Fans return to the Yankee Stadium proves
emotional for players & local business
BY ALEX MITCHELL
The Yankees may have lost their
home opener of the 2021 season
against the Toronto Blue Jays on
Thursday, but the reunion of fans
and baseball was still a joyous occasion
for not only for those 10,850
spectators but also players, local
businesses, and even one mayoral
candidate.
Prior to 10 a.m., plenty of jovial
fans were braving some no-joke rain
and cold on that April Fool’s Day as
many were hosting socially distant
tailgates in parking decks adjacent
to the Macombs Dam Bridge across
from Yankee Stadium – for many, it
was simply more than a game.
One noteworthy fan, who came
decked in Yankees gear as far as the
eye could see was mayoral candidate
Andrew Yang, who rode the D train
up to E. 161st Street to watch the
Bronx Bombers with his family.
“It goes to show that New Yorkers
can come together and have fun and
enjoy our city again without feeling
like we’re doing something unsafe,”
Yang exclusively told amNewYork
Metro.
“Opening Day represents such
a big turning point for our city, not
Fans eagerly wait to enter the stadium. Photo by Dean Moses
just for Yankee fans who want a 28th
championship but also the small
businesses in the surrounding who
really suffered last year from fans
not being able to attend the games,”
he added.
While Yang and his family
watched on the third baseline from
the stadium’s 200 level, several others
rooted from many of those small
businesses surrounding Yankee Stadium
– just like old times.
“Words can’t capture how important
it was, aside from the economics
of it, these are families who felt
emotionally abandoned over the past
months,” said Cary Goodman, director
of the 161st Street Business Improvement
District.
Goodman sharply noted that while
much of the city endured a harsh winter
it has been signifi cantly worse for
the seasonal businesses on that corridor
of 161st Street and River Avenue.
“That winter began for them after
the ALCS in 2019. That was the
last time fans were at a Yankee game
prior to this season,” he said, noting
that the locally beloved mom-and-pop
bars and shops managed to “hold on
by their fi ngertips” through the past
18-months.
“You look at it only being roughly
ten thousand fans in attendance, to
us that’s 10,000 more patrons who
haven’t been up here recently,” Goodman
added.
As a way of welcoming back the
good old crowd, the BID commissioned
famed Bronx and Yankee artist
Andre Trenier to create a mural
of manager Aaron Boone outside the
stadium.
The director has also laid some
upcoming creative plans by utilizing
the area’s Open Culture Zone to welcome
back Yankee Stadium’s fellow
tenant, NYCFC of the MLS on April
24.
As Goodman hopes for a World
Series parade to bend around the
Grand Concourse in October, he said
that hearing the “same electricity”
at Yankee Stadium before the pandemic
was something “joyful and
hopeful.”
After hearing his name screamed
in section 203’s fi rst inning role
call for the fi rst time since 2019, the
Yankees’ honorable slugger, Aaron
Judge, reiterated that same sentiment
in his postgame press conference
on Thursday as well.
“Having that buzz, having that energy
back in the stadium was something
special I know we all enjoy…
those fans, that energy, it makes the
game, they’re part of the game, just
like all of us,” Judge said.
Judge also took ownership of
“missed opportunities” he had to put
the game away in both the seventh
and ninth innings – something that
a full, 20 percent crowd let Number
99 know.
“They let us know when we don’t
do our job,” he said in regard to the
Bronx cheer.
Judge also had an up close encounter
with one fan while fi elding a ball
in foul territory late into the game.
“As I’m trying to run away I feel
somebody kind of grabbing at me and
they kind of tried to get their hand in
the glove and rip (the ball) out,” he
said with a smile on his face about the
Bartman-esque fan.
“It’s their fi rst time back at a stadium
in a long time. I’ll give ’em that
time,” Judge said.
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