Alabama quarterback Ty Simpson walked into ESPN’s production meeting wearing a Yankees T-shirt, which immediately raised questions from Sean McDonough and Greg McElroy.
The issue wasn’t the shirt itself. It was that Simpson had only been a Yankees fan for a couple of months.
Simpson was wearing the shirt because the Yankees had just eliminated the Boston Red Sox from the playoffs. New York beat Boston 4-0 in Game 3 of the AL Wild Card Series on Thursday night behind rookie pitcher Cam Schlittler, who struck out 12 batters in eight scoreless innings. The Yankees advanced to face the Toronto Blue Jays in the ALDS, where they dropped Game 1 on Saturday night, 10-1.
McDonough and McElroy, who ranked second in Awful Announcing’s 2024 college football announcer rankings, shared the story during their broadcast of Alabama’s game against Vanderbilt on ABC.
“And, by the way, a newcomer as a New York Yankees fan,” McDonough said. “He walked into our meeting yesterday in a Yankee T-shirt. ‘So, how long have you been a Yankees fan?’ ‘Oh, just a couple of months.’ He went to New York with his dad, a quick trip in July before they had to go to camp. [They] went to Yankee Stadium and had a chance to meet Aaron Boone and Aaron Judge. He said he was always a Derek Jeter fan after having seen a documentary about him.”
Simpson took heat for the wardrobe choice beyond just the ESPN booth.
“He was getting teased for being — a couple of his friends called him a ‘fake’ Yankees fan,” McDonough added.
McElroy, who played quarterback at Alabama before joining ESPN, wasn’t going to let Simpson off easy.
“He took a lot of heat for wearing that Yankees shirt,” McElroy said. “I’m just wondering, I wanted to ask him one of our questions: had the Red Sox won Game 3, would he have been rocking a Red Sox shirt?”
“Apparently, maybe he’s a bit of a fair-weather fan,” McElroy quipped.
“I do not [inaudible] he’s becoming a Red Sox fan in late July,” McDonough responded.
McDonough has deep ties to Boston baseball. He called Red Sox games on television from 1988 to 2004 and returned to the radio booth in 2019, where he continues to work part-time alongside his ESPN duties.
Simpson is from Martin, Tennessee, a town without an MLB team nearby. The closest options would be the Atlanta Braves or Cincinnati Reds, but neither is particularly close. So when Simpson got the chance to meet Aaron Judge and tour Yankee Stadium during a summer trip to New York, he apparently decided that was reason enough to become a Yankees fan.
At least Simpson picked a team that just won a playoff series. Whether he sticks with them after Saturday’s 10-1 loss remains to be seen.
About Sam Neumann
Since the beginning of 2023, Sam has been a staff writer for Awful Announcing and The Comeback. A 2021 graduate of Temple University, Sam is a Charlotte native, who currently calls Greenville, South Carolina his home. He also has a love/hate relationship with the New York Mets and Jets.