Returning To Normal

Ian Crouch wants to know when Yankees fans and Red Sox fans will get back to hating one another:

There was hope that the N.B.A. playoff series between the Knicks and the Celtics would help gin up some regional sports tension, but barring a miraculous offensive renaissance by the Celtics, that now seems unlikely. Still, it shouldn’t be too hard to turn folks back against us. The Bruins might clobber their way deep into the playoffs. Maybe the Red Sox will outpace expectations and lead the American League East into the summer. And so by late July, when Tom Brady debuts a new hairstyle at Patriots training camp and coach Bill Belichick says some brusque and gnomic thing, the sports world will have spun back onto its proper axis. Détente will give way to all the normal taunts, and fans from New York and beyond will be forced to admit what they’ve been thinking for months: that Boston sports are, well, still kind of insufferable. And Boston fans will be there, still crowing about the unique spiritual grandeur of our hometown teams, and giving as well as we get.
At the end of a lousy baseball summer last year, I wrote about my lasting memory of the 2012 season: I was sitting in the outfield bleachers for a game against the Yankees, another loss in a string of them for a Red Sox team that had disgraced itself. In the middle of the eighth, “Sweet Caroline” came on the loudspeaker, and as it reached its first chorus, some heedless Yankee fan in the stands sang his own modified lines at the top of his voice, mocking the crowd: “Last place never felt so good. So good! So good!” I thought of that glorious jerk this weekend as I listened to all the good vibes from Fenway on the radio. When the Yanks come to Boston for the first time this season in July, I hope that he or his brethren are in the house, rooting hard against the Red Sox. And the chase begins again.

This reminds me of one of my 9/11 complaints: why are we still playing "God Bless America" every Sunday in Cincinnati.  That was never played before September 11, 2001, and it should be retired.  Same deal with the Yankee-Red Sox love fest.  Yes, it was nice last week, but it is time to move on.