Marc Chalpin

Robby Incmikoski: Again, I thank you, Marc. Thank you for your time. And I really think you guys as baseball fans are gonna like what we’re doing.

Marc Chalpin: Sounds great.

Robby Incmikoski: All right, here we go. Marc, what is it—Chalpin? Is that how you say your last name?

Marc Chalpin: Yeah, M-A-R-C C-H-A-L-P-I-N. I’m actually impressed because most people say Chaplin or Chapin, or they always get it, they always get it wrong—but very simple name.

Robby Incmikoski: When you grow up with “Incmikoski,” you learn how to pronounce names, believe me. Hey, so I want to ask you—and this is just a general question—if a fan were to step into Yankee Stadium that’s never been there, what would you tell ’em the experience is like, Marc?

Marc Chalpin: If I were gonna talk about that, I have to talk about the very first time I walked into the old stadium. We could start with that.

Robby Incmikoski: Tell us about it.

Marc Chalpin: So I was eight years old, and the old stadium was built in a way that was very dark when you’re inside. Then, if you get there on a nice day, there are these tunnels, and you walk out of the tunnel and then it’s just like light. And I always say it’s kind of like when Dorothy walked into Oz, when it went from black and white to color. And it was just this magical experience, magical place. You know, the new stadium not quite the same with that, but I like that the new stadium has bleachers are no longer separated. In the old stadium, it was separated. So I guess the first thing you got to understand is you’re in a very special place. The new place isn’t quite the same as the old, but it’s still the Yankees, which have this history that no other team has. It goes from Babe Ruth to Aaron Judge in this linear form with so many championships, and it’s just—winning is what we do. So you feel the presence of that. I do Yankees fantasy camp, and to a much lesser extent, you get what it feels like to put on the pinstripes because you’re actually playing ball where the Yankees play ball in Florida.

So there is this aura that a real Yankee fan has, so they will experience that.

Robby Incmikoski: When you—tell me, just for a little bit of background: You obviously grew up in New York. I’m assuming you grew up in New York—you’re a Yankee fan as long as you can remember. Is that right?

Marc Chalpin: Yeah. I guess what makes me a little bit different is that—I get it—it was passed down to me through my mother, not my father.

Robby Incmikoski: Okay.

Marc Chalpin: My mother is the big Yankee nut in the family, with me. My dad . . .

Robby Incmikoski: What is her name? What’s your mom’s?

Marc Chalpin: Roberta. Roberta Chalpin.

Robby Incmikoski: Chalppin. Okay. Roberta Chalpin. Yep.

Marc Chalpin: Man, she grew up in the Bronx during the Mickey Mantle era, and she was going to Yankee games as a ten-year-old. So I think that passed down to me when I was very young, and I just love baseball. I grew up in Westchester County—Scarsdale, New York—and the Yankees have been a part of me my whole life.

Robby Incmikoski: When you, can you just give us a little bit of backdrop because anybody that talks and see it on TV, I’ve been to a bunch of Yankee games. I’ve heard the roll call myself. How did the Bleacher Creatures come about? When did it start, and how did you come up with this?

Marc Chalpin: Okay, well if you really want to go back to the beginning, there’s a man whose name . . .

Robby Incmikoski: Which I do.

Marc Chalpin: Okay, this isn’t completely my story to tell—there are probably two other Bleacher Creatures you should talk to. Yeah . . .

Robby Incmikoski: Okay, so if there are, we would love to talk to them. That’s no problem at all.

Marc Chalpin: Yeah, and they’re two that I really think would be great, but . . ,

Robby Incmikoski: Well, tell me about it. Wait—here’s what we want. Let me just explain.

Marc Chalpin: Okay.

Robby Incmikoski: Our goal with this book, Marc, is to—we want people to get a tour and get a feel and get a taste of what it’s like at this place through words and stories. So whatever’s gonna best express that, we want to do it.

Marc Chalpin: Yes.

Robby Incmikoski: So if we need to set up meetings with two others to help tell the story of the Bleacher Creatures, we’re gonna do it. And we want to do it in the most respectful and thorough way imaginable. So with that said . . .

Marc Chalpin: Yeah.

Robby Incmikoski: Tell us your version and just how did this come about, man—because it’s one of the cooler things in Major League Baseball.

Marc Chalpin: Yeah, okay. So let’s go to the beginning with a man named Ali Ramirez, who was known for ringing a cowbell, and he started in the Mickey Mantle era until he passed away in 1996. He was important enough to the Yankees that they put a plaque on his seat—this seat is dedicated in memory of Ali Ramirez. He’s considered the first Bleacher Creature. I never met him because I didn’t start sitting in the bleachers until 1999, but I’ve met members of his family. And in 1983, there’s a woman named Tina Lewis. She is the queen of the section. Tina is one of the names that I want you to talk to.

Robby Incmikoski: Love to.

