Kraken trainer Justin Rogers’ journey to coming out as gay, and how the team supported him
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Ryan S. Clark, NHL reporter
SEATTLE — “Dear younger JR. Becoming the best you will take time and understanding. That knot in your stomach — the one that makes you feel confused, isolated, lost in the world — invisible to everyone but you? It will slowly loosen. You don’t even understand the knot, but with time you will learn things about yourself and fulfill dreams so many others like you feel they cannot.”
These are the words of an older and more insightful Justin Rogers. This is what Rogers would tell his younger self about how it is OK to fully embrace and understand those feelings at a time when it feels like there is no road map.
Rogers’ journey has taken him from his hometown in southern Michigan all the way to the NHL, where he is now an assistant athletic trainer for the Seattle Kraken.
One pivotal moment on that journey came on Christmas Eve and Christmas Day back in 2014. Rogers tried so many times to find the perfect words to convey to his family what he was managing inside. It was on Christmas Eve when he determined he had endured long enough. The book he was reading at the time gave him the inspiration to drive to the grocery store, buy some index cards, write down his feelings and give them to his family members.
He shared the letters with his family on Christmas Day.
What did Rogers tell his parents, three brothers and two sisters-in-law? It’s the same thing he wants the NHL and the rest of the world to know: He is gay.
And when it comes to hockey, he is believed to be the first openly gay support staff member on an NHL bench.
Rogers waited nine months after he told his family before telling his two best friends, who accepted him. Nearly eight years passed until Rogers had what he has described as an intentional conversation with someone about being gay. Kraken general manager Ron Francis was that 10th person. Sharing his truth with Francis opened a door for Rogers to feel comfort about being gay in hockey and wanting to share his story in the hopes it can help others.
“I think it was more at that point, he felt that it was kind of time to tell his story,” Francis said. “I said, ‘Let’s figure out how to help you do that.'”
An athletic trainer’s work is visible to the outside world only when someone gets injured during the course of a game. But the Kraken’s players and everyone else in the organization have either directly experienced or witnessed what makes Rogers so valuable. He’s in tune to the nuances of what works for every player when it comes to pregame and postgame workout routines. His caring nature is what allows players to be open with him about their health, which can be a sensitive subject in a sport in which toughness is a form of currency.
“For some guys, it’s more than just the treatment,” Kraken goaltender Philipp Grubauer said of Rogers. “You can talk to him. He’s open to listening. He’s obviously a professional and we’re down there to work and to get better on the ice. He helps us to get more out of us on the ice, but also, if you have something on your heart, you can talk to him and he listens and gives advice too.”
Rogers’ decision to publicly come out coincides with a time when the league’s relationship with the LGBTQIA+ community appears to be on shaky ground. Although every NHL team held Pride or Hockey Is for Everyone nights last season, there were seven players who decided to not take part in warmups when their teams donned Pride sweaters. There were also teams that decided to not have any players wear the sweaters in warmups after it was initially planned that they would.
In late June, NHL commissioner Gary Bettman said that teams will no longer wear specialty sweaters during warmups because it had become “a distraction.” Bettman said teams can still have events such as Black History Night or Pride Night. They can also still create specialty sweaters and sell them at auction to raise money for community organizations.
October played witness to how the NHL struggled to gain a firmer grasp on its policies and messaging. It began when the league issued a clarifying memo about previous guidelines for what franchises and players could do this season in relation to special initiatives such as Pride Night. Another detail included in the memo was the NHL’s decision to ban Pride Tape on sticks. Arizona Coyotes defenseman Travis Dermott became the first player to defy the Pride Tape ban, and days later, the NHL reversed course by saying players could use Pride Tape in addition to stick tape that supports other social causes.
Rogers’ decision to openly speak about his sexuality, his journey and his need to help others inspired the Kraken to come together and deliver a message to Rogers that they hope to also share with others who identify as LGBTQIA+.
