Opening Day is finally here! It has been 174 days since the Yankees last played a game that counted. On top of that, it has been 531 days since the Yankees last played a game that counted at home in front of fans. That was all the way back to Game 5 of the 2019 ALCS.Â
Today will be the first time Gerrit Cole pitches in front of the home faithful. While it may only be around ten thousand fans, it’s better than nothing.
Doug Behar, the Yankees’ Senior VP of Stadium Ops, confirms that the Yankees will allow 10,850 fans into the park on Opening Day.
— Jack Curry (@JackCurryYES) March 30, 2021
And I know Cole is certainly excited:
"To use a baseball term, it feels like I kind of got dry humped" 😂
Gerrit Cole discusses his next start being at Yankee Stadium in front of fans pic.twitter.com/GbWndu399r
— Yankees Videos (@snyyankees) March 27, 2021
Not much was happening last year in the sport between March and July. This year, we will get a full seven months of Yankees baseball! Got nothing to do on a random Tuesday night in May? Oh look, the Yankees host the Astros for this first time since Houston’s cheating scandal was exposed.
While the temperature has been in the 50s and 60s the past couple of weeks, today’s forecast is a little more cold and damp. But with the rain supposed to be clearing up by late morning, not even the weather could put a damper on today. We will get a full 162-game season. We will get fans. We will undoubtedly get to see a game in July where half of our starting lineup is injured Tyler Wade is leading off. That’s the beauty of the sport.
Personally, Opening Day is one of the best days of the year. Also up there is the first day of the playoffs, and I hope that when that time comes we will be able to have even more people in the stadium. But that’s down the road in October — for now, the import thing is that these are the last few hours without baseball for seven months. Let’s get it started.