Marc Chalpin: She is a force of nature, and she is amazing. He passed the cowbell on in 1996 when Ali died, to a man named Milton Ousland, who’s had the cowbell ever since. Milton started sitting in the bleachers in 1984. He doesn’t show up as often because the prices went up, but he’s incredible on camera—he’s incredible, period. You’re gonna love him.

Robby Incmikoski: Does he still have, we’re talking about the cowbell, the original cowbell that Ali had?

Marc Chalpin: No, I think, actually I’ll let Tina answer that one for you.

Robby Incmikoski: Okay. That’s fine.

Marc Chalpin: I don’t want to take her stories.

Robby Incmikoski: No problem. No problem. Yep, no problem.

Marc Chalpin: But Tina was basically the one that kind of was the anchor of the group as it formed, and as the dynasty began, more people started to come—waves of fans come. They’re called the Bleacher Creatures because we’re creatures of habit—everybody has a little thing they do, or they did back then. And I started sitting in 1999; the roll call was already famous by then. The roll call has its origins through the mid-’90s. A man named John Cenas [Zenes? dn] is one of the people credited with inventing it. John, and a guy named Teddy, and Tina as well.

And the roll call took off. There was an article in the New York Times I found from 1998, and then it just became a popular thing. As I understand the story, if you go back to the Dave Winfield era, the Bleacher Creatures had a very good relationship with him—back-and-forth talking—and they would greet him every game.

After Winfield left, Jesse Barfield—who I know, sorry to name-drop, but I know him very well . . .

Robby Incmikoski: No, great career.

Marc Chalpin: He’s a freaking phenomenal human being, a great guy. Great man too. So he became the guy in right field who was after Winfield. After Barfield, Roberto Kelly kind of shifted to center field with Roberto Kelly, and then Bernie Williams. So after that, one day, as I’ve been told, Jim Leyritz made a very good catch in left field, so they started cheering him. And then they’re like, “Well, we can’t leave Paul O’Neill out,” so they started doing the outfield. And then in 1997, Tino Martinez allegedly made a comment in the paper: “What about the infield?” And that’s kind of how the modern roll call was born.

And it’s been like that ever since. We don’t do the pitcher or the catcher, except for David Wells and David Cone, the two guys who pitched the perfect games—they loved it. And then one person led it for about fifteen years; he left, and then Tina gave it to me, and I’ve been doing it since 2016. When I’m not there, someone else does take care of it. We have a couple of different people who kind of pick up the mantle when I’m not there. I don’t go to eighty-one games, but this year, I went to a personal-best sixty-nine, which is now seventy-one.

Robby Incmikoski: Wow.

Marc Chalpin: Because . . .

Robby Incmikoski: Right. So when—there are so many ways to go with this, and they’re all great. For you, a guy who at age eight inherited Yankee fandom from his mother—how cool is that for you?

Marc Chalpin: It’s great. You ever watch that speech in Field of Dreams when Kevin Costner is always talking about how when he had trouble with his dad, they could always talk about baseball? I have a very good relationship with my mother, but we always have that. One of the cool—yeah, I didn’t go to the stadium a lot as a kid, but I watched it all on television. But some of the games I went to were very special. The very first game I ever went to—when I was eight, Oscar Gamble hits this—the Yankees were down a couple of runs in the ninth, and they rallied to tie it, and then Oscar Gamble hits a walk-off home run in the tenth. And that’s my first experience at Yankee Stadium. And years later, at Yankee Fantasy Camp, the first time I did it, he was my coach, and I told him the story.

Robby Incmikoski: Oscar Gamble was?

Marc Chalpin: Yes, the late great, and that was awesome. Oscar was—sometimes you hear, “Don’t meet your heroes,” but Oscar was a great guy. Bless him.

Robby Incmikoski: He had big hair, if I remember correctly, right?

Marc Chalpin: Yeah—yeah, but not when I met him. He was bald then.

Robby Incmikoski: Right. I remember he used to have that big hair all over the place, yeah.

Marc Chalpin: He did, he did, he did. And then my fourth-ever Yankee game, Dave Righetti pitched a no-hitter, so I was there. And coincidentally—and this is getting back to the bleachers and how fate sometimes exists—Tina Lewis, that was her first time in the bleachers, or the first time when she started to become a regular Bleacher Creature, was 1983. And I was in the park that day by coincidence.

Robby Incmikoski: Really? Wow.

Marc Chalpin: I wouldn’t meet her until years later, but . . .

Robby Incmikoski: So I looked at your Instagram—Ariel [? dn] had pointed, had quoted one of your posts. My question—this is what’s cool, man. So I did the Pirates for eleven years, right? We have a fan group called the Renegades of the Rotunda, and . . .

Marc Chalpin: Okay.

