Friday, November 6, 2009

Victory Parade Pictures

The parade today was a pain logistically - to be expected when you cram a couple extra million people into Manhattan on a Friday morning - but I managed to get a couple pretty good pictures (culled from a ton of other shots of other people's hands and cameras) and wanted to post them here.

Ladies and gentlemen, your 2009 World Series MVP.

And Paul Blart, Mall Cop.


Miiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiichael Kay.



Freddy Sez with his frying pan/sign combo. If I hadn't seen this, I would have assumed that they had to shake him awake on a park bench somewhere to get him to come along.



A-Rod, giving the Jay-Z/Rocafella hand gesture and wearing a very goofy-looking hat that he may or may not have bought from Justin Timberlake.



Alfredo Aceves and his wife (I'm guessing), along with Phil Hughes right behind him and Brian Bruney on the far right.

Surprised they didn't make Bruney walk.

Get it? Because he gives up too many walks!!!!1!1one!!exclamationpoint!


Sabathia and Teixeira with the appropriate signage.



Mr. Derek Jeter, but that's not the best part of the picture, in my opinion. It's that pretty much everyone is holding up a camera.



Jeter with his parents behind him, Minka Kelly on the left and a roll of toilet paper in his hands. Unlike A.J. Burnett, who gunned the one that was thrown to him back into the crowd, Jeter politely tossed it aside.



Me taking a pictre of someone taking a picture of Joba who's taking a picture of us.

/universe implodes



Andy Pettitte and his family. Tell your wife to stop texting, dude.



Mariano Rivera waving a Panamanian flag. He "closed" the parade, you could say.


The scene was... interesting. There was very nearly a big fight that broke out because a group of thuggish kids thought someone "was invading their territory". Word for word, I swear. Guys, there are about 3 people per square foot down here, no one has "territory".

We got of at the Rector St. stop on the 1 line and the cops weren't letting people walk up to Broadway. Instead we had to go all the way down to Battery Park and get to Broadway from there. Coming around the Citi Bank building there was a total human gridlock. Some geniuses were yelling for everyone to "just move" as if there were some people blocking the way who just needed to be reminded of that. Others were encouraging people to "keep pushing", which from my experience with dense pedestrian traffic isn't the safest thing to do.

There were a bunch of little fuckers (maybe 15-16 year old kids) that decided it would be a great idea to bodypaint themselves white with pinstripes and the number 27 on their back, apparently not realizing that they'd be brushing up against people all day. The people behind us had noisemakers and kept running into TGI Friday's to take shots during the parade. If the Yankees have the best fans in the world, they weren't at the parade today.

But that's fine. We saw it. It was awesome. There a couple of moments where I got the chills watching players go by and the ticker tape fall down. And that's about all you can ask for, right?

Endless Parade

Good morning Fackers. Have you lost that shit-eating grin yet? Yeah, me neither.

Things are going to be a bit light around here today as both Jay and I (and a cast of thousands) are heading down to the Canyon of Heroes for the parade. For those of you not fortunate enough to go, you can follow along at MLB.com

Yesterday, LoHud linked to this wikipedia page listing all the Canyon of Heroes ticker tape parades in NYC history. A few quick thoughts on all that:

  • NYC went through about a fifty year stretch where they really liked having parades

  • Despite that, it wasn't until 1954 that the city honored a baseball team with a parade, and it wasn't the Yankees. It was the Giants, who were honored for winning the NL Pennant before they went on to win the World Series.

  • The Yankees first parade came for winning the AL Pennant in 1960, despite the fact that they lost the World Series in heartbreaking fashion. And the parade didn't occur that fall, but rather just prior to the start of the 1961 season.

  • The first Yankee parade for a World Series championship wasn't until the spring of 1962, celebrating the 1961 championship. It was the Yankees' 19th World Series championship, but the first to result in a ticker tape parade.

Even so, the Yankees, the nine Yankee parades through the Canyon of Heroes are the most of any group or individual so honored by the city. It's been like an endless parade for them...