Why It's Possible to Do the Unthinkable

Just minutes from now, the 2009 version of the World Series will be underway in the Bronx. The series features two of the larger-market teams in baseball, the New York Yankees and Philadelphia Phillies. A great deal of non-Phillies/non-Yankees fans I know with any slight interest in the Series have been going through the following thought process in deciding who they want to root for:

"I don't really want the Phillies to go back-to-back, and I don't like their fanbase, but I REALLY hate the Yankees. So, I guess I'll cheer for the Phillies."

Like these people, I am interested in checking out this World Series, but neither team is the one I root for full-time. However, I'm finding myself much less inclined than others to hate the Yankees going into this World Series, the 40th in which the Yanks are appearing. On that note, as a non-Yankee fan, I'm going to shock the world by attempting to justify cheering for the Bronx Bombers. I've broken my arguments down into what I call the 3 P's...

1. Payroll
As a fan of a small-market team, why on earth would I want the team with a payroll many times larger than mine to win it all? For fans of these teams, it looks like with a payroll currently exceeding $200 million, the Yankees are trying to "buy championships." Well, if the team that's throwing the most money into team salary continually wins the World Series, then perhaps in the near future, there will be a higher possibility of more attempts to level the playing field among the 30 MLB teams. If a team that is being resourceful with a low payroll can't win the World Series, then the one who splurges on re-signing players, making trades and signing for marquee players deserves the championship. It's painful to cheer for a team that is harming the equality of the teams in the league, but with them winning more and more, more calls for change could be on the horizon.

2. "Parity"
If my team can't win in back-to-back seasons, then I don't want anyone's team to repeat. Believe it or not, the Yankees haven't won a World Series since the unfortunately over-hyped 2000 Subway Series with the Mets. Thus, if you're a strict fan of parity in professional sports, you probably want the Yankees to take this one, despite this being possibly their 27th World Championship. Also, if the Yankees win, perhaps they can officially regain their famous swagger throughout the organization and fanbase that they've held for decades. With that swagger that everyone loves/hates, maybe baseball can grow again. Or at least other baseball fans can be even more justified in hating the Yankees.

3. Power Players
Mark Teixeira, Alex Rodriguez, and Hideki Matsui are just a few of the names on the Yankee roster without rings to their name. I don't expect you to love all of them (I wonder which one of those three is liked the least...), but I at least find their style of play to be very exciting on most nights. Seven of their starters hit at least 20 home runs this year (Derek Jeter also had 18). The Phillies certainly have a great deal of bats that can match up with the Yankees, but if you love the offensive slugfests in baseball, no one scored more runs in Major League Baseball this season than the Bronx Bombers.
If you want to define "power players" even more broadly, you could throw in the many power arms included in the Yankee pitching staff. CC Sabathia, A.J. Burnett, Mariano Rivera, and even young guys like Joba Chamberlain and Phil Hughes bring some serious heat from the mound.
Also, who can write about the Yankees and not include the Steinbrenners? As owners, their aggressive approach to winning and getting the pieces necessary to win games put this year's team in a great position to take home the trophy. I think a lot of non-Yankee fans, especially fans of small-market teams, would trade their owners for ones as dedicated personally and financially as the Steinbrenners have been over the years.

To tell you the truth, that was somewhat painful to write. However, it does make me feel a little better about being a neutral fan this time around. Hopefully, if you're in the same boat as I am, this at least eased your hatred of the Yanks a little bit. Enjoy the Series...

Assistance

Surprise! My first actual post here isn't going to be about something sports-related. I've just returned from the law building to finish typing this out.

A couple of years ago, while still attending the University of Delaware as an undergrad, a friend of a friend and his parents were touring the campus when they randomly ran into my friend and me. As a result, I ended up basically advertising the school to him and his parents through my take on what the environment was like at UD. The next fall, I found out that he indeed chose to go to Delaware, and I felt very pleased that I very likely had a substantial role in his decision.

With that being said, I invite anyone (and anyone who knows someone) who has questions about the University of Delaware, going to law school, and Pitt Law School to send your questions my way. I am more than willing to help you out with any concerns or points of interest you might have concerning each. I will give you one fair warning though: especially relating to Pitt Law, I might not have quite the requisite amount of experience to give you a solid opinion about it, but I'll do my best to explain what I know.

Essentially, I'm talking up my abilities to give a realistic perspective for others to use however they want. What I can tell you very quickly right now is that I certainly do not regret attending the University of Delaware. For the LSAT, you're probably not the kind of person who can just walk into the testing room and post a big-time score, so you'll have to take it from me and make sure you budget a decent amount of time to preparing for the different sections. I have no idea whether the approach I took in applying to various law schools would work for you as well, so if you're applying now, I can tell you what I did and what I'd probably do differently were I to do it again. As for law school, I'd be lying if I told you it's been easy so far, but the experience has been very rewarding intellectually and I've made friends very easily with many of my classmates. I'm thankful that my law school hasn't (at least not yet) served to be a cutthroat environment with professors willing to make class time extremely rough on students. Again, as for anything else you would like to know, feel free to let me know.

I think that about covers the basics regarding my invitation to give advice to those who seek it. Whether you use it or not, I wish the best to everyone who at least took the time to read this. Expect my first sports post to come just after the World Series ends; I have an interesting project of sorts planned...