Robby Incmikoski: I’m actually interviewing their leader on Monday. It’s a guy named Chris Miller, and they dress up as actual pirates—they wear the hat, he’s got the costume and everything. Sometimes TV people kind of stay away from fans, fan groups and stuff. I’ve always kind of been drawn toward them. I got to know the guys in right field in Oakland, I got to know, like . . .

Marc Chalpin: Um-hmm.

Robby Incmikoski: I’ve gotten to know different fan groups around baseball, man. We all love baseball—I might want my team to beat your team, but ultimately we’re all fans of the game; we’re on this planet together.

Marc Chalpin: Yeah.

Robby Incmikoski: You know what I’m saying? We’re not gonna fight or argue or anything like that. So I’ve always had a lot of respect for opposing fans, the way they represent their team, and the passion they have for the game, and the passion they have for the franchise. And I noticed, Marc, that players take notice of that too—and they have a lot of respect for you and they like being around you. I saw you got a picture with Bernie Kosar—a freaking quarterback in the NFL is going out to take pictures with you. What is that like—when you see players come out and get Chad Curtis or I can’t remember who it was, or like a couple other . . . oh no, Shane Spencer it was, who it was, like a picture with him that went out to see you guys. I remember when Shane Spencer played. So what is it like developing relationships with the fans that you support, and how cool is it that people come to take pictures with you?

Marc Chalpin: I still find it’s kind of crazy to me because I don’t even get a discount off my tickets. I’m a Yankee fan just like everybody else, but social media has put me a little bit in the spotlight, and I know that comes with the territory. And I think it’s very important to treat people the way you want to be treated. I’ve seen cases where people don’t treat people right and are rude to people, and I just can’t do that—it’s not in my nature. And we’re all ba—like you said, we’re all baseball fans here. If I can help somebody have a better experience, that’s great.

Usually it’s kids, or guys in their twenties—wish it was supermodel thirty-year-olds, but that doesn’t happen very often. But when it comes to people who’ve played for the Yankees now—that goes back to the fantasy camp stuff. I’ve done Yankee Fantasy Camp twelve times. It is the greatest experience a baseball fan can have, and other teams do it, that’s why I say baseball, not just Yankees.

Robby Incmikoski: Of course.

Marc Chalpin: But I have had the opportunity to get to know quite a few people. Shane Spencer is one of the coaches at the camp.

Robby Incmikoski: Right.

Marc Chalpin: So I’ve known him for years. Jim Leyritz also, a fantastic human being, Mickey Rivers . . . [I didn’t hear Mickey Rivers’s name. dn]

Robby Incmikoski: He had a few big hits for the Yankees.

Marc Chalpin: What’s that?

Robby Incmikoski: He had a few big hits for the Yankees over the years.

Marc Chalpin: Yeah, he’s had a good . . . it’s fun because I add him to the roll call, and I introduce him as “the man who gave Marc Wohlers whiplash,” and he loves it. He loves coming out there, we love having him out there. And it’s funny because when a public figure comes out there, the regulars know how to protect the guy from being mobbed. So in a way, we also work a little security for the team as well. We do a lot that people don’t necessarily see—we help people find their seats. It’s just . . .

Robby Incmikoski: Wait, tell us about that. Tell us about the good that you do, because a lot of people might be intimidated—and that’s the truth. They might be afraid to walk up to you guys. They might think like somebody’s wearing another jersey or another hat that you’re gonna . . .

Marc Chalpin: Yeah, I mean look, we’ll boo the hell out of a Mets fan, and we’ll boo people in other jerseys, but we’re not gonna beat them up or anything. I mean, that’s not gonna happen. That’s not who we are.

Robby Incmikoski: So you help people find their seats. Tell us about that. Tell us what the vibe is like out there.

Marc Chalpin: Well, you got to remember that, because some people think general admission. You might see an empty seat on a bench—it’s not as formal as the rest of the stadium is. Most seats are. So if someone’s sitting in your seat, or somebody . . . there’s a lot of regulars. Many don’t have their own seat because not everybody there is a season-ticket holder. But they come every game, and we find room. But if somebody actually has the seat, we make sure that they’re allowed to—no matter what jersey they’re wearing—if it’s their seat, it’s their seat. But a lot of times people come in the section, and they show their ticket. This happened in the playoffs. It’s like, “No, you’re in section 202, it’s over there. You’re in section 204, it’s over there.” So we make sure they get to the right place.

Robby Incmikoski: How many—sorry, go ahead.

Marc Chalpin: No, it’s just part of it. We have actually a pretty decent relationship with security right now, and most of the time whenever there is a problem, it’s not the regulars that are involved. Sometimes we get press that has nothing to do with us. I don’t remember if you remember this, but back in the ’80s, there was an incident with Wally Joyner at Yankee Stadium, where somebody threw a battery at him, and it just missed him . . .

Robby Incmikoski: I remember that, yeah.

Marc Chalpin: And sometimes they blame us for it. He was a first baseman. The thing came from the upper deck . . .