It’s to tell them they are accepted, loved, respected, supported and should not have to hide who they are anymore.
“I think the most respect you can give a person is that you treat them the exact same way as everyone else. That’s how we all feel here,” Kraken alternate captain and winger Jordan Eberle said. “I think we’ve done that with Justin. I wouldn’t say we openly talked about his sexuality in the [dressing] room because he wasn’t openly open about it, but we all knew. But now that has changed a bit and maybe that makes him feel more comfortable, and maybe events with the team and he can bring whoever he wants and can talk about it more.”
“While in high school you will develop a love and passion for athletic training and sports medicine. That, plus being a great-grandchild of one of the first Doctors of Osteopathy, drives you to follow your dreams despite feeling deeply isolated at times. Walking into every team locker room being gay will challenge your fears of acceptance, like it does for so many others in the queer community. You know you are different. But you will discover there is a community within the sports world made up of LGBTQ+ individuals just like yourself.”
Everyone back home in Parma, Michigan, a farming community of less than 800 residents, knew Rogers as a high achiever who lettered in three sports and was active in nearly every extracurricular activity. It was more of the same when he enrolled at Michigan State.
Nobody knew about what Rogers was struggling with internally. He felt isolated.
“I got to college, realized a few more things and it really wasn’t until grad school that I was able to accept myself and say, ‘OK. I am a gay man. I have no idea what that means yet,'” Rogers said. “It still took years after that to get to the point that, ‘I’m gay and I’m ready to be out with myself comfortably and telling my family and friends in my life.'”
It was not until Rogers started working as an assistant athletic trainer for the Penn State men’s hockey and men’s golf programs in 2012 that he even started to consider coming out to people. He said he deliberated for about a year before coming to the conclusion that he not only wanted to come out, but he was actually going to come out.
“That’s when I started realizing, ‘I am like those people. I can associate with those people and I can also be in this sports world at the same time,'” Rogers said. “It was almost like both worlds were meshing at a fast rate together.”
“There will be many signs of acceptance you will pick up on, both during and after your own personal acceptance. Before ever coming out to your first athlete at Penn State there will be moments of general care and curiosity from athletes that will live with you forever. One scene will repeat itself more times than you can count. There will be numerous times that sports television networks discuss LGBTQ+ stories while you are working in an athletic training room full of athletes. It will never cease to amaze you that once one of these stories comes on, the room pauses, going silent with every athlete glued to the TV, watching, learning, soaking in every word. Then, as soon as the TV segment is done, the athletes will go right back to normal rehab routines.”
Rogers was a few years into his tenure at Penn State when a freshman who had just scored a goal skated back to the bench after his shift and asked Rogers if he was gay.
“It threw me off. What are you talking about? Why are you asking me this question in the middle of a game after just scoring a goal?” Rogers recalled.
After the game, Rogers spoke with the player, who told him that he was accepting of Rogers being gay.
Rogers, who by that point had come out to his best friends more than a year earlier, shared why the moment resonated with him to this day. He said that player could have gone and told the entire team. But to Rogers’ knowledge, he kept what they discussed private.
Rogers’ path to joining the Kraken began when he saw they had a job posting on a professional website for athletic trainers in hockey. He applied and was able to interview with the club, which led to him being hired and starting in July 2021 — months before the franchise played its first game.
“Obviously, when the Kraken became an organization, they came out with their pillars right away,” Rogers said. “Myself and a lot of my friends became fans of the organization for those reasons. I feel like I followed them on social media almost immediately because No. 1: They were doing such good work. No. 2: Maybe I’ll end up there one day. … That could be a place that I would really gun to work for and work to get there to be a part of that staff and that organization.”
“There will be athletes drafted in Seattle’s expansion draft who will do all sorts of research about their new city. One will tell you and everyone around they learned Seattle has one of the biggest LGBTQ+ communities. Another Kraken player will tell you about music he heard from a queer artist at a drag brunch with his girlfriend while on All-Star break. Now you will have a locker room with players and staff who know your sexuality and support you.”
