BOSTON -- Yankees fans will need more than a T-shirt to
taunt the Red Sox.
A day before Boston and New York started the AL championship
series, Major League Baseball recalled a T-shirt it had sanctioned
because it rubbed Red Sox fans the wrong way.
The message on the shirt that drew the negative reaction read:
"Hey Red Sox ... Who's your daddy?"
The shirt bears both a Yankees logo and a picture of a red
pacifier with the letter "B" on it -- a reference to remarks Red
Sox ace Pedro Martinez made after a recent loss to Boston's
longtime rivals.
"Call the Yankees my daddy. I can't find a way to beat them at
this point," Martinez said.
MLB began offering the shirt for wholesale distribution to
licensed retailers over the weekend and promoted it on a Web site,
spokesman Carmine Tiso said.
On Monday, the few thousand shirts that were made were recalled
from retailers, and the shirt was removed from the Web site.
"We did hear some feedback from the Boston fans, who didn't
necessarily feel they were comfortable with the T-shirt and the
message on it," Tiso said. "Some fans felt it went a little too
far, and obviously in this instance we're listening to our fans."
Although most MLB-sanctioned apparel promotes individual teams
without denouncing their rivals, there have been some items that
touched on baseball's biggest rivalries.
The ALCS starts Tuesday night at Yankee Stadium. Last year, New
York beat Boston on Aaron Boone's 11th-inning homer in Game 7.