Speaking of Dutch: Yankee in an anglicized version of the Dutch word yanqui, which, in essence, means redneck, yokel, country bumpkin, etc.

As a Met fan, I’ve always felt the best retort to any Philly-fan trash-talking is “Yeah, but you have to live in Philadelphia.” Works for everything.

“We won the World Series!”
“Yeah, but you have to live in Philadelphia.”

“You guys were a joke this year.”
“True. But you still have to live in Philadelphia.”

(I kid, I kid. The problem with trash talking is that some people take it WAAAY too seriously. I actually like Philadelphia. And I realize that my team is, right now, a colossal cosmic joke. But still. New York versus Philly? Come on!)

I for one love the utter ridiculosity of NY Post trash talk.  My favorite quote from the Post story: “Another Yankee fan, Laura Nidelle, 24, insists the Yuengling-slinging rubes from Philly are uncultured and uninteresting…”

TC, I come from the school of thought that says we should revel in our rep, within reason.  Besides, the Visigoths got to sack Rome.

As for the trashtalk… I sense more of it than normal coming from NYC and my many Yankee friends.  That might be wrong, but in previous championship chases, I always saw my fellow Philly fans leading the charge with trashtalk.  Perhaps that was a manifestation of our desperation for a title, or a subconscious manifestation of our realization that our team was inferior.  Maybe 9 years without a title for the Yankees breeds a little bit of doubt. 

As for me, and for most Phillies fans, I’m feeling a serene confidence in this Phillies team. The fans have probably loved other recent Philly sports teams with nearly the same level of passion—the ‘93 Phils, the ‘00-01 Sixers, Jameer Nelson’s St. Joe’s team, the four guard Villanova group, etc. But this time, that adoration is accompanied by a sense of true confidence that we have the best team, no matter who’s on the other side of the diamond.  I’m just a little too young to remember anything about the Broad Street Bullies of 1974 and 1975, but that might be the last time people in Philly felt this way about a team.  And that was the last Philly team to repeat. Based on most measures, the Yankees are a better team.  But the same could have been said about the Dodgers.  At this point, I’ll take the WFC’s mix of talent, desire, and confidence against anybody.

As for bringing everyone together, I think Phillies and Yankees fans could probably come together on a rousing chant of “Cowboys Suck!”

Good job with the selective cutting and pasting there, George, but try as you might “not cuturally significant” and “but not culturally significant enough to be a world city” (which is what I actually said) are not the same thing. If you’re going to argue, argue with the whole point, which is that as much as Philly has to offer, it has less to offer than New York.