Rogers knows that being a member of any marginalized community means having to assess your surroundings to make sure you feel safe and, above all, that you can feel like yourself.
Working for the Kraken gave Rogers that sense of comfort. Anyone who has spent an hour in the Kraken’s offices or around the team on a game day will see how the club has cultivated what might be the most diverse and inclusive environment throughout the NHL.
Inclusion, intersectionality and representation are among the Kraken’s core tenets. They partnered with Seattle University to create an MBA program designed to diversify sports leadership. Their analytics staff includes people of color and women. They became the first team in NHL history to have an all-Black broadcast duo when radio play-by-play announcer Everett Fitzhugh, who was filling in for John Forslund, called the game alongside color analyst J.T. Brown in 2022. Back in February, the Kraken announced that the Muckleshoot Indian Tribe will be their sweater patch partner, making it the first time in league history that an Indigenous tribe has its logo and name on a sweater.
This was the landscape for Rogers, who decided he wanted to tell Francis, whether the Hockey Hall of Famer already knew it or not.
“I don’t think it matters how many times you come out to somebody, there’s always a level of nerves,” Rogers said. “You don’t know how someone is going to react. Ron is the most stand-up, phenomenal person in the world. Ron loves everyone within his community. I had zero doubt he was going to have my back and that it would matter with him.”
Francis said the day Rogers walked into his office and told him he was gay, he immediately thanked Rogers for having the confidence and trust in Francis so he could feel comfortable enough to share that with him.
What made it so important for Francis and the Kraken to help Rogers tell his story?
“Everybody that works for us is unique, and in trying to make him feel comfortable and part of the group like he belongs, you want to help him be able to share his uniqueness with other people,” Francis said. “I just didn’t think it was a big deal for me to step in and help him with that. I felt very appreciative that he had enough trust in me to come and have this discussion.”
Francis shared how he’s had conversations with friends whose children have come out about their sexuality. Those discussions allowed him to gain a deeper understanding of those who have struggled to feel free to live as their true selves. Francis believes it is important to facilitate those conversations.
“I think people understand there’s a lot that we need to learn,” Francis said. “You’re going to have some really tough conversations. It’s not always going to be easy. You might get to the point when you’re at an impasse or you don’t understand certain things, but I think you still have to work through that. It’s what we’ve tried to do as an organization, which is try to have these conversations.”
Helping Rogers tell his story with the hope that it can help others is something that was also important to a number of Kraken players. Reigning Calder Trophy winner Matty Beniers, along with Grubauer and Eberle, welcomed the chance to share what makes Rogers so beloved and respected and discussed the challenges the game has faced over the past year when it comes to acknowledging those in the LGBTQIA+ community.
Beniers drew from his experience attending a Boston-area high school he said was diverse, where he knew people who were openly gay, lesbian and transgender.
“I think that was just completely normalized,” Beniers said. “You didn’t bat an eye, it didn’t change anything. I had lots of classmates who were different sexualities. For me, it was normalized then. I didn’t really think about it at all, and in this situation, it was the same thing with JR.”
Eberle said he has friends in his life who identify as LGTBQIA+ and said that their sexuality does not change how he feels about them.
“It’s the way I was raised,” Eberle said. “I have kids and if they identify to be whatever they may be, it doesn’t matter to me as long as they are a good human.”
Grubauer said his conversation with Rogers was the first serious one he has had with someone who was coming out. He said he believes both the city of Seattle and the Kraken have provided the sort of welcoming environment that can hopefully allow anyone who is struggling with sharing their identity a chance to feel free of that burden.
Eberle explained how even though Rogers had not been open about his sexuality until recently, the team still had an idea that he was gay. Rogers himself said there might have been hints, such as what he posted on his Instagram feed, the fact he’ll occasionally wear a rainbow watch band for his Apple Watch or how he has put money on the board for Pride Night.
