The 48,000+ Yankee Stadium crowd boomed their signature unified 'YEAHHHHHHH!!!!!!!!’ My voice, it dissolved by the time he hit second base. My calves, they burned from jumping up and down with the rest of the Bleacher Creatures. My eyes, in total disbelief from seeing what I just saw. My hands, they trembled like I was struck by lightening.
I just witnessed Derek Jeter's 3,000th hit, folks. Something I wanted to witness since I could understand the significance of the 3,000 hit milestone.
Ever since I knew what the New York Yankees were I admired Derek Jeter. As a little kid in the backyard, I was Jeter and the pitcher was whoever wasn't Jeter. To me, Derek Jeter was baseball.
When the ball ricocheted off the black Louisville Slugger lumber, 15 years of fandom flashed through my brain. And as the 420-foot bomb traveled to the hands of one lucky young man, I stopped and focused on the heroic figure that hit it, and smiled. Then, after all the commotion stopped and they got back to the game I realized: this could turn his season around. Maybe the .300 average, super-clutch Jeter is back for his final contract.
My thought became reality as he notched his 3rd hit, a scorching double down the line, his 4th hit, his patented opposite field single while I was at the burrito stand, and his 5th hit, a dribbler up the middle to drive in the winning run. He looked like the Derek Jeter of old, the Jeter that gave his body up to catch a foul ball against the Sox. He looked like the Derek Jeter that came out of nowhere to flip the ball to Posada against Oakland when the Yankees were all but eliminated by Oakland. He looked like the shortstop that hit postseason home run after postseason home run, the shortstop that patented his backhand-jump-turn-strike-to-first from the left field grass. In the eighth inning, he looked like the guy you wanted to come up in game seven in the World Series, in the bottom of the ninth with two outs in a tie game. And when he interrupted his postgame interview, to acknowledge the crowd that stayed to cheer him in the 90-degree heat, he looked like a god.
Most importantly, of everything he looked like yesterday, he looked like the Derek Jeter I wanted to be when I was five.
