A World Series to Watch

Whether you are a die-hard baseball fan, a disgruntled Red Sox supporter or anybody else for that matter, the ongoing World Series between the New York Mets and the New York Yankees is one that you cannot ignore. This week will represent much more than baseball, so everyone should be tuning in--not only to the television, but to the pulse of New York. For the sake of knowledge, history, sociology and baseball, this is the series to watch.

The last time the world saw a subway series was 44 years ago in 1956, after which both the Giants and Dodgers left New York. The Mets were spawned in 1962, and since then New York City has been the site of a constant ongoing rivalry. This series is the culmination of 39 years of trash-talking and angry debate as fans rub elbows in the subways, in sports bars--the city makes escape impossible. Thirty-nine years of pride is now on the line: This is what the city has been waiting for. Make no mistake, the games played this week will be talked about in the Big Apple for decades to come.

There is no doubt about the fury that these games will cause. The past four years of interleague play between the Mets and the Yankees have had all the intensity of any normal World Series. Each game was the be-all-end-all, the apocalypse of baseball. Division series records stopped mattering, and it was all about the rivalry. Now, with the teams actually fighting for the World Series, the intensity level is constantly at bases loaded, bottom of the ninth. Baseball has never seen anything like it.

Of course, the tensions over this subway series are high in a city packed with eight million New Yorkers, commonly known for their fervent devotion to area sports teams. New York is a city of fans, and the word fan is short for fanatic, which, according to Webster Dictionary, means, "marked by excessive enthusiasm and often intense uncritical devotion." New York fans are fanatic about either the Mets or the Yankees--teams that inherently polarize their fans. It's possible the fans will be more exciting to watch than the games. And who could ask for a better match-up than the Mets and the Yankees? The two teams are incredibly talented, and exciting to watch. Their payrolls are high--some people take affront at that--but it just means that the players are the best money can buy. We're lucky enough to be able to watch the World Series of World Series be played by baseball's best.

And do, absolutely, watch the series. Feel it and live it. Expect awesome heroics. Expect great baseball. Expect to see the worlds capital bursting at its seams. Oh, and one more thing. Most importantly--hope and pray that this series goes to seven games. You won't be disappointed.