“If he didn’t want to talk about it, then you don’t talk about it,” Eberle said. “Whatever he does in his personal life is up to him. But he knows my kids, my family, I met his dad on the dads trip. I think the biggest thing for him was he just wanted to become open and make it apparent so he can bring his personal life in more, more than what he’s done prior.”
Knowing Rogers wanted to be more open, what have the Kraken players done to make sure that their dressing room feels like a welcoming place?
“I don’t think there is anything different we have to do because I think we have such a great group of guys that you are so welcomed,” Beniers said. “That’s not even in the back of our heads.”
A Kraken spokesperson told ESPN that the team will continue to host a Pride Night and still plans on creating sweaters for those nights. Those sweaters will be signed by players before being auctioned off to raise money for charity.
What was it like for Rogers to be a member of the LGBTQIA+ community who worked in the NHL last season?
“I think in-season, my main focus was working on the team and getting the players ready,” Rogers said. “Pride Nights are cool for the fans, but it doesn’t necessarily affect me because I have my community around me. Am I disappointed that we’re not wearing a jersey? Sure, but that’s 16 minutes of work that the NHL and the teams are doing. I hope now we are able to flip the spotlight from the jerseys to doing the true behind-the-scenes work that hopefully teams are doing.”
Beniers, Eberle and Grubauer were asked how they’ve grappled with the reactions that some in the league had to Pride Night sweaters while also finding a way to make sure Rogers feels supported.
Eberle said they cannot worry about what other organizations do, but they can control what happens with the Kraken. He said the fact Rogers feels comfortable speaking out says a lot about the environment everyone within the Kraken has tried to foster.
“Other organizations can do what they want. Guys can have their own beliefs. I think if you talked to Justin he would say the exact same thing,” Eberle said. “We believe in what we do here, and we try to include everyone and make everyone feel comfortable with us so they can come to work and we can be successful. At the end of the day, that’s what we’re trying to do.”
It all comes down to this for the Toronto Maple Leafs and the Florida Panthers. Sunday’s game marks the conclusion of a wild roller coaster of a series that included two wins to start for Toronto, then three straight for Florida, followed by a hard-fought win in Game 6 by Toronto that provided one more matchup.
Who moves on to face the Carolina Hurricanes in the Eastern Conference finals? Who begins their offseason vacation a bit earlier than they’d hoped?
Read on for a game preview with statistical insights from ESPN Research, a roundtable debate with key players in Game 7 and final score picks, a recap of what went down in Saturday’s game and the three stars of Saturday from Arda Öcal.
Matchup notes
Florida Panthers at Toronto Maple Leafs
Game 7 | 7:30 p.m. ET | TNT
The Maple Leafs have lost six straight Game 7s and are 12-15 all-time in Game 7s. The Panthers are 3-1 all-time in Game 7s, including a win in last year’s Stanley Cup Final.
Auston Matthews‘ first goal in 11 career postseason games against the Panthers came at an important time, technically serving as the game-winner of Game 6. He became the second Maple Leafs captain in history to score the winning goal in a contest when facing elimination, joining Darryl Sittler in 1976.
Teammate Mitch Marner assisted on Matthews’ goal and is the second player in Toronto franchise history with 50 playoff assists — Doug Gilmour has 60.
Joseph Woll had his first career playoff shutout, becoming the first Leafs goaltender to register a shutout when facing elimination since Curtis Joseph in the 2002 Eastern Conference finals.
Florida’s Brad Marchand will appear in his 13th career Game 7, which will be most among active players. He’s the fifth all-time to hit that benchmark, joining Scott Stevens (13), Patrick Roy (13) and his former Bruins teammates Patrice Bergeron (14) and Zdeno Chara (14).
Sergei Bobrovsky has a 2-0 career record in Game 7s, including last year’s Cup finals win over Edmonton. He is looking to join a group of eight goaltenders who have won their first three Game 7s.