Robby Incmikoski: I was gonna say, how the hell you gonna reach him from right field with a battery?

Marc Chalpin: If we could do that, we’d be on the team. So no, we don’t do that; we don’t throw stuff on the field. In fact, we hate that. Sometimes you’ll see people throwing—something good in the playoffs it happens—they’ll throw water or beer, and we’re like, “Why are you doing that? We don’t want to get wet.” We don’t do that. Now, we have our traditions when good things happen, but we don’t do things bad. A year or two ago, there was something with one of the Indians—or Guardians, sorry—and people were throwing stuff at him, but no regulars were involved in that. Anything that came from our section came from the other side of it, where none of our regulars sit, and in the section in front of us, 103. So we didn’t do it, but we got a lot of blame, in fact, for it. So that’s the downside of our reputation. But the fact is, most people who sit there have a great time.

Robby Incmikoski: I would love to watch a game with you guys one day. That’d be a real cool experience. So just a couple technical questions so our facts are right. What section are you in, how many rows and how far wide? About how many people do the roll call each day?

Marc Chalpin: It’s impossible to say how many people do the roll call each day, because it’s usually anyone within earshot—people in 103 do it. But, I mean, I sit, we’re section 203, and I would say rows 1 through about 13, maybe seats 15 through 25—that’s kind of our group, yeah.

Robby Incmikoski: Over a hundred.

Marc Chalpin: Yeah, I mean I’ve got a good story about that. When we moved from one stadium to the other, [not sure if he said one stadium to the other or one section of the stadium to the other. dn] Tina and I pretty much organized the whole thing. I collected all the season ticket holders, Tina had contacts, and we worked with the Yankees. They were very, very good to us. They basically said, “Here’s the grid—fill it out.” And we ended up taking 134 seats, and 99 of them were 81-game plans, and . . .

Robby Incmikoski: Wow.

Marc Chalpin: They were phenomenal. It’s not like that now, because . . .

Robby Incmikoski: How many did you say you got? You guys got the grid, and you got to pick your seats. How many of you did it?

Marc Chalpin: Basically, I got to fill it out like a wedding chart. And they really stepped up for us, and that’s why when sometimes people say the Yankees don’t care—I’m like, “Yeah, they do.”

Robby Incmikoski: Yeah, that’s right.

Marc Chalpin: Yeah, so . . .

Robby Incmikoski: How many of you did it, you said? How many, a hundred? How many?

Marc Chalpin: I believe it was 134 seats, with 91 of them were all 81, and the rest were 40s too [or 42? dn].

Robby Incmikoski: 134 . .  you said 134, is that right?

Marc Chalpin: Yeah, I believe that’s the number—134.

Robby Incmikoski: So we’ll just say around 130 seats. So like around 130 seats. And 81, you said, were full—or wait, 91 were full-season tickets and another bunch were half-season tickets.

Marc Chalpin: Yeah, yeah. Nothing less than that. That was when the stadium opened, and it was, I believe, twelve dollars a seat. Now next year it’s gonna be thirty-six. So over the years, we lost a lot of season ticket holders because of money, and it is what it is. Times also change—we can’t be as rowdy as we were when I started, and that’s fine. You just adapt. Some maybe-not-so-politically-correct chants that we used to do we can’t do anymore, but that’s okay. I replaced them with one-liners and stuff instead. Once I started doing the roll call, I was less of a heckler and more—I kind of had a focus because I didn’t want to lose my voice for the next day. That’s how I kind of . . .

Robby Incmikoski: Right.

Marc Chalpin: You got to come back. I hate when my voice cracks.

Robby Incmikoski: Right.

Marc Chalpin: It’s annoying, it’s embarrassing, but it doesn’t happen too often, so that’s good.

Robby Incmikoski: Let me ask you this—so again about the roll call: Does it start at first base? Does it start in the outfield? Just walk us through . . . don’t do an actual walk, but just tell me about this. Is there a set order for it every game?

Marc Chalpin: Yes, yes, there is. So basically, I try to do things a little bit—everybody who does the roll call should do something that makes it their own. I didn’t copy the guy who went before me, and the people who do it besides me don’t copy me exactly. But I have a very simple intro: “What do you say we get this roll call started?” Very short, very sweet. We do a clap, and then we start with center field. Then I’ll yell “Yo!” and then the first name of the center fielder, and after that we start chanting his name. Then we move to left field, right field, first, second, short, third.

