As a new Major League Baseball season dawns, here is my list of the teams in the order of how much I like them or not. I'll go 1 to 30, rather than 30 to 1, because, if you're a regular reader of this blog, you know who 1 is, and you can probably guess who 29 and 30 are -- but not necessarily in that order.
1. New York Yankees. You already knew that. But you deserve an explanation. People ask me: "How can you be a liberal Democrat, with an affinity for the underdog, and still support the Yankees, the overlords of baseball, the most capitalist sports team of them all?"
Part of it is that most of my family were Met fans, but my grandfather grew up in The Bronx, and he was the source of my baseball education. Part of it was that I had a difficult childhood, full of emotional defeats, and I turned to the Yankees as a place of refuge, something to ease my pain.
But as The Eagles -- the rock band, not the Philadelphia football team -- taught us, every form of refuge has its price. For me, that price was living in a place that seemed to have more Met fans than Yankee Fans. And the kids who were Met fans, rather than acting like plucky underdogs who stood with the downtrodden, acted like dicks.
It got worse in the mid-1980s, when the Mets were making Playoff runs, and the Yankees weren't quite good enough. Met fans developed all the arrogance of Yankee Fans, and had earned hardly any of it. They acted like their 2 titles, in 1969 and 1986, outweighed the Yankees' 22 titles (the most recent having come in 1978). This is why the 2000 World Series replaced 1978 as my favorite title. It should have shut them up forever. Of course, it didn't.
2. Philadelphia Phillies. Aside from the New York teams, this is the closest team to me. Great city. Great ballpark. Not a great history, but an interesting history. And when they do well, it ticks Met fans off. Anything that ticks Met fans off is okay by me.
3. Washington Nationals. Great city. Great ballpark. Met fans don't like them. You might expect me not to like them because they were the Montreal Expos. But that situation was complicated, and the current Nationals organization shouldn't be blamed for that. Also, during the 2019 World Series, Trump visited, and their fans booed the hell out of him. And, in that Series, they beat the cheating Astros. For both of those things, the Nats will always have my thanks.
4. Chicago Cubs. The city, the ballpark, the finally-successful end to the curse, the fans who endured it all. I'll admit, their run in 1984, when I was 14, had an effect.
5. San Francisco Giants. Their connection to New York is almost irrelevant now. But as a representative of a great city, playing in a great ballpark, with a fine history, and as the arch-enemy of the L.A. O'Malleys, they have my respect.
6. Chicago White Sox. I love the city. The ballpark gets a bad rap: No, it's not the old Comiskey Park. But, structurally, it reminds me of the 1976-2008 format of Yankee Stadium, plus it's got an update of the Comiskey "exploding scoreboard." And the team has guts. And their fans never got the credit they deserved for sticking by their team through a drought which, if not as long as the Cubs', was longer than the Red Sox'.
Author Jean Shepherd was a White Sox fan, and he put it this way: "If I was a colonel in some horrible war, and we had to take an enemy pillbox, and it was a suicide mission, I'd look out at the men and say, 'Are any of you White Sox fans? Follow me!' And those White Sox fans would follow me, and we'd take that pillbox! Because White Sox fans are special."
7. Pittsburgh Pirates. I have a soft spot for Pittsburgh, a city that was hammered by the loss of industry over the 1st 20 years of my life, and then rebuilt, going from a city of coal and steel to a city of healthy care and computers. Three Rivers Stadium was all wrong for baseball, but Forbes Field before it was a classic, and PNC Park after it is as well. Honus Wagner, Pie Traynor, the Waner Brothers, Ralph Kiner, Roberto Clemente, Willie Stargell, Barry Bonds... uh, maybe scratch that last one.
Their fans have now suffered through 44 seasons without so much as a Pennant. They deserve to be rewarded, even if they have also seen their city win 6 Super Bowls and 3 Stanley Cups, to go with the Pirates' 9 Pennants and 5 World Series.
8. Oakland Athletics. This ranking will drop considerably if they move to Las Vegas. I'm not even counting their Philadelphia heritage -- because they don't, not really. They display their Philly World Series wins, but they don't retire numbers for their Philly legends.
Still, the A's and their fans survived the San Francisco media's ignorance of them for usually-inferior Giant teams for a long time. They survived three cheap owners/ownership groups and at least six "fire sales," and the transformation of one of the most fun places to watch a game into the most unsuitable non-dome stadium in the majors. Instead of taking their team away, give them a break.