Who is the one key player you’ll be watching?
Ryan S. Clark, NHL reporter: Joseph Woll. There are a few reasons here. It starts with the obvious: whether he can replicate what he did in Game 6, or at least carry several elements of that performance over into Game 7. Another reason stems from the conversation around tandem goaltenders, and the need for depth at that position. We’re so used to seeing teams have one primary option in net who’s expected to play every second. But this postseason has shown the value of having at least two — if not three — goalies who can be trusted. Woll getting a Game 7 victory would further emphasize that reality.
Victoria Matiash, NHL analyst: William Nylander. The most productive player for the Leafs this playoff run, Nylander has been scoresheet-silent this past week. After posting six goals and nine assists through nine games against Ottawa and Florida, Toronto’s most dynamic performer all regular season long has posted an egg in three straight.
If one of the coolest cucumbers in the game manages to break loose and rifle one past Bobrovsky, he’ll give his side an excellent chance to clear a hurdle not enjoyed by Leafs fans for many, many years.
Arda Öcal, NHL broadcaster: Auston Matthews. The Leafs captain scored his first career playoff goal against the Panthers in Game 6, which was also his first career goal beyond the first round of the playoffs. We hear it all the time: The superstars need to show up and show out when it matters the most. He got it done in Game 6. Can he do the same on Sunday when it’s winner takes all?
Kristen Shilton, NHL reporter: Mitch Marner. Now that Matthews got the monkey off his back with that critical goal in Game 6, it’s time for Marner to have his own series-defining moment in Game 7. Marner had four points in the Leafs’ first three games against Florida, but he has registered just one assist since then. And after that ill-fated spin-o-rama turnover move Marner pulled in the Game 5 debacle, this is his opportunity for a little redemption on home ice, too.
Marner is, like Matthews, among the most criticized players in the league for poor postseason performances when it matters most. Well, the stakes have never been higher. It’s now or never for Marner to put his mark on this one.
Greg Wyshynski, NHL reporter: Brad Marchand. Even in a moment of pure elation — a Game 6 victory on the road, with your two most maligned players combining for the winning goal — the prevailing thought among Maple Leafs fans is whether this is just another mechanism to eventually deliver maximum anguish. Marchand powering the Panthers to a Game 7 victory on Toronto’s home ice would be maximum anguish.
It has to be Marchand who twists the dagger. He has a 4-0 record against Toronto in Game 7s, all with the Boston Bruins, and can become the first player in NHL history to defeat the same opponent in at least five winner-take-all games. Factor in that the Leafs wanted to trade for Marchand before he chose Florida as his deadline destination, and now we’re talking an ironic level of pain. Brad Marchand being the reason that the Panthers win this Game 7 would cement his status as the Toronto Maple Leafs‘ greatest tormentor — perhaps second only to themselves.
The final score will be _____.
Clark: 4-3 Panthers in OT. Think about how this current iteration of the Panthers really started making its mark. It was that Game 7 win against the Boston Bruins back in 2023 that set the stage for the Panthers to become one of the NHL’s preeminent powers.
They have shown a comfort level with playing in Game 7s, which was the case last season when they won the first Stanley Cup in team history. Tapping into that experience in Game 7 could be the difference between a third consecutive Eastern Conference finals appearance or starting their offseason earlier than they would like.
Matiash: 4-2 Maple Leafs. Never mind the Leafs’ depressing losing record in Game 7s with the Core Four in action. Disregard Paul Maurice’s impeccable history in carbon-copy essential winner-take-all contests. Losers are only losers until they win.
If Toronto adheres to Berube’s system, utilizes its advantage in speed, counters Florida’s physicality reasonably enough, and doesn’t commit ridiculous infractions — silly penalties, dumb giveaways — they can finally flip the script on what’s been a tired and gloomy narrative in a town that’s craved better for much too long. If this central crew of bona fide stars truly wants to keep the elite band together for years ahead, this victory is essential. Marner scores the empty-netter to seal it.
