Copyright 2004 Daily News, L.P.

Daily News (New York)
October 14, 2004 Thursday
SPORTS FINAL EDITION
SECTION: SPORTS; BLEACHER CREATURE; Pg. 79

LENGTH: 535 words

HEADLINE: TRAITOR GETTING BOXED OUT

BYLINE: BY FILIP BONDY

BODY:


If they just dress a bit better and trim their hair after the sweep, the Red Sox players are welcome to join Section 39 and cheer on the Yankees in the World Series next week against St. Louis - a team with nice uniforms. Because as it turns out, there are some surprising and disturbing vacancies in the right-field bleachers.

Even as the Yankees were humbling Boston again, 3-1, and as the Stadium fans were Daddy-ing Pedro into submission, some traitorous Creatures traded in their bleacher tickets for box seats, citing a variety of bogus and vile reasons. They were cheering, maybe even sleeping, with the enemy.

Let's not kid ourselves here. The box seaters may scream for the Yankees, but they are in many ways worse than Met fans. This is a class war, people, not just a baseball war. And yet, there was Mike Donahue, Section 39 stalwart, sitting right behind the Yankee dugout last night, with a ticket he got from an old frat brother.

"The weather is changing and my voice is cracking, so I can't be heard all the way from the bleachers," Donahue insisted, pathetically. Nobody believed this, least of all Donahue. Mostly, he just wanted to get Gary Sheffield's batting glove, if Sheffield tossed it over the dugout. Donahue was a glove sniffer of the worst kind.

I doubt very much whether the ushers down there actually allowed Donahue to stay for the entire game in his elegant throne. For one thing, he was smuggling in three beer cans, wrapped like a fake deli sandwich. He also had his trusty vodka in a fake cell phone.

You can take the Creature out of the bleachers, but you can't take the bleachers out of the Creature.

There were others like Donahue, former Creatures, stabbing us in the back all over the park. Pops left the bleachers long ago, heading for the upper deck because of the beer ban. Cartelli was last seen behind home plate somewhere, sneering at his erstwhile brothers across the park.

It's their loss, not ours. If you weren't there in the bleachers, you missed a Red Sox cap getting confiscated and cut into tiny pieces. You also missed the opportunity to be interviewed by 20 or 30 media outlets.

Bald Vinny was giving an interview yesterday to USA Today, and Vinny's lawyer had offered him up to Channels 2, 4, 5, 7 and 12. He has been hoping to publicize his T-shirt stand, and has gotten himself into real trouble for it. When he granted the Minneapolis Star-Tribune an audience last week, the writer dubbed him the "Bleacher Creature leader."

"So we all report to you now?" Jesse from Connecticut demanded.

While it is true that Vinny leads the first-inning roll call and attends virtually every game and is the first one outside the park every day, that doesn't necessarily make him the leader. Bad Mouth Larry reminded everybody that Tina remained the leader.

Last night, between his many interviews and his selling of "Pedro's Daddy" T-shirts, Vinny attempted to deflect the controversy.

"I'm just a figurehead," Vinny said. "There's no organization, no newsletters, no dues."

Donahue wanted to know why he was paying $10 a week to Larry, if there were no dues. But nobody was listening to Donahue's jokes anymore, because he was heading for the box seats. filipbondy@netscape.net

GRAPHIC: LINDA CATAFFO DAILY NEWS Banner offers new theory of evolution with Johnny Damon, whose Bosox are having hairy time against Yanks.

LOAD-DATE: October 14, 2004