The fact of the matter is, the Mets have and will always be a smaller team with a smaller following than the Yankees. The Yankees are much older, more storied, and all in all are the most successful and lucrative franchise in sports. This is going to cause a greater following. And Philly only has one team, so if you’re in that area, you latch right onto that one team.

Point is, for someone to fall in love with a team, they have to be “hooked.” I didn’t really become a diehard until the Mets signed Pedro in ’04. I liked the Mets, but I liked the Yanks a bit as well; I was just a young, baseball-in-general fan. There have been a lot more times in history that the Yankees have been able to “hook” fans-in the late ’50s, ’70s, and ’90s, winning multiple series in each of those periods. That’s three generations of Americans right there.

On the other hand, most Met fans were either hooked by a) the novelty of a new team; b) the run in ’69, or c) the teams of the mid-’80s. That’s much less opportunity to get fans.

True enough, the past 10 years have been a horrible period for Mets fans. It’s unfortunate that the stigma of “poor Mets fans” has been associated with the team-that fans are constantly sh*t on by their team.

It’s probably not always going to be this way. Sometimes it sticks, like the lovable loser Cubs, but they haven’t won in over 100 years. The Mets are at a 23 year drought.

This is probably one of the lowest points in Mets history, if not the worst-a team with World Series potential was absolutely decimated. And it so happens that Philly and Yankee fans are the fans who most love to dish the hate on other teams. It’s a bad spot to be in. There’s only one way to change it, and that’s for the team to play well. Otherwise, we can just try to have pride and support the boys in Blue and Orange.