Öcal: 3-1 Leafs. Here’s how I see it going: Toronto gets the first goal in the first period from Marner, then weathers the Cats’ onslaught in the second. Marchand scores early for Florida in the third, followed by a John Tavares quick response, then Auston Matthews pots home the empty-netter. The Leafs head to the Eastern Conference finals for the first time since 2002. And then 300,000 people celebrate this second-round victory at Nathan Phillips Square.
Shilton: 3-2 Leafs in OT. If not now … when? Toronto knows exactly what to do in order to shut Florida down. It won’t be easy. Paul Maurice is 5-0 in Game 7s. The Panthers know how to win big games. But the blueprint to beating them is also there for the Leafs to execute.
Joseph Woll was at his best in Game 6. Toronto’s top line got rolling. The Leafs look stout defensively, and there’s a collective effort there that’s been lacking before. This chance to reach a conference finals for the first time since the early 2000s is too good to let slip away and for once, Toronto won’t let it. And that last appearance in 2002 came off a Game 7 win over Ottawa — with a chance to play Carolina. Coincidence? Maybe not!
Wyshynski: 2-1 Panthers. Auston Matthews has been eliminated from the playoffs eight times. Three of the past four eliminations were by one goal, with two of the games going to overtime. This is to say that even when they fall short, these Leafs usually don’t go out with an effort like their Game 5 embarrassment at home.
But they will go out. Florida just has too many guys that have done this before. Carter Verhaeghe and Sam Reinhart have been huge in Game 7s. Sergei Bobrovsky is 2-0 in them. Another team might be rattled by squandering a chance to close out their opponents. Florida squandered it three times in the Stanley Cup Final last season against Connor McDavid — and still pulled it together to win the Cup in Game 7. The Panthers win, the Leafs finish the series valiantly and another offseason of critical decisions begins in Toronto.
Öcal’s three stars from Saturday
Upon hearing of the unexpected death of Winnipeg forward Mark Scheifele‘s father, the Stars’ fan base mobilized online and began a campaign to donate $55 (Scheifele’s jersey number) to charities that the veteran supports. Add that to the list of reasons why hockey fans are the best.
The overtime hero who sends Dallas to the Western Conference finals for the third straight year — a rematch from 2024 against the Edmonton Oilers. Harley became the fourth defenseman in franchise history to score an OT winner in the playoffs, joining John Klingberg (2019), Mattias Norstrom (2008) and Paul Cavallini (1994).
Scheifele had an incredible game, including the opening goal, hours after finding out his father had passed away. It was Scheifele’s first road playoff goal in the past 13 games.
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Mark Scheifele strikes first for Winnipeg
Mark Scheifele scores the opening goal of the game for Winnipeg just a day after his father’s death.
Saturday’s recap
Dallas Stars 2, Winnipeg Jets 1 (OT)
DAL wins 4-2, plays EDM in conference finals
Multiple games of this series ended with multi-goal victories. That was not the case on Saturday, as these two heavyweights played a tight contest that would eventually go to OT. Winnipeg’s Mark Scheifele scored the game’s opening goal 5:28 into the second period (the day after his father unexpectedly died), followed by the equalizer by Dallas’ Sam Steel. That’s where the score would remain until the end of regulation. It did not take long in OT for Thomas Harley to send the fans in Dallas into a frenzy and his team into the Western Conference finals for a rematch from last year with the Edmonton Oilers. Full recap.
0:24
Jake Oettinger makes remarkable save to keep score level
Jake Oettinger does his best attempt at acrobatics in the crease, making a lights-out save for the Stars in the third period.
Sports
‘He turned his back on us’: What it was like watching Juan Soto’s Bronx return with the Bleacher Creatures
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Jorge Castillo
NEW YORK — The first sustained jeers of the 2025 Subway Series, a raucous and crude chorus of pent-up resentment, were unleashed 20 minutes before first pitch of Game 1 on Friday, when Juan Soto emerged to stretch in center field in his New York Mets grays.
