SECTION: Sports; Pg. 50

LENGTH: 538 words

HEADLINE: STADIUM TOO TOUGH FOR TRIBE

BYLINE: BY FILIP BONDY

BODY:


I AM A Bleacher Creature at the top of my game, and I can't wait for tonight. Because, David Justice, it works this way in and around a real city: You yell about my mutha, I yell about yours. You beat me in Games 2 and 3, I beat you in Games 1, 4, 5 and 6. I keep screaming, move on to the World Series. You go on vacation, visit your precious Rock and Roll Hall of Fame.

I still can't believe Mick Jagger ever stepped foot inside that place.

I go to Arthur Ave., maybe to Mario's, to celebrate with some thin-sliced eggplant parmesan and a vintage wine. You go back to your lake-effect snow, pack your locker and eat some thin-cheesed sausage pizza.

If the place is open past 6.

Yesterday, Justice started whining about us, about the New York fans. He might as well have attacked the Statue of Liberty. He complained we've said nasty things about him in the past. Personal things.

"I mean, come on, we are talking about the Yankee fans," Justice said at a press conference at the Stadium, baseball temple of the gods. "I've heard everything about my mother, about my history, too. . . . We all know everybody in this room knows how rough they can be. They can't get any rougher, unless they show up with Uzis."

We don't have Uzis in Sect. 39, in the right-field stands. We don't need Uzis. Our tongues are our weapons, more pointed than our program pencils, more demoralizing than spilt beer. In the stands at Yankee Stadium, we are carefully monitored by Rudy Giuliani's ample police force, and yet we manage to barb to death our enemies.

As bleacher fans, we've chanted, "Halle Berry," a few times, at Justice. We've sung the usual ditties about opposing outfielders who just seem to annoy us by their very existence.

So what? Why do you think they call it a Bronx cheer?

We're allowed to heckle, to scream our lungs right out of our rib cages. Last time I looked it up, screaming at famous people on playing fields was protected by the First Amendment, by freedom of speech in these precious United States of America, of which Ohio is a peripheral member.

Cleveland takes the field; Cleveland hears it from me and my pals.

Cleveland fans yelled at David Wells on Sunday, acted tough about his mom, Attitude Annie, a kindred spirit of the bleachers. If Eugenia were around today, Hell's Angel that she was, she wouldn't have just sat there and listened to that nonsense. She might have had a few good words for the people at Jacobs Field.

She died almost two years ago, though, and Boomer doesn't like to hear stuff about his mom. Who would?

"I don't think anybody in the game of baseball should appreciate somebody talking about family members," Wells said.

Wells didn't just talk, though, like Justice does. Boomer came back and struck out 11 Cleveland batters, won the pivotal Game 5 of the American League championship series. He basically buried the Indians.

Now they are a dead team walking, drooping into Yankee Stadium tonight, hoping for a miracle against David Cone.

Against the Creatures, too.

"I'm sure when I get on the field I'm going to hear people talk about me," Justice said.

Finally, the guy has something right.

Notes: Bleacher Creature



GRAPHIC: KEITH TORRIE DAILY NEWS WIPE THAT SMILE: David Justice may not look so happy tonight when he deals with fans at Stadium.

LOAD-DATE: October 13, 1998