Derek Jeter: Enemy’s End

On Sept. 25 Derek Jeter stepped up to the plate at Yankee Stadium for one final time. It was the bottom of the ninth, and the New York Yankees were tied with the Baltimore Orioles 5-5. Yankees outfielder, Antoan Richardson, was in scoring position on second base. As the throngs of Yankees fans chanted his name, Jeter took his stance. Orioles pitcher Evan Meek threw the first pitch and WHACK… Jeter sent the ball sailing into right field with a line drive. Richardson rounded third, the ball was thrown home, Richardson slid, and he was… safe! Derek Jeter, in his final at-bat at Yankee Stadium, made the winning hit for his team. It was a pitch perfect conclusion to a legendary career.

I’m a Boston Red Sox fan. I always have been and probably always will be. I never have nor ever will cheer for the New York Yankees. And yet, seeing Derek Jeter hit that game-winning single fills me with an odd sense of warmth. There’s something inherently good about the way Jeter ended his Yankee Stadium career. I always love when an old hero gets one last win before he goes. What comes to mind is the aged cowboy who shoots down the ruthless young gunslingers and rides off into the sunset, the townsfolk behind him waving goodbye as peace returns to their fair town. Jeter is 40, which could hardly be considered old in normal society, but in the world of baseball, the average age of retirement is around 40 years old—his time had come. So when Richardson slid into home plate and Jeter came off the field, it was an explosion of joy. The Yankees cheered, the crowd cheered and people all over the country expressed their amazement over the final play. After all, everybody loves a happy ending.

Of course, ten years ago millions of Red Sox fans, myself included, were celebrating a happy ending of our own. The Red Sox had done the impossible. Down three games to zero against the Yankees in the American League Championship Series, Boston pulled itself out of Hades’ grasp, climbed out of the Underworld and won four straight games to get to the World Series. Four straight victories later and the Boston Red Sox were 2004 World Series Champions. The best part, however, wasn’t that the Red Sox won their first World Series since 1918. It was the fact that they had done it by pulling the rug out from under those smug, greedy, no good, dirty rotten New York Yankees and their smug, greedy, no good, dirty rotten captain, Derek Jeter.

11-year-old Andrew relished the look on Jeter’s face as he lost the seventh ALCS game. He swam in the sea of Yankees fans’ tears as their cherished Bronx Bombers blew the big one. Because when you grow up as a Boston Red Sox fan, there is one undeniable, fundamental, indisputable truth that gets drilled into your brain: Yankees suck. And boy, oh boy did I think the Yankees suck. The hatred that I had for Jeter and the entire Yankees organization was so strong and concentrated, you could have bottled it up and sold it to gardeners as weed killer.

Ten years and two more World Series victories later, my caustic attitude towards Derek Jeter and the New York Yankees has greatly subsided. As I got older, I started becoming less and less interested in my hometown sports teams. Once the Red Sox became champions, all of that raw emotion that had been building inside of me as a Boston sports fan—a period of time encompassing the mid 90s to the early 2000s where the Red Sox kept losing while the Yankees kept winning—fizzled out. What’s the point of hating Derek Jeter and the Yankees when my team has proven in multiple seasons that they are better than them? It seems strange to me to hate a team that performs worse than your own. In fact, wouldn’t that make us Red Sox fans what we hate the most… Yankees fans?

Getting back to Jeter specifically, I hold a newfound sense of respect for the man. His work both on and off the field is nothing short of stellar. One look at his career statistics and you can tell that he is one of the greatest baseball players of his generation. A five-time World Series champion, Jeter is the Yankees’ all-time career leader in hits (3,465), doubles (544), games played (2,747), stolen bases (358), times on base (4,716), plate appearances (12,602) and at bats (11,195). Jeter is also a fourteen-time All-Star, a five-time Gold Glove Award winner, a five-time Silver Slugger Award winner, a two-time AL Hank Aaron Award winner, the 2000 World Series MVP, the 1996 AL Rookie of the Year and the winner of the 2009 Roberto Clemente Award. There is also the Turn 2 Foundation, a charitable organization that Jeter founded in 1996 to help children and teenagers avoid drug and alcohol addiction.

On top of that, I really admire Jeter’s sense of loyalty. Since his Major League debut in 1995, Jeter has only ever played for the New York Yankees. While guys like Randy Johnson and Johnny Damon have come and gone, Derek Jeter has spent his almost twenty-year career in a Yankees uniform. There’s something to be said for a player who has always stuck with the team that brought him to the dance.

Jeter’s last season is over, and now I look back on my history with “Captain Clutch” with renewed eyes. I used to hate him. I hated his athletic ability. I hated his World Series Championships. I hated his uniform and his number. But now I look at Derek Jeter and I see a first ballot hall of famer. I see a consummate professional. I see a player who, win or lose, always had his team’s back. So as Derek Jeter puts down the baseball bat, gets on his horse, and rides off into the sunset, I place myself amongst the townsfolk. I’m not one of the ones emphatically waving goodbye. After all, I can only imagine how many of those 3,465 career hits were scored against the Red Sox. Instead, I picture myself quietly staring as he travels out of town and into the open desert. And as he looks back one last time, I give him a silent, respectful nod. Well done, Derek Jeter. Well done. •