“F— Juan Soto!” reverberated from the bleachers beyond the right-field wall amid boos all around Yankee Stadium. Soto, ever the showman, did not directly acknowledge the greeting. But he subtly tugged at the bill of his cap toward the bleachers, surely in the direction of at least some people who had showered him with love last summer into autumn as the New York Yankees rode Soto and Aaron Judge‘s historic tandem production to the franchise’s first World Series appearance in 15 years before Soto ditched them during the winter.
This was a battle between first-place teams 10 miles apart, a fact that alone would have provided more juice than usual to the weekend series. The addition of Soto’s perceived betrayal, one of the sport’s biggest storylines, made it perhaps the most anticipated meeting between the clubs since the 2000 World Series.
Marc Chalpin took his usual bleacher seat in Section 203 behind right field, surrounded by his Bleacher Creature brethren, at approximately 6:30 p.m., anticipating the inevitable. If he had it his way, fans wouldn’t have greeted Soto in his return to Yankee Stadium with vulgarity. “F— Juan Soto!” was, to Chalpin, both over-the-top in its obscenity and underwhelming in its creativity.
Chalpin, tasked to initiate the Bleacher Creatures’ famous Roll Call since 2016, didn’t believe Soto warranted the vitriol, because he was a Yankee for only one season and, above all, didn’t win a championship. But he knew the three-word melody was coming for the man who spurned the home team for the — gulp — Mets.
“You’ll hear it from non-regulars,” Chalpin said, “but it won’t be us.”
Daniel Cagan was one of the non-regulars in attendance Friday. A die-hard Yankees fan from Los Angeles, Cagan happened to be in town for work, bought a ticket and attended the sold-out group therapy session by himself. Wearing a No. 68 Dellin Betances jersey, with a beer in hand before getting to his seat in Section 204, he predicted what he expected to ensue.
“Mayhem.”
With Soto’s decision to spurn the Yankees for the Mets over the offseason, the “Re-sign Soto!” pleas he heard from the bleachers in 2024 morphed into the crude taunt repeated dozens of times over the next three-plus hours. They were interspersed with rounds of boos and occasional fresh, less crass chants. It was a reaction stemming from Yankees fans’ introduction into how other fan bases have often felt about their ballclub.
For years, the big, bad, richer-than-everybody-else Yankees snatched stars, via free agency or trade, from other teams. This time — and probably for not the last time — the roles flipped: Mets billionaire owner Steve Cohen, refusing to be outbid, lured Soto from the Bronx to Queens after the Yankees offered a 16-year, $760 million contract. Soto opted for the Mets’ 15-year, $765 million deal, which includes an option to increase the total value to $805 million, free use of a luxury suite at Citi Field, up to four tickets behind home plate for all home games, and personal security for him and his family for both home and away games.
“Seeing him go to the Mets, it’s just, like, it rubs you the wrong way,” said James Roina, a 22-year-old Yankees fan who was sitting in Section 204.
Roina wore a white pinstriped Soto No. 22 Yankees jersey that he customized to read “SELLOUT” on the back using packing tape and a marker. A few brave Mets fans were sprinkled throughout Sections 203 and 204 behind Soto, proudly wearing his No. 22 in blue and orange. Fans of both teams wore Dominican-flavored caps and jerseys.
“F— Juan Soto” chants and middle fingers flew every few minutes as fans from the two sides sporadically exchanged pleasantries over the nine innings. It was so boisterous during the first inning that the Bleacher Creatures were drowned out for some of the Roll Call. Most interactions were light-hearted. On occasion, a security guard intervened to defuse a situation. Nothing escalated to a physical altercation.
“[Soto] was only here for one year,” Chalpin said. “It was a very, very good year, but it was just one year. So he’s not an all-time Yankee great or anything like that. This isn’t Paul O’Neill. He never won here. He had a great year. But there is a distinction between a guy who won here and a guy who didn’t.”
