An open letter to Tyler Kepner (NY Times Yankee beatwriter)

Dear Mr. Kepner,

Are you aware that the tone, word choices, selection of statistics, and the opinions expertly embedded in your reporting all create the strong impression that you have a powerful dislike for the Yankees?

Many Yankee fans read the NY Times and may be driven away (to places like, God forbid, the NY Post) by this apparent loathing of the team that is on display day after day, in report after report, and in analysis after analysis.

Wouldn't you rather report on a team that you enjoy watching? Having had the privilege of watching and reporting on virtually every single Yankee game played over the last few years, it is impossible that the Yankees' professionalism, respect for their opponents, and poise under pressure, all of which should be at least somewhat inspiring to anyone who watches the team regularly, has escaped your attention. And yet you give no indication of these strengths of the team in any of your reports.

Instead what I usually see is a seemingly obsessive fixation on the economics of the team; the salaries, the ballpark, and the like. And in every article is seems that your purpose is to dampen our spirits in the best of times, and rub salt in our wounds in the worst. It reads like the bitter grumblings of a Red Sox fan masquerading as a Yankee reporter.

I think I speak for all of your Yankee fan readers when I say that, while you write brilliantly, and while I love the NY Times and enjoy getting my news from this paper, unless the tone of the Yankee reporting becomes a little more balanced and respectful, I shall be forced to turn to other sources of Yankee news.

Regards,

-Leigh