A Blue Jays Superstar Thrives on Bronx Cheers

The subsequent time the son of a street staff’s celebrity visits the Bronx, the Yankees can be smart to deal with him properly. Kids with lengthy recollections and extraordinary expertise enjoyment of revenge.

In the Nineties, it was Ken Griffey Jr. Now, it’s Vladimir Guerrero Jr. Just as Griffey tormented the Yankees repeatedly in his prime, Guerrero, 24, is doing the identical in his. The newest punches came to visit the weekend in a sequence victory for the Toronto Blue Jays.

Guerrero, their slugging first baseman, blasted a two-run homer to start out the scoring on Friday. On Sunday he did it once more, pulling a blistering liner into the seats close to the left area foul pole with two outs within the sixth inning. The Blue Jays went on to win, 5-1, and the Yankees misplaced a sequence for the primary time this season.

As he rounded first base, Guerrero pointed skyward. He stutter-stepped on his approach round third. He kissed his wrists as he pranced house. The crowd booed, and Guerrero reveled in it.

“Of course, you listen to it,” Guerrero, who’s hitting .341, stated in Spanish by way of an interpreter. “But they’re not going to take that home run away from me. I’m just going to continue to run the bases and enjoy it.”

Though Guerrero can’t be a free agent till after the 2025 season, he vowed publicly final low season to by no means play for the Yankees. The declaration echoed one by Griffey, then with the Seattle Mariners, who was filmed signing autographs at previous Yankee Stadium and vowed: “If they were the only team that gave me a contract, I’d retire.”

Griffey’s stance got here from a sobering incident as a teen, when he was sitting along with his father, Ken Sr., on the Yankees’ bench earlier than a sport. A safety guard informed the Griffeys that the Yankees’ proprietor, George Steinbrenner, had issued an edict to clear the dugout. They did, however not earlier than Ken Sr. identified that the son of a teammate, Graig Nettles, was taking grounders at third base at that very second.

The takeaway — {that a} white participant was given privileges not afforded a Black participant — emboldened the youthful Griffey, who hit 41 homers in opposition to the Yankees in his profession, together with 5 in a five-game playoff sequence victory in 1995. (Only one staff, the Minnesota Twins, allowed extra homers to Griffey.)

Guerrero’s father, Vladimir Sr., by no means performed for a New York staff in his Hall of Fame profession, though his profession common in opposition to the Yankees (.319, together with the postseason) is a bit higher than his .316 profession mark throughout the common season and playoffs. Whatever the origin of Guerrero’s subject with the Yankees, it appears to chop simply as deeply.

“It’s a personal thing,” he stated Sunday. “It goes back with my family, and I’m not going to talk about more than that. Things happened in the past and I’m just going to leave it like that.”

Like Griffey Jr., Guerrero Jr. has thrived in opposition to the Yankees. His slugging share at Yankee Stadium is .614, one of the best of any participant within the ballpark’s 15-year historical past (minimal 100 at-bats). His 12 homers within the Bronx are essentially the most he has hit in any street stadium.

“You get here and you get booed, and you can kind of do one of two things,” Blue Jays Manager John Schneider stated. “Reggie Jackson said, ‘They don’t boo nobodies,’ so I think Vladdy kind of worked off of that a little bit. We all know the kind of hitter that he is.”

Toronto starter Kevin Gausman, who blanked the Yankees for seven innings on Sunday, stated Guerrero basks within the heel’s position.

“It seems like he loves playing here,” Gausman stated. “He says he doesn’t like coming here, but he plays pretty well here. Anytime he comes up to bat, we’re all paying attention because he just hits the ball so hard. He’s a guy that kind of likes being the villain when we come here.”

The Blue Jays’ George Springer has expertise with heckling; he performed for the champion Houston Astros in 2017, the yr of their sign-stealing scandal, and was among the many gamers booed by opposing followers as soon as the scheme was revealed. Springer stated Guerrero is calm by nature, trusting in his expertise and his course of. But it’s a subtlety that impresses Springer most.

“How he processes information is next-level,” Springer stated. “He’s a student of the game in his own way. The way he goes about things, I mean, he remembers everything.”

Including, fairly clearly, one thing from the previous that drives Guerrero to conquer the Yankees each likelihood he will get.