And then I gotta end it. For many, many, many years, we always ended it with chanting, “Box seats suck.” That’s how we ended it, but the Yankees asked us to stop doing that. So we did. And the previous person—his ending basically was “Sit down, the show’s over,” so I kind of went the opposite approach. I went very polite. I’m like, “Thank you for your participation.” Then I say, “Just a friendly reminder, we do not do the wave in our section.” And then if we’re in first place, I’d be like, “Before we go, let’s remind everybody where we are in the standings,” and then we would yell, “First-place Yankees!” Or if we’re not in first place or it’s the playoffs, I say, “Let’s remind everybody the kind of baseball we’re supposed to play here,” and then we end it with “Yankee baseball.” And then I’ll say, “Okay, that was very good—why don’t we do this again tomorrow?” or “We’ll do this again tomorrow.” Same joke. Before I was leading it, I’d always say, “Hey, that was really good—let’s do that tomorrow.” So I just kind of took my own catchphrase and put it into the actual roll call.

In recent years, after I say, “Thank you for your participation,” one of the other Bleacher Creatures started yelling, “You’re welcome!” and then other people started doing it, and now, when I say, “Thank you for your participation,” like thirty people do it. So they yell, “You’re welcome!” at the same time. It is hilarious every time—it took me a while to not, to try not to laugh. So that’s good. So yeah, I mean, that’s basically it. It’s pretty much the same every time. Sometimes there will be a mishap, like when Melky Cabrera made an error in the middle of roll call, right when we were chanting his name. He turns to wave to us. The ball goes right by him—that happened once.

Robby Incmikoski: What was that reaction? Hey, hold on—what was that reaction? So what was the vibe amongst the Bleacher Creatures as that happens?

Marc Chalpin: Probably we were . . . it was hilarious. We’re like, “Sorry,” but yeah, that was a funny one. The other day—I mean, that was before I was doing roll call—but I’m not immune to making mistakes. A couple of weeks ago, not that long ago, I forgot to do Soto. I went from left field to first base, and everyone’s like, “What the hell are you doing?” Thankfully, there were other people in the section who caught me right away, and I went, “Right, I’m like, oops.” So after the roll call, I’m like, “Okay, sorry, that was an E-10. That’s on me,” and then we moved forward. But I’ve been getting some crap for that, but look—I mean, we make mistakes sometimes.

Starlin Castro was once on the disabled list, but I get so used to the same name that I forgot and I went to the wrong guy. So it happens. Hey, I mean, even the best fielders make errors, so I’m not immune to that. It’s baseball.

Robby Incmikoski: Baseball.

Marc Chalpin: Yeah, it’s baseball. Boone makes it very hard on me because he changes the lineup every day.

Robby Incmikoski: Yeah.

Marc Chalpin: There’s not—I get into a habit. I want to get into a habit and just go be automatic. That’s why I kind of like the playoffs, because I know it’s gonna be Judge, Verdugo, Soto, whoever’s playing first base, Torres, Volpe, Chisholm, and turn around and say “Thank you.” It’s much easier when you know that. But then sometimes he’ll put [? dn] in, he’ll change the first baseman, putting Jon Berti at first base, and he’s never . . 

Robby Incmikoski: I saw that—first time in his career.

Marc Chalpin: Yeah. I’m like, “What are you doing to me, Boone?” So I like consistency. Before we had Boone, it used to be very consistent.

Robby Incmikoski: So it’s center field, left field, right field, then first, second, short, third—that’s the order.

Marc Chalpin: That’s right. That is the order every time.

Robby Incmikoski: When you—so in terms of . . . let me ask you this: Was there ever a day—do you have a most memorable day that you spent out there in right field? Does one stand out for all of you collectively, whether it was the end of a season, or the first game after maybe somebody passed, or just something . . . are there any memorable moments that you could share with us from right field?

Marc Chalpin: Oh God, so many.

Robby Incmikoski: I’m just talking about the ones that like just jump out at you.

Marc Chalpin: All right, Aaron . . . okay, Aaron Boone’s home run in 2003.

Robby Incmikoski: Of course.

Marc Chalpin: That was a bitter series with the Red Sox.

Robby Incmikoski: Yeah.

Marc Chalpin: And you know, we were watching  road games, and we see Manny Ramirez—we were watching the road game in one of the Bleacher Creatures’ apartments, and Roger Clemens throws a ball. It was just high. It wasn’t even near him—and he basically charged the mound. And we were ready to fight the TV. I mean, so that was a very bitter series. I’m gonna give you this from my point of view: I got a few of these. It was a terrible game for the first eight innings; Clemens didn’t do very well, we were losing the whole game, and I’m just sitting there miserable.

Then we come to life because Jorge—the eighth inning where they tied the game, Matsui, Jorge, what they did. And then all of a sudden, it’s like life got brought back into you. Now Aaron Boone later on in the game, Mariano, three innings of scoreless baseball—such an amazing performance. Then Boone hits that dramatic home run on the first pitch of the at-bat. It was just amazing. So you know how when a team wins a dramatic game, they pile up on each other—especially if they just won the pennant—so you know how teams celebrate when that happens. I missed the whole thing because we were doing the exact same thing in the bleachers. Yeah, we were jumping up, piling on each other, the hugs, everything. It was an amazing, amazing experience.