In the days leading up to the game, Chalpin knew how he wanted the Bleacher Creatures to welcome Soto.
“You know, he turned his back on us,” Chalpin said. “My attitude is we should turn our backs on him. I don’t wish him harm, but I don’t wish him success either.”
So Chalpin and dozens of Bleacher Creatures in Section 203 turned their backs on Soto when he ran out to take his spot in right field for the first time. After the game, Soto said he didn’t notice the gesture.
Joe Lopez, a Bronx native and Bleacher Creature regular since 1987, joined in on the silent treatment.
“I knew he wasn’t coming back,” Lopez said. “Because the idea is to make as much money as you can. So how are you gonna dog Soto for going after the money? I mean, come on. He got everything he wants. He got the money. He got the suite. So you’re going to hate him for that? He’s not Aaron Judge. Aaron Judge could’ve gone home to San Francisco for more money. But he wanted to be here.”
Other chants occasionally surfaced. “MVP” chants for Judge were louder than usual, an effort made to remind Soto he wasn’t even the best player on the Yankees anyway.
Another favorite was “We got Grisham!” in reference to Trent Grisham, the other player the Yankees received with Soto from the San Diego Padres and who was buried on the Yankees’ bench last season but is now enjoying a breakout campaign. Fittingly, the praise came almost a year after they chanted “We want Soto!” when Grisham replaced an injured Soto in a weekend series against the Los Angeles Dodgers.
Yankees fans yelled, “You can’t field!” at Soto in the first inning. They called him, in rhythmic unison, an “a–hole”. With his monster contract in mind, they chanted, “Soto, greedy!” Later on, they unearthed the classic “Overrated” chorus.
All along, Soto did his best to ignore them. He jokingly acknowledged the sentiment at-large before his first plate appearance when, smiling, he took off his batting helmet, tipped it to the crowd, tapped his chest twice and mouthed, “Thank you.”
The bleachers, however, did not get that level of acknowledgement — until the eighth inning, when a “you miss Judge!” taunt erupted and Soto appeared to outline a heart toward the bleachers. Moments later, Soto caught the inning’s final out and threw the ball into the bleachers behind him without looking. A fan, after some peer pressure, threw the ball back, igniting another roar from the crowd.
“We finally got to him,” said Milton Ousland, another Bleacher Creature staple. “He knew the F-him chants were coming. We had to do something different.”
Ousland has been sitting in the bleachers since the 1980s, back when home games were at the old Yankee Stadium and the Mets were, in a blip in the franchise’s 63-year history, the best team in town. He became the section’s cowbell man in 1996, in time for the first of four Yankees championships in five seasons. Back then, Ousland insisted, Friday’s reaction to Soto would’ve been G-rated.
“This is nothing,” Ousland said. “We used to be so bad that [opposing right fielder Jose] Canseco used to DH. We used to look up bad words in Japanese. We used to chant curse words at Ichiro [Suzuki] the whole game in Japanese. We would look it up and hand out a paper to everybody, as they walked in, that had all the curse words in Japanese.
“We’ve really been on top of players before. This is nothing new. The only thing that’s new is that a guy chose the Mets over us.”
There was a point late in Friday’s game, with the Yankees holding a five-run lead, when the two fan bases momentarily coalesced to become one. It happened when the score of Game 6 of the Eastern Conference semifinals, played at Madison Square Garden, was shown on the video board. The hometown New York Knicks were thrashing the Boston Celtics 46-27 en route to an easy series-clinching win.
Ousland, who wore a Knicks cap, banged his cowbell in celebration as the bleachers went wild around him. Pinstriped people high-fived the brave blue-and-orange souls. A light “Jalen Brunson!” chant broke out. But the truce was fleeting. It was quickly back to business until Soto, who finished 0-for-2 with three walks in a 6-2 Yankees win, made the game’s final out.
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