We have arrived at a sunny Memorial Day with both the Yankees and the Mets residing in first place in their respective divisions, something that hasn’t happened since 1988.
Those impressive starts, of course, don’t guarantee either team a thing over the next four months of the regular season or into October.
The Mets were bounced in the NLCS in ’88 by Mike Scioscia, Orel Hershiser and the Dodgers, who went on to capture the title over Oakland in a World Series mostly memorable for gimpy Kirk Gibson’s “I don’t believe what I just saw” Game 1 walk-off homer against A’s closer Dennis Eckersley.
That also happened to be my first season working as a hot-dog vendor and concession-stand worker at Fenway Park while a student at Boston University, purposely yelling “hot dawgs” in an exaggerated New York accent just to annoy the Beantown faithful.
