Life in Red Sox Nation

I didn’t so much as visit another college before move-in day four years ago and I cannot claim to have agonized over whether to accept Harvard’s offer of admission. But the usual suspects—professors, proximity to home, housing policies, advising, student life—were not the source of the few doubts I did harbor about coming to Harvard. It was the Boston Red Sox that were keeping me up at night.

Could I, native New Yorker, a lifelong Yankees devotee, and bona fide Jetermaniac stand to reside in the heart of Red Sox Nation for the next four years of my life? Would I ever feel welcome in a place where the interlocking N-Y was off-limits? And what of Jeter? What about Jeter? This future was hard to imagine, but I also figured that the Harvard thing might be worth a shot.

And might I remind you that, at the time, the latest chapter in the Sox-Yankees rivalry had been penned by Aaron Boone, the unlikeliest of postseason heroes and ironclad proof that the Red Sox and their fans were doomed to failure for eternity.

That idea stood for all of two months—right up until the time I found myself gazing down on a packed Harvard Yard full of freshly minted Sox devotees in the wake of Boston’s improbable comeback against the Yankees in the 2004 American League Championship Series. The nightmare was just beginning.

“I wasn’t really worried before I got here,” said New Jersey resident Amit Kumar ’08, another transplant from Yankees country. “But it became really annoying once I got to Harvard.” As Kumar notes, the “pseudo-Red Sox fans”—the ones who abandon their hometown teams or pick up a Sox-habit only after freshman move-in—are the real problem for the Crimson Yankees fan.

Two weeks later, the Curse of the Bambino ended. The fifth floor of Weld Hall again provided an excellent view of the festivities as the Red Sox won their first World Series in 86 years and pandemonium reigned in the Yard. Two years after that I became a member of the first Harvard College class since that of 1919 to witness multiple Red Sox championship teams. As my father put it when I called home in 2004 to seek consolation, “86 years, and it only took you two months!”

All kidding aside, I could go on and on about my objections to the widespread Sox bandwagoning by Harvard students, which at times seemed as ubiquitous as complaints about dining hall fare. But the truth is that things were not as inhospitable as I had feared. Thankfully, attacks on my fanhood have not gone much beyond some gentle ribbing at the hands of a Massachusetts-bred roommate and general hoots and hollers after the latest Sox triumph.

But that does not mean that every follower of the good guys has been so quick to hide their pinstriped heart. Fellow Yankees fan Kendall A. Kulper ’08 said she counted some dirty looks while touring Fenway Park in a Jeter jersey as the most unpleasant first-hand interaction with citizens of Red Sox Nation. Then again, even Kulper didn’t press her luck when she took in her first live game at Fenway last season. “I couldn’t find my Jeter shirt,” she recalled, “but my boyfriend said point-blank he wouldn’t defend me during a brawl, so maybe it was a good thing I didn’t wear it.”

Let there be no mistake—Yankee fans are no angels. They’re overconfident, defenders of regressive economic policy, and are quick to lord over rivals with sepia-toned stories of the old days. But at least we’re open about our faults. Most annoying of all is the Bostonian tendency to play the underdog. “Not even Red Sox fans, but all Boston fans want to act like they’re the underdog,” Kumar said. Sixteen Celtics championships in the NBA, the Patriots’ ongoing semi-dynasty in the NFL (thank you Eli), and... well, not the Bruins, but the point stands.

But I’m not bitter, just bruised. It’s one thing to subject us to history and flood the streets with revelers, or have themed dinners on opening day at Fenway, or even blow a good amount of our House social budget on an event I wouldn’t be caught dead at. But the line needs be drawn somewhere: senior spring, a time to spend time with your friends and cherish your last moments at Harvard. In keeping with that theme, a group of friends decided that a trip to see the Red Sox and Royals was in order last month. Kansas City isn’t the most exciting team to watch, and several of us were woefully unprepared for a final exam set in two days.

A few hours into the night, as refrains of Neil Diamond’s “Sweet Caroline” coursed through the red-clad crowd in the eighth inning, I glanced up and noticed a zero on the scoreboard. Boston starting pitcher Jon Lester was working on a no-hitter, and I knew what was to come—the Sox would not let me leave town without one last shot to the gut. As my camera’s battery wore down (no-hitters are something to be remembered, Sox or not), and we prepared for the crush that awaited us at the Green Line station, I was struck by the awful truth that I had spent four years trying to deny. I, along with the rest of my Bombers-loving ’08 brethren, just happened to be in the right place at the wrong time.

As Kulper put it, “Who do they think they are, the Yankees?”