It has become remarkably easy to get a negative story about the Yankees into the New York papers. If you showed up to the Stadium naked, demanding to bring a rabid bobcat in with you and were refused entry, there would probably be a sympathetic writer at some outlet willing to take up your cause.
John Vendikos' case isn't quite that extreme, but you have to wonder if it would have made its way into the paper if it wasn't for the generally negative press response to the new home of the Yankees. Vendikos worked as a bartender at the Stadium Club at the other Yankee Stadium for 27 years, but was forced to re-interview for a job at the new stadium. Vendikos, 73, recounts what happened at that interview.
"I had to wait in line for three hours, and when I got in, the guy said to me, 'Why should I hire you? You're an old man,' " Vendikos told the New York Post. "At first, I was sure he was being a wisenheimer. But then I realized he was dead serious."
We should all be able to agree that we need more bartenders who call people wisenheimers, so we are all losers in the wake of the team's decision not to bring Vendikos on board at the new joint.
Vendikos has filed a complaint with the Equal Employment Opportunity Comission against the Yankees. The Yankees deny any wrongdoing and point out that they've hired many people over 65 to work at the new Stadium, and, for once, it doesn't appear that they've done anything terribly wrong.
If every employee had to re-interview, Vendikos wasn't treated unfairly simply because of his age. Obviously, an interviewer calling him "an old man" isn't good form and should earn the Yankees a slap on the wrist, but jobs aren't lifetime appointments and employers have the right to make changes.
The Yankees have done enough to earn derision from New York City this season, that doesn't mean they're guilty of anything and everything that goes wrong in someone's life.
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Josh Alper is a writer living in New York City and is a contributor to FanHouse.com and ProFootballTalk.com in addition to his duties for NBCNewYork.com.
