I am a member of the Evil Empire

Hank Steinbrenner is definitely a chip off his old man George's block. This early, some 30 days before the start of the new Major League Baseball season, the heir has hurled the gauntlet towards the Boston Red Sox by saying that the notion that the United States is a Red Sox Nation is an absurdity. "You can't create any controversy with fact. You can ask any marketing expert who is the number one brand of any team in any sport in the country and it's the Yankees. We are number one."

Will this spill over into the field and into the games? Well, that's adding fuel to the fire of one of sport's great rivalries. That's good I guess but it adds more pressure on the players to win and uphold their respective owners' honor.

But I'm a card carrying member of what the Red Sox fans derisively call "the Evil Empire." That's okay, I always thought that the Galactic Empire always had the coolest gadgets, characters, and weapons. Maybe save for Qui-Gon Jinn.