Another time, we had the All-Star Game at Yankee Stadium . . .

Robby Incmikoski: That was ’08, if I remember correctly.

Marc Chalpin: You are correct.

Robby Incmikoski: Justin Morneau—Josh Hamilton’s Home Run Derby show, where Hamilton put on the show and Morneau won it.

Marc Chalpin: Yeah, which shows you how weird the Home Run Derby was back then. So, on the All-Star Game itself—we’re always one step ahead. The All-Star Game’s once every thirty years at Yankee Stadium, so what should we do that’s different? About eight of us show up in tuxedos, full tuxedos, and I’ve got the pictures. That was really cool. So here we are doing the roll call, and for the record, we only roll-called the two Yankees that were in the All-Star Game.

Robby Incmikoski: And that was . . .

Marc Chalpin: Nobody else. The roll call is for Yankees only. So I would love the All-Star Game back again.

Robby Incmikoski: I love this. I love this.

Marc Chalpin: To see if we can make the new guys do the tuxedo thing. I want to bring that back.

Robby Incmikoski: Do you have a picture? So once I do this, do you have a picture? I’m putting a note in my—’cause I gotta track down some pictures. Do you have a photo that we may put into the book of you guys in tuxedos?

Marc Chalpin: Yes, I do.

Robby Incmikoski: I don’t need it right this second. We have months to do it, but I’ll track you down for that. But I would love to put a photo of that in the book.

Marc Chalpin: Yeah. The only question I have is, it was emailed to me from someone on the Daily News—I don’t know if they have any rights to it. I have no idea.

Robby Incmikoski: But we would just credit—we would credit whoever gave it, whoever it is.

Marc Chalpin: Yeah, okay, that’s—

Robby Incmikoski: No, we give, we just give the photo credit, that’s all.

Marc Chalpin: Yeah, I’ll give it to you, okay.

Robby Incmikoski: ’Cause we’re gonna have a user-submitted section too, so it’s going to be from one-off ballparks like Rickwood Field and London, Mexico—all those specialty parks where they play. So I’m gonna do a section of that. But what helps tell the story is photos—people tell anecdotes. I have a list of about twenty different photos, and I’m trying. Ariel has a picture of her grandfather taking her to meet Joe DiMaggio when she was one year old . . .

Marc Chalpin: She showed it to me.

Robby Incmikoski: Yeah, like that. So that’s gonna go in the book. We want to get pictures of people. By the way, Kyle just texted me he had to duck out for another meeting—we have another one coming up at eleven, but we’re still going, me and you.

Marc Chalpin: That’s fine.

Robby Incmikoski: So we’re not done yet. I still have some more questions for you. He’s got three young kids, so that’s why he’s always in and out.

Marc Chalpin: That’s okay.

Robby Incmikoski: I’m the one who asks all the questions; he transcribes and does quality control for the most part.

31:40 Marc Chalpin: Yeah. Also Derek Jeter’s final game at the stadium—we actually planned it out that we were going to do a “Thank you, Jeter” chant in the seventh inning, and Tina wanted me to start it off, and I did. But it’s very hard because everyone’s so excited. So I had to basically throw my voice out constantly going, “Thank you, Jeter!”—and getting, our section starts doing it. And before you know it, the whole stadium’s doing it. And that “Thank you, Jeter” chant—that came from us. And we made sure we didn’t stop, because the crowd were dying down. We just did not stop until we made sure that was all over the place. That was a big one—Jeter’s final game was magical. The last game at the old stadium, we were the last people to leave. The Yankees let us stay.

Robby Incmikoski: How long did you stay at old Yankee Stadium? How long were you there—an hour, two hours?

Marc Chalpin: After the game? No, not that long.

Robby Incmikoski: Half hour?

Marc Chalpin: Yeah, probably a half hour. We were the last group of fans. I got a picture of us in the bleachers that final time. I’ve got video of me walking out—well, I’m holding the camera—but walking out of the stadium for the final time.

Robby Incmikoski: Really—wow.

Marc Chalpin: Yeah, it’s crappy 2008 quality, but . . . 

Robby Incmikoski: That’s all right.

Marc Chalpin: I have it. It was just an amazing experience. The old stadium, in many ways, was designed a little bit better for us. So in the old stadium—have you been in the bleachers in the new stadium at all, or in the current stadium?

Robby Incmikoski: I have, but never during a game because I’m always working. We were there in 2020—Judge hit a sixtieth against us . . . Will Crowe. He did that. I was, Cabrera hit a walk-off grand slam; we were up by five. We were up by four or give. I think we were up by five going into the ninth and gave it up. But anyways . . .

Marc Chalpin: So, in the current stadium, when you come to your seat, you’re walking down a set of stairs.

Robby Incmikoski: Right.

Marc Chalpin: But in the old stadium, you would walk up a set of stairs . . .