Yes, they were the original steroid-cheating team. But they were also the team that produced Reggie Jackson and Catfish Hunter, and the Yankees wouldn't have made it without them.
9. Detroit Tigers. Having had Hank Greenberg, alone, helps. Having had Ernie Harwell, alone, helps. Having played 88 seasons in Tiger Stadium, alone, helps. Their fans having to endure what was done to their city is worthy of anyone's respect. It is true that, in 2006, '12 and '13, they beat the Yankees in the Playoffs. But I blame Brian Cashman for that.
10. Baltimore Orioles. Baltimore is a tough city -- and this week's collapse of the Francis Scott Key Bridge makes it tougher. But Camden Yards, and Memorial Stadium before it, were classic ballyards, and the team has some legendary characters -- and some men of legendary character.
11. Colorado Rockies. Denver wanted a team for so long, and, unlike Tampa Bay, their actions since suggest that they deserved it. I can tell you that they would be higher on this list if they had beaten the Boston Red Sox in the 2007 World Series. Alas...
12. Cleveland Guardians. A city I like, a ballpark I like, and fans that have suffered through the longest current World Championship drought, 76 years. The downside is that a lot of their fans still cling to the questionable name "Cleveland Indians" (which the team used for what is now 87 percent of their history), and some of them even cling to the unquestionably racist (and just plain ridiculous) mascot Chief Wahoo.
13. Minnesota Twins. Some of baseball's greatest legends in one of America's nicest cities -- two of them, if you count St. Paul -- gets offset by 28 years of playing in the freakin' Metrodome.
14. Milwaukee Brewers. I like Milwaukee as a city, and I liked Milwaukee County Stadium. But American Family Field (formerly Miller Park) is one of the few new 1992 to 2010 stadiums that is not an improvement over its predecessor. And they will forever be tainted by their connection to Bud Selig.
15. San Diego Padres. They produced Dave Winfield and Tony Gwynn they have a nice city, they have a nice ballpark, their fans hate the Dodgers, and their fans have also suffered a lot. On the other hand, as their team has begun to spend big, their fans have begun to act like Mets West, talking trash to their more successful "neighbors," without the results to back it up, and that has dropped them a little.
16. Los Angeles Angels. They've changed their name 4 times in 64 years. They're the ultimate suburban team. They can be reached by public transportation, if you count Amtrak. But they've had to endure constant comparison, usually unfavorable, to the Dodgers, and a few genuine tragedies, so they are worthy of some sympathy.
17. Seattle Mariners. Their fans still want to talk about the 1995 AL Division Series. They don't want to talk about how they filled up Internet chat rooms in June 2001 with "SEATTLE MARINERS 2001 WORLD CHAMPIONS" and then got embarrassed by the Yankees in 5 games in the AL Championship Series.
18. Atlanta Braves. The Tomahawk Chop is bad enough. But they moved from the city of Atlanta to the mostly-white northwester suburbs, when everyone else is moving as close to downtown as possible.
19. Cincinnati Reds. Some Reds fans have the same entitlement complex as Ohio State football fans. Others have the same entitlement complex as Kentucky basketball fans. (Ohio Stadium is 110 miles to the northeast, while Rupp Arena is 82 miles to the south.) It makes them believe things that are absolutely ridiculous.
Things like: Cincinnati is the best baseball city, the 1970s Reds were the greatest baseball team ever, Johnny Bench was the greatest catcher ever (better than Yogi Berra), Sparky Anderson was the greatest manager ever, Dave Concepcion deserves to be in the Hall of Fame, and, of course, Pete Rose deserves to have his ban lifted and be elected to the Hall of Fame. These are things you believe when you're from "Cincitucky."
20. St. Louis Cardinals. It can be argued that, aside from the Yankees, no team has a better history than the Cards. But I am sick of hearing about how St. Louis is "the best baseball city in America." Based on what? Attendance? The Yankees, Dodgers and San Diego had higher attendance last season, and Atlanta nearly did.
21. Texas Rangers. It's Texas. It's the suburbs of Dallas. George W. Bush owned them. Stupid stadium that you can't get to with public transportation. And they have no problem with cheaters: Ivan Rodriguez, Juan Gonzalez, Rafael Palmeiro, Jose Canseco.
