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March 19, the baseball season is scratching at the door and I’m visited by that stringent brew of optimism spiked with a stiff dose of unbridled hatred. Hatred for the Yankees, of course. Since moving to NYC ten years ago, my natural dislike of them has ulcerated into an eternal flame of malice. I’m sure it’s not healthy. It’s certainly not sensible, especially in the two-titles-in-four-years reality of Red Sox Nation. But, fuck it, that’s baseball. Try explaining–in cold, clear-eyed terms–Walter O’Malley’s insurmountable development obstacles to someone raised in Flatbush in the fifties. Baseball is about love and rage and heartbreak. There is a certain degree of holistic logic to it all anyway. An emotional attachment to the names on the back of the jerseys and an antagonism to enforced tradition is, after all, how I became a Red Sox fan in the first place. Long story, some other time… maybe when the smell of freshly-cut grass has taken hold.