About the Yankees and me

I became a Yankee fan the October that I turned 6, in 1960. I fell in love with Bobby Richardson, Mickey Mantle, Whitey Ford and Roger Maris (but not Bill Mazeroski). The next year was a pretty good year to confirm a lifelong loyalty to the Yankees.

I don’t care if you hate the Yankees. You admire sustained excellence in other parts of your life, gladly watching movies starring Meryl Streep or Tom Hanks and loyally buying the latest Apple product. I admire sustained excellence in baseball.

I’ve seen the Yankees play live in at least eight different ballparks, including old and new Yankee Stadiums (I did a whole post on that old Yankee Stadium game. It was ugly).

I’m director of Student Media at Louisiana State University and a longtime journalist. I blog about journalism at The Buttry Diary.

The past two Octobers (and into November), I have revealed a second loyalty. I lived in Kansas City from 1985 to 1990, taking my young sons to the ballpark regularly. As a lifelong Yankee fan, I kept my loyalties straight, cheering for New York when the Yankees visited and for the Royals the rest of the time. Well, I utterly failed at turning the boys into Yankee fans. And the Royals have given me (and them, as guest bloggers) more to blog about the past couple Octobers (writing this in 2015) than the Yankees have.

You may reach me by email at stephenbuttry (at) gmail (dot) com.