We hear it all the time across the baseball world: whatever town the Yankees invade, they are going to get that team’s best.
For many teams across the league, taking on the Bombers offers a chance to topple the titans of the sport, an opportunity to take over the headlines from a team that has dominated them for more than a century.
For the Yankees and much of their fanbase, facing these smaller-market, upset-hungry teams can sometimes be seen as an afterthought Yanks, about as bothersome as a bug on a windshield.
But what about a bug, or better yet, thousands of bugs, swarming on the field?
As made famous, or infamous, in the 2007 ALDS, the swarm of midges from Lake Erie to Progressive Field helped tilt the scales of the series, and added another chapter to a longstanding rivalry that often is awarded that label. But as “War on the Diamond,” a new documentary available to stream on all VOD platforms on Nov. 15, chronicles, a Yankees/Cleveland rivalry dates back just over a century, with decades of bad blood spanning from 1920 to the 2022 ALDS and Josh Naylor’s rock-the-baby celebration at the expense of Gerrit Cole.
As the documentary clearly lays out, the birth of this long-standing rivalry came, tragically, in death.
The through-line of “War on the Diamond,” with the direction of Andy Billman (who directed the ESPN 30-for-30 “Believeland”), is the life and death of Ray Chapman, the then-Indians shortstop who was struck in the head by a high-and-tight pitch from Yankees submariner Carl Mays, suffering a skull fracture and ultimately dying at a nearby hospital. Mays, infamous for pitching inside and carrying a hot temper that led to him smashing a teammate’s head repeatedly into the seat of a train car over a game of cards, or throwing a baseball into the stands at fans who were heckling him, became a face of a rivalry that lasted through the decades, whether Yankee fans acknowledge it or not.
“War on the Diamond” highlights the landmarks of this classic baseball rivalry with rich storytelling that will satisfy baseball history buffs, especially Yankee fans. Sure, the story is told through the scope of the Indians/Guardians franchise and the city of Cleveland, but Cleveland did breed one of the most iconic figures in Yankees history in George Steinbrenner. The Boss’ story gets plenty of love in this documentary, chronicling his bid to buy his hometown franchise before Vernon Stouffer pulled the offer at the 11th hour because…of a stolen check that Steinbrenner swiped from Stouffer’s son to try and get his semi-pro Cleveland basketball team into the NBA?
That’s right.
Imagine, the notoriously low-spending Guardians having been owned by the notoriously free-spending Steinbrenner in the 1990s, when Cleveland was on the precipice of an elusive title. What if Steinbrenner was in the owner’s box in Cleveland instead of celebrating an ALCS victory in 1998 with the Yankees?
Wins over the Yankees may have seemed to mean a lot more for Indians fans in those days, but Steinbrenner kept that rivalry alive by making it known that he hated to lose to his hometown club, the one he said he would one day own after watching them win the 1948 World Series. The documentary is refreshingly self-aware in that aspect, realizing that Cleveland’s hatred of the Yankees runs much deeper than it does from the other side in New York, but it adds to the charm of the rivalry, and, in turn, to the documentary.
But it still needs a good story, and “War on the Diamond” has it: the midges, El Duque saving the Yankees’ historic season in 1998, Kenny Lofton’s grudge against Joe Torre, Joe DiMaggio and Bob Feller, Babe Ruth and Tris Speaker, and of course, Chapman and Mays.
As for the rivalry between fanbases, it may be a bit more one-sided, but there is still enough hatred, at least from one side, to make the rivalry, and the viewing of “War on the Diamond,” worthwhile, as one Cleveland fan illustrates while being interviewed for the film.
“The Yankees don’t see the Indians as much of a rivalry as the Indians see the Yankees,” he said. “And that makes me hate them even more.”
“War on the Diamond” can be pre-ordered here.
Follow Ryan Chichester on Twitter: @ryanchichester1
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