Robby Incmikoski: Up. Yeah.

Marc Chalpin: So depending on, everybody would see you come in. If regulars would come in during say the fourth inning because they’d be outside drinking, we would boo the hell out of them. But if there’s a celebrity lookalike, we would, they would know. So one time, there was an older man with white hair, a white beard—looked like Kenny Rogers. As soon as he starts walking up the stairs, a hundred people start singing “The Gambler.” I mean, it was great. You know, we’d been seeing guys who look like wrestlers, we’d start doing that, you know. We’ve had some very funny moments in this section.

Robby Incmikoski: Dude, that’s great. How do you describe the relationship that you all have, given that you share a passion for Yankee baseball?

Marc Chalpin: Between, with each other?

Robby Incmikoski: The Creatures with each other, yeah.

Marc Chalpin: I would say a dysfunctional Yankee family, secondary. We’ll fight each other a lot, we’ll argue—there’ll be drama like with any group. A lot of it is stupid. But at the same time, we have an annual Christmas party—we get together every year in December at Yankee Tavern.

Robby Incmikoski: Where’s Yankee Tavern? Is that next to the stadium?

Marc Chalpin: Yeah, it’s actually . . . that bar was established in 1927—Ruth and Gehrig drank there. But that’s what . . .

Robby Incmikoski: My… in 2016 Yankees, but yeah . . .

Marc Chalpin: Yeah, so we stopped doing this years ago, but there was a time when we would do an annual softball game, and we took it very seriously to the point where we would choose captains two months in advance, there would be a draft about a month before, and we kept stats, we made DVDs—some of our Bleacher people were announcers. It got intense sometimes, but it was great. You’d be surprised at the production quality that we came up with—it’s really cool. The announcing was hilarious because we had some good senses of humor and one-liners. Some people, we don’t even know their real names because we have nicknames for them. There were people I’ve known for ten, fifteen years, and I didn’t know their name until we moved to the new stadium and I had to use their ticket account—like, “What’s this?” But there’s a lot of characters in the bleachers.

Robby Incmikoski: That’s what makes baseball great, man.

26:28 Marc Chalpin: Yeah. Look, not as many as before, because when I started coming in, we were all very creative, whereas, very few of the younger Bleacher Creatures are funny, that make new stuff. We got one guy who’s really kind of good at that, but not too many. A lot of it . . . I still come out with the one-liners and the original stuff, but ultimately it comes down to—we’re creatures of habit, and it’s a very fun experience. Ariel was there—it was her first time. She ended up sitting right behind me, and I talked with her for three hours.

Robby Incmikoski: Best. She’s the best.

Marc Chalpin: Yeah, I mean, I’ve known this girl for a week. I feel like she’s amazing. I’m like a fan of her grandfather because she showed me some pictures.

Robby Incmikoski: And he just passed earlier this summer, but . . 

Marc Chalpin: Yeah.

Robby Incmikoski: Hey, one other thing I forgot to ask before I forget, Marc, sorry to interrupt you, but I want to ask: the name “Bleacher Creatures,” how did they get that name? Do you know?

Marc Chalpin: That is definitely a Tina question . . .

Robby Incmikoski: Okay, I’ll ask Tina . . .

Marc Chalpin: Beyond my time . . .

Robby Incmikoski: It’s no problem.

Marc Chalpin: Yeah . . .

Robby Incmikoski: Can you connect me with Tina?

Marc Chalpin: Yeah, I can connect you with Tina. Just got to get her permission.

Robby Incmikoski: L-E-W-I-S?

Marc Chalpin: What’s that? Yeah, L-E-W-I-S. She may want to write a book of her own someday.

Robby Incmikoski: Why wouldn’t she?

Marc Chalpin: Yeah, she would be, it would be a hell of a book. I try to look at the good in the section always. There’s another guy. His name was Tom Brown—he was one of the greatest characters in the section ever. He hasn’t been there much in the last twenty years and hasn’t been there for the current stadium, really.

Robby Incmikoski: Okay.

Marc Chalpin: He was like one of the welcome wagons to the section, and he was one of the first people I got to know. And he’s the one who kept inviting me to any Bleacher events. So he’s a very good friend of mine—I’ve been to his wedding. And that’s something else—we go to each other’s weddings.

Robby Incmikoski: Great man.

Marc Chalpin: But Tom . . . when he stopped coming—that’s one part of it. While we’re very different people, I wanted to be the welcome wagon guy.

Robby Incmikoski: Right.

Marc Chalpin: So in many cases, I’m the first person people meet, more so now because of the roll call. But I try to make it so I’m nice to you unless you give me reason not to be.

Robby Incmikoski: Yeah, Marc, you’re fantastic. I really enjoyed this. This is really, really good, man. And if you can connect me with Tina, that would be just tremendous.

Marc Chalpin: And you want to talk to Milton too . . .