22. Arizona Diamondbacks. The State is coming along, but it's still the State that allowed the election of Sheriff Joe Arpaio. Stupid uniforms. Stupid stadium. Yes, I know, it's so hot that they need a dome. But they could have made it not look like an airplane hangar. And they had real grass, and switched to artificial turf. Oh yeah: 2001. Matt Williams admitted to cheating. Luis Gonzalez hasn't, but who's kidding who? And Curt Schilling? I know it was 2004 in Boston instead of 2001 in Phoenix, but I want the blood on that sock tested. If he was guilty in 2004, he was probably guilty in 2001, too.
23. Toronto Blue Jays. The first game I ever saw live, the Jays, a 2nd-year expansion team, beat the defending World Champion Yankees. It seems like, no matter how good each team is, the Jays give the Yankees trouble. I came to call them "those pesky Blue Jays." Also, stupid stadium, and stupid uniforms.
24. Kansas City Royals. Mostly, this is lingering from their 1976-85 glory days. They were dirty. And, of course, in 1983, with George Brett's pine tar, the Royals set the standard. The Yankee Doodle Double Standard: If you cheat, and it hurts the Yankees, it's okay. They did beat the Mets in the 2015 World Series, though, so they could be lower on this list.
25. Tampa Bay Rays. Rotten city (St. Petersburg). Even more rotten State. Worst stadium in baseball. Lousy uniforms. Classless organization. Worst fans in terms of showing up, and probably worst in terms of knowledge, too.
The Twins, the Astros, the Padres and the Mariners all considered moving to Tampa Bay. The White Sox nearly did for the 1989 season. The Giants came even closer to doing so for 1993. It took until 1998 for them to get a team. Now, we know why: Those fans didn't deserve a team. They won't come out for a good one, let alone a bad one. Don't tell me the dome is in a bad location in St. Petersburg: Yankee Stadium is in the South Bronx, and Shea Stadium was literally across the street from a junkyard, and fans still came.
26. Miami Marlins. Rotten city. Even more rotten State. Stupid stadium. Stupid uniforms. And, with Ivan Rodriguez, they cheated their way to beat the Yankees in the World Series. And the fans don't come out to see them. If the Rays won't move to Montreal, maybe the Marlins should. After all, Jeffrey Loria sold the Expos (and sold them out) so he could buy the Marlins. Also, the owners of the Marlins sold to Loria so they could buy the Red Sox. That's reason enough to put them in the bottom quarter.
27. Los Angeles Dodgers. Or, as I prefer to call them these days, The Los Angeles Baseball Team. The Treason of '57 shall never, ever be forgot.
28. Houston Astros. Until 2013, they were in the National League, so the only things I had against them were the fact that they had introduced domes and artificial turf to baseball, and those awful uniforms, all of which they'd abandoned by that point. And the fact that they were in Texas.
Then they started cheating, and became the Red Sox South -- or, if you prefer, the Chicken Fried Sox.
29. New York Mets. Up until 2003, certainly no later than October 19, 2004, The Other Team could legitimately have been put at Number 30 -- or 28 from 1993 to 1997, or 26 up until 1992. But maybe that would have been wrong. After all, being in the other League meant that, up until 1997, we weren't playing them in the regular season. The rivalry was between the fans, not the players.
Still, because we have to live among Met fans, with the occasional Chowdahead scattered here and there in the New York Tri-State Area, losing the 2000 World Series would have been 10 times worse than losing the 2004 American League Championship Series was.
30. Boston Red Sox. It used to be that, as with the Mets, the rivalry was more between the fans than the players. The exception was in the 1970s, when the Red Sox had a bunch of dopes with chips on their shoulders. But things got really nasty in 1998, when Pedro Martinez arrived in Boston, and began throwing at Yankee batters' heads and hands. And in the 1999 ALCS, after some perceived bad calls, the fans at Fenway Park began throwing garbage onto the field. "Athens of America"? Yeah, surrre!
You will never find a more wretched hive
of scum and villainy.
Still, as Yogi Berra taught us, "We've been playing these guys for 80 years. They can't beat us!" They found a way. They found a way to inject some success. It almost worked in 2003. It did work in 2004. It's worked ever since, as they go from one method of chicanery to another. And, of course, because what they do hurts the Yankees, they never get punished.
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