As the Jeter Era Ends, His Fans Must Be There - New York Times

Being a baseball fan is like going on a diet or practicing politics: There are several different levels of extremity.

The fans who showed up on Thursday for Derek Jeter's final game at Yankee Stadium, for example, were clearly dedicated. Not only did they suffer through the rain, but they also more than likely paid a sizable premium to get a seat.

But their level of fandom paled in comparison with the enthusiasm of authentic Jeter freaks, like Stephanie Wall. Not satisfied with merely witnessing Jeter's final home game, Ms. Wall was among those zealots who planned to travel to Boston for the weekend to be there for his last at-bat.

'Of course, I'm going,' she said in an interview on Wednesday. 'Ever since he announced he was retiring, I knew I had to be there.'

Ms. Wall, an adult of 32, could not express the extent of her idol's awesomeness. Choking up, she eventually said: 'It's just, well, he's my life - I know that that sounds crazy. There's my family, and then there's Derek Jeter.'

It is certainly no secret that Jeter mania has been kindling in New York in the last few weeks, as he has been endlessly acclaimed as an incomparable shortstop in an elaborate farewell tour.

Gov. Andrew M. Cuomo recently announced that the tallest building in Albany would be lit up during Jeter's last home game with a projection of his famous No. 2. Mayor Bill de Blasio, by official proclamation this month, declared Sept. 7 'Derek Jeter Day,' a happening that was celebrated here on Earth by a host of Yankee heroes - and in space, where three astronauts aboard the International Space Station tipped their hats to him.

Tickets to the game at Yankee Stadium on Thursday night, fattened by the secondary market, where the average price was $830 a ticket, were said to be the most expensive ever sold for a regular-season game in baseball history. And it was not just in New York that the 'Jeter effect' had taken hold. From Baltimore to Kansas City, ticket prices soared.

Ms. Wall, who works in marketing for the Modell's sporting goods chain, had been searching for a ticket for the Sunday game in Boston ever since February, when Jeter broke her heart by announcing his retirement.

'I guess I just got lucky,' she explained, adding that in early June she had found two single seats on StubHub.com - for $170 each - and snapped them up. She plans to take her friend Rich Kaufman ('my sort-of, not-quite boyfriend'), who edits a Yankee blog, Bronxpinstripes.com.

'I didn't care what it cost,' she said. 'It's Jeter's last game.'

Widing Cruz, 38, will also be driving up to Boston for the weekend - after attending the valedictory home game in New York. This is an ambitious plan, considering that Mr. Cruz does not exactly have in hand a ticket to either game.

'But I will get inside,' he said. 'I can't tell you much, but I can say this. I've got friends in the N.Y.P.D.'

As for the game in Boston, Mr. Cruz, a web designer, figures he can use the money saved on his freebie in New York for a ticket at Fenway. Not that he has problems dropping cash when it comes to Derek Jeter.

'In the last three days,' he said, 'I bought a Derek Jeter hat and three - no four - of his jerseys.' Those were for his father, his daughter, his girlfriend and himself.

Abetting some of these last-gasp Jeter compulsions is a happy band of Boston fans who seem perfectly content to set aside the Yankee-Red Sox rivalry to profit from the desperate fans in New York. Stephen T. Bradley, the chief executive of AuthorBee, a storytelling website based on Twitter, did a brisk bit of business on Thursday morning when he sold his two season tickets on StubHub for $500 each.

'I don't love selling my seats to Yankees fans,' Mr. Bradley wrote in an email, 'but the finances on this one merit it.' The transaction, he explained, was 'strictly a 'profit' opportunity - or more accurately, a 'cost-recovery' opportunity.'

Mr. Bradley nonetheless acknowledged that a meaningful moment, both for Yankee fans and others, would transpire at Fenway on Sunday afternoon.

'I don't think there's anyone on the planet who is not a Jeter fan - Sox fans included,' he wrote. 'I expect he's going to get a very warm send-off up there.'

Whatever the case, the tickets he sold allowed the man who bought them, another Jeter addict, Michael S. Ruconich, to go to the Sunday game.

Mr. Ruconich, who is 27 and a civil engineer, plans to leave his home in Mineola, on Long Island, on Saturday morning and get to Fenway the next day with his fiancée, Leah Offenbach.

'Ever since I was born,' he said, 'my father instilled in me that I'm supposed to root for the Yankees, just like his father instilled the same in him. Derek Jeter was a huge part of that. So, yeah, I had to be there.'

Entities 0 Name: Jeter Count: 8 1 Name: Derek Jeter Count: 5 2 Name: Boston Count: 5 3 Name: New York Count: 5 4 Name: Yankee Count: 5 5 Name: Wall Count: 3 6 Name: Cruz Count: 2 7 Name: Bradley Count: 2 8 Name: Andrew M. Cuomo Count: 1 9 Name: Albany Count: 1 10 Name: Bill de Blasio Count: 1 11 Name: Mineola Count: 1 12 Name: Stephen T. Bradley Count: 1 13 Name: Stephanie Wall Count: 1 14 Name: AuthorBee Count: 1 15 Name: Widing Cruz Count: 1 16 Name: Yankee-Red Sox Count: 1 17 Name: Baltimore Count: 1 18 Name: Modell Count: 1 19 Name: StubHub.com Count: 1 20 Name: Rich Kaufman Count: 1 21 Name: Kansas City Count: 1 22 Name: Earth Count: 1 23 Name: StubHub Count: 1 24 Name: Leah Offenbach Count: 1 25 Name: Ruconich Count: 1 26 Name: Long Island Count: 1 27 Name: Michael S. Ruconich Count: 1 28 Name: Sox Count: 1 Related 0 Url: http://ift.tt/1stmsTg Title: Jeter readies for final game in Yankee pinstripes Description: When Derek Jeter puts on New York's navy pinstripes Thursday for one final home game, it won't matter to a packed Yankee Stadium that there's no postseason play on the line. Teammates. Friends. Family. Fans. They will all be there for only one reason: to thank the captain.