It’s a tough year to be a Yankee fan. With a $200 million payroll, the seats aren’t the cheapest MLB tickets, the beloved stadium is closing and the team has underperformed.

But New York Yankees tickets are still very popular with most games sold out. With the 56,000 seat Yankee Stadium closing, fans want to come one more time to the place that gave them so many memories over the years. And that may mean going to a New York ticket broker to visit Monument Park or do the roll call in the place they always have known and loved.

But it’s going to end very soon. With only seven games left, Yankee fans will say one last goodbye. It will be sad because there will be no October for the team either. If the fans want World Series tickets they will look to New York Mets tickets or Boston Red Sox tickets.

Many won’t and will forget sports until they gets New York Yankees tickets to New Yankee Stadium next year. Rather they will >find Broadway musical tickets, concert tickets for Madison Square Garden or Cheech & Chong in New York.

Whatever they look to do, these show will be more affordable New York City event tickets than the New York Yankees.

This might be Brian Cashman’s greatest move ever…and no, I’m not talking about signing Hideki Matsui or Mike Mussina, or selling beer in plastic bottles instead of easy-to-spill cups — I’ll give Cash credit here.  I’m talking about the mid-season acquisition X-Man, Xavier Nady. The man has brass cajones.  In tonight’s 9-4 victory over the O’s, Nady singled in the go-ahead run and then tacked on a solo homer in the ninth for good measure.  When the Yanks win these days, it seems like Nady’s right in the middle of it.

In under a month as a Yankee, Nady is now hitting .319 with eight home runs and 21 RBIs.  Nice. And you know what’s nicer?  He shuts his mouth and does his job in a way that doesn’t command too much attention — of course he does get to hide behind the glowing lights that are A-Rod and Jeter.  If Cashman wants to make another good move here, he locks this 29-year-old up long-term.  Then again, Cashman may try to trade X-Man off to whatever team the Yankee GM winds up with next year…

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Derek Jeter got his 2,500 career hit tonight, putting him on pace to get to 3,000 sometime in 2011…assuming he doesn’t get injured or go into a major tailspin.  And every time I see Jeter move along on the all-time Yankee hit list, I can’t help think of Joe D and his service to Uncle Sam.  Yes, the Yankee Clipper spent three of his prime years playing ball for the U.S. Army during WWII.  Give DiMaggio 200 hits in each of those three years and he passes Lou Gehrig for first place on the list with around 2,800.

But I guess you can’t play the “what if?” game like so many Yankee fans do with Joe D or Mickey Mantle and his injuries…and his booze.  Personally, I’ll argue that the latter may have helped Mickey play better.

Check out the Yankee all-time list here.

Still, Joe D does not have the highest Yankee lifetime average.  That honor goes to Babe Ruth with a .349 lifetime mark…Jeter is currently fifth at .315 and DiMaggio was fourth at .325.