Twenty-five years after 9/11, Subway Series seems secondary

It’s easy to get caught up in the symbolism of the 2026 Subway Series, what with the Mets visiting the Yankees for a three-game series beginning on Friday, September 11.

Twenty-five years after the Towers fell and baseball stopped for literally a week. The New York Mets, sitting in third place and all but out of the playoffs, took the field donning NYPD and FDNY hats instead of their own. A month later, President George W. Bush threw out the first pitch at Yankee Stadium before Game 3 of the World Series.

Twenty-five years later, Yankee Stadium takes the stage again. The Subway Series, meanwhile, seems almost anticlimactic. The Mets, despite taking two of three during the Queens leg in May, sit in last place. Tyrone Taylor, whose game-tying home run in the ninth inning of the series finale practically won the series for the Mets, is now in Chicago.

The Yankees, on the other hand, are fighting for playoff positioning and sit three games behind the first-place Tampa Bay Rays. The AL East is within reach, and the NL East cellar-dwellers have a shot at playing spoiler. That’ll show those snooty Yankees, right? Step into Yankee Stadium and knock the Bronx Bombers out of their own division race…and on 9/11 Weekend to boot!

And therein lies, for lack of better word, the problem. Twenty-five years later, and tribalism is alive and well. From sports to politics to ongoing Game of Thrones debates.

The Yankees and Mets are facing off for a weekend of baseball in games that are, at their core, kind of meaningless. And yet, emotions will run high this weekend and the shit-talking will reach epic levels. Yankees fans will gloat about Soto bogging down Steve Cohen’s payroll. Mets fans will go full little brother mode and just throw out varying versions of “Yankees suck” that Red Sox fans invented decades ago.

Meanwhile, down at Ground Zero, the performative outrage over Mayor Zohran Mamdani attending a remembrance ceremony will be yesterday’s news before the calendar even turns to September 12.

It almost makes baseball feel like an afterparty. That isn’t to say the Subway Series should be center stage, that belongs and always will belong to the families of those we lost. But anyone who’s been paying attention to both teams knows this series deserves more excitement than it’s getting.

Look at it this way. Juan Soto jumping ship from the Bronx to Flushing on a record-setting $765 million (plus bonuses) contract was supposed to re-ignite the rivalry. The Mets were now serious contenders with World Series expectations. Add former Yankees All-Star closer Clay Holmes as a new Mets starter, and the flames were fanned more.

And then, the fire was out just as quickly as it started. The Mets didn’t make the playoffs in Soto’s first year in Flushing. In fact, in typical Mets fashion, they were eliminated from the Wild Card on the last day of the season. Losing a must-win series to the Miami Marlins.

And 2026? Fugheddaboutit. The Mets tripped at the starting line and it’s been a punchline since. Holmes went from breaking his leg in the Queens leg of the Subway Series to being traded to the Cubs at the deadline.

This was supposed to be an excitement weekend of even more exciting baseball after a long, hard, emotional day. Twenty-five years since the worst day in the city’s history.

It almost feels like going to watch an ’80s tribute band at the country club. Everyone can picture this setting. Especially the half-canned music and being served catered food from boxes marked “For school and prison use only.”

Who knows? Maybe MLB will schedule another Subway Series for the 30th anniversary in five years and things will be different. It might even be a World Series preview in 2031 depending on if Cohen and Stearns can right the ship.

But in 2026? No excitement whatsoever. Showing up for this seems almost obligatory instead of something we’re actually looking forward to.

And yet, because we’re New Yorkers? We’ll show up anyway. It’s the Subway Series. Yankees-Mets. Just because it’s a one-sided rivalry doesn’t mean the series gets no attention.

Instead, watch the games. Enjoy the games. Talk trash as you see fit. And maybe, just maybe, the Mets will do what they always do and play the Yankees a little harder.

And maybe, just maybe, the Yankees will rise to the challenge this time.