of the Yankees second best run. I doubt anything will ever compare to the 1949 to 1964 run, but this has been damn impressive.
The constant Free agent purchases by the Yanks on George’s orders have hurt the Yanks more than it has helped them. In the early 90s Gene Michaels rebuilt the Yanks by building up the farm system, making careful trades and getting good starting pitching and great relief pitching. This plan worked great. This is what they need to get back to and are trying to get back to. Clemens is a great big, gold plated, diamond encrusted band-aid in a season of massive rotation injury.
Jim
My family (native New Yorkers) generated fans of the Dodgers, Giants and later Mets. Nobody could tolerate the front-running associated with the Yanks even then, before the spending disparity between the Yankees and other teams grew to ridiculous proportions.
There have always been teams drawing disproportionate numbers of fans from around the country because of success (other examples including the Dallas Cowboys and Chicago Bulls). I pity Yankee fans when and if spending caps go into effect in major league baseball. Most will never adjust to having to compete with other teams on an equal footing.
Speaking of panic over the prospect of losing - I enjoyed the N.Y. Times pundits forecasting gloom and doom a week and a half ago - and egging on Steinbrenner to fire Joe Torre. You didn’t have to know much about baseball to be sure the Yankees would buy themselves back into contention one way or another.
A couple of things:
(a) Steinbrenner has a history of, as Biggirl said, “paying good money for old has-beens”. That said, Steinbrenner has ceded most control of baseball operations, and is fairly uninvolved in current player decisions, such as Clemens. Hopefully, we won’t see many of those boneheaded decisions, such as when George declared, “I just got you the championship” when he signed Steve Trout.
(b) We Yankee fans, or as RealityChuck calls us, MFY fans, have pointed out that the Yankees are, and have been, a mix of home grown and hired talent. The payroll is an advantage, but for an Orioles fan to be kvetching is slightly hypocritical. The Orioles were also known at one point for their high payroll, only they were less successful.
© Jackmanii, even a minor league prospect has to get batters out. The bullpen for the MFY has been surpisingly good, all things considered. It’s the starting pitching that’s questionable.
(d) Lastly, because it is not worth a separate thread, Josh Phelps shot on Kenji Johjima was uncalled for, as was Proctor’s retaliation. Washburn plunking Phelps was not only called for, but expected by everyone in the stadium, including Phelps and the umpires.
I’ll be at the game tonight, and I’m expecting at least one HBP.
I don’t expect it to carry over, Marley23, as Proctor didn’t hit anyone. His was just a ‘purpose pitch’, that served to slow down a very fast moving game. We will find out, though.
I didn’t realize he missed the batter and threw clear behind him. The benches did clear. I hope there’s no further retaliation, but tempers may be short.
Enjoy the game. I cut way back this year. No ticket plan for the first time in a while.
Roger is a 45 yr old power pitcher. How about a steroid or HGH test. Actually how about testing everybody.
I used to despise the Yankees and all their fans. Then I met them and talked to them.
They’re really no different than fans of any other team. They know their team wins a lot, but like Spider-man, with great power comes great responsibility.
If you’re looking for the high moral ground in rooting for a sports team, forget about it.
Does the name Nolan Ryan ring any bells?
I’m pretty sure they do test everybody now. Clemens has been tested for steroids, although that probably means little, and at this point there is no reliable HGH test.
This is a good point. The Patriots have a great organization and eyes for talent, so I take nothing away from them, but with the cap increase this year, their offseason resembled nothing so much as the stereotyped Yankee offseason. Character-wise, the Pats are just like the rest of the teams. Except Tennessee and Cincinnati. 
Annnnnddddd…we have a winner!
This brief moment of wisdom and clarity brought to you by BobT - well done.
I’m with the OP. Watching an underdog win is exciting. Watching the Yankees win is… Boring. I don’t have anything against the Yankees or their fans, the way I do with some teams (you’re allowed to root for the Braves if and only if you’re from Atlanta), but what do you get out of it? I just don’t see it.
Tell me it’s boring all you like - baseball isn’t even my favorite sport, but Aaron Boone’s ALCS home run was the most exciting sporting moment I’ve ever watched. I smile every time I think about it or post about it.
Particularly since just before the pitch, I turned to my then-girlfriend and the guy whose room we were watching in and said something like “You know, when this guy came to the Yankees, he was struggling badly in his first few games, then hit an extra-inning walkoff home run…”
Nolan was before steroids.
The Yankees could have probably gotten the Tigers to rent Verlander for a year for 25 million. It would be worth it to get that kind of money in the organization.
So you’re saying it’s possible for a 45-year-old power pitcher to be clean, then?
I don’t know when the steroid era officially began and I am not trying to imply anything about Ryan, but he was on the same team as Jose Canseco, and a few other steroid users if memory serves, for two years.
Are you old enough to have watched Bucky Dent’s HR against the Red Sox in 1978? Do you remember Jim Leyritz in 1996? Boone makes my top 5 Yankee moments, but those two home runs and the perfect games beat out Boone, IMNSHO.