Yankees Fan Rich Bans Newfound Dodgers Fan Mike Del Tufo from Pinstripes Honking

There are a lot of things that infuriate Rich about baseball in October. Watching the Red Sox happy is high on the list. But one thing tops even that: watching Mike Del Tufo claim the Yankees.

"You may not claim the Yankees and the Dodgers," Rich said, issuing what amounted to a formal ban on Del Tufo honking for the pinstripes.

The offense, as Rich laid it out, is about timing. Del Tufo forsook the Yankees, and he did it after the Dodgers beat New York in the World Series. Rich recalled the posts with the toothy grin, the "my East Coast team won" energy. Now, after the Yankees swept the Red Sox, Del Tufo wants back in. The crew even spotted someone in a Niners and Dodgers hat in the text chain, which only made things worse.

Del Tufo's defense was simple. "I can have two teams," he said. When he pointed out that none of them are named Kenesaw, Bud or Bart, the room noted that technically Rich is the commissioner of the Rich Eisen Show.

Rich made clear it was never about the right to root for more than one team. Plenty of people do. The problem is rooting for two teams that run directly into each other, and doing it opportunistically. Was Del Tufo rooting Dodgers and Yankees back when Andre Ethier was trying to knock in Matt Kemp?

"The answer to that is an emphatic no," Rich said. "You only took on the Dodgers when they got Ohtani to go along with every other yacht that they water ski behind." Then they won the World Series, multiple of them, and suddenly two teams was fine.

Del Tufo's escape hatch was that he would come back "when Boone goes." That did not help his case either, because Rich thinks Aaron Boone just managed the best two games of his Yankees tenure in back-to-back playoff wins, with bunts and runners moved. Del Tufo would not give Boone the credit. Rich would, noting the Yankees played most of the year without Aaron Judge, all year without Giancarlo Stanton, and a month without Cody Bellinger, and still finished with the second best record in the league.

The decisive moment came when Rich asked what Del Tufo would do in a Yankees and Dodgers World Series. "I'll cheer for both," Del Tufo said. Rich pointed out that is impossible, and rested his case.

"You may root for whoever you want," Rich said. "I have the right to not accept it."

In fairness, Rich has some dual-loyalty history of his own. His youngest son calls him a passionate Rams fan, and the boy is worried about what happens if the Jets get good again, since Rich's brother and nephew Lee live and die with them. Rich said he will always have a keen interest in the Jets, but "it's so much more enjoyable not living and dying watching them." With both teams 1-2, the crew checked the odds: the Rams still sit at plus 400 to win the NFC, the Jets are 105 to 1 in the AFC, and a Jets and Rams Super Bowl is 530 to 1. "Let's put a buck down," came the reply.

Then Rich told the story of the banana. Years ago, before the Dodgers got Ohtani and went on this run, a Dodgers fan on Halloween night gave his son grief for being a New York sports fan, calling the Yankees a bunch of chokers. The son, a Patriots fan, was dressed ironically as Aaron Rodgers with a wrap around his leg after the Achilles injury, and actually roots for most Boston teams because of Suzy. Rich, dressed as a banana, went right back at the guy. "I was doing what Yankee fans should do when accosted like that," he said.

The punchline: the Yankees still have not won anything since then, as the room was quick to remind him. Rich knows. But the ruling stands. Del Tufo rooting for both is, in the final word of the segment, "unacceptable."