Robby Incmikoski: I would like—what’s his name? Milton what? I’m gonna mark this down.

Marc Chalpin: Milton Ousland.

Robby Incmikoski: I’m gonna Marc this down, right? M-I-L-T-O-N . . . Ousland?

Marc Chalpin: Yeah, M-I-L-T-O-N O-U-S-L-A-N-D.

Robby Incmikoski: Oh, Ousland, okay.

***Marc Chalpin: I’ll tell you something: I would love to see him at more Yankee games, because there is a difference when he’s there and when he’s not, because I do the roll call—I’m done two minutes into the game. I’ll just gab with anybody. But Milton, he has this, the cowbell that rallies the team, and we have this chant that we do with it, and it fires the crowd up. He does it the whole game, or different times during the game, and he doesn’t come as often as he did. I think mostly, partially because of work, partially because of the price, and it’s better when he’s there.

Robby Incmikoski: Of course.

Marc Chalpin: And he’s just a great guy. I give him all the props in the world.

Robby Incmikoski: Yeah. This is great, man. So if you don’t mind, I have your number locked in my phone, and I can get in touch with you, or you get in touch with me or whatever. The Yankees have home field, so you’ll see them . . .

Marc Chalpin: I’ll be there Monday.

Robby Incmikoski: You’ll see them Monday. So you’ll see him Monday. If you think of it, will you just give them a mention. And like I said, the reason I asked you about Fridays is because they wouldn’t have played today anyway even if there was a Game 5, so . . .

Marc Chalpin: Yeah.

Robby Incmikoski: I’m real respectful of the baseball schedule. So I just know that . . . we can talk on an off day or after the season ends, which hopefully is for you guys after the World Series with the Yankees holding the trophy above their head.

Marc Chalpin: Yeah, we could use that.

Robby Incmikoski: So Tina and Milton are who I should speak to, you said, right?. That’ll really help tell the story of the Bleacher Creatures. Man, that would be awesome.

Marc Chalpin: Yeah, yeah. I mean, there’s a lot of stories I didn’t touch on, but you know I could. It’s just—I feel like I don’t want to step on Tina’s toes or Milton’s toes. I mean, Milton’s been there since he’s thirteen years old; Tina—I mean, there’s so many stories I didn’t even get to.

Robby Incmikoski: There’s—yeah, of course.

Marc Chalpin: Ultimately, I think a good experience is just coming and watching a game. In the things we used to do that we can’t—I mean, you know, times change and you gotta roll with it.

Robby Incmikoski: Yep.

Marc Chalpin: And sometimes there were things the Yankees asked us to stop doing, and that’s not “You guys are 100% right. It’s 20-whatever, and we can’t do that anymore,” and I get it. You gotta be respectful of things. And ultimately, you gotta be respectful of people, except if they’re on the other team.

Robby Incmikoski: Yep. Yes, amen. You’re gonna have an opponent, you know, so . . .

Marc Chalpin: Yeah. I mean, look, part of our job is to get under their skin. I remember one time yelling at a player—we got Wikipedia now, we can do a lot. I think it was Carl Everett; he was in the press for beating his . . . So we’re like, “Which has more stitches, the ball or your kid’s face?”

Robby Incmikoski: Wait, say that again. What?

Marc Chalpin: “What has more stitches, the ball or your kid’s face?”

Robby Incmikoski: Oh my God.

Marc Chalpin: We recycle that line . . . if they beat their wife, or—obviously, the Astros, we certainly have some choice things to say. I mean, being in the bleachers, one of the cool things that happened was when the Astros came to New York for the first time after COVID, and this is the first time after the scandal, I got interviewed by the New York Post. And what I didn’t know was that I was the only fan they were interviewing. So I see myself on the back page of the Post, being quoted, and I basically got the honor of telling the Astros to go fuck themselves for the entire city of New York. And I’m like, “I’ll do that anytime.” I basically told them that their championship was crap and it doesn’t count because they cheated.

Robby Incmikoski: Right.

Marc Chalpin: It just sucks that the 2017 Yankees paid the price for that. They might have gone all the way that year.

Robby Incmikoski: Hilarity—that is hilarious.

Marc Chalpin: Yeah, yeah. So one time there was a player—I’m not gonna name him—but in the minor leagues, he stopped playing baseball for three weeks because his girlfriend cheated on him. So I yelled that out. And the whole crowd was, “Whoa,” and then he turned around—“All right, I got you.” I mean, here’s a good one: getting creativity—when Ichiro was on the Mariners, I learned how to curse in Japanese just to yell at him.

Robby Incmikoski: Oh my God.

Marc Chalpin: And we had a Japanese guy making sure we got it right. So if you ever saw the movie Major League—the very beginning, you see these Japanese players cleaning the field and they’re saying that, and you see the subtitles saying they’re shady.

Robby Incmikoski: Right.

Marc Chalpin: I’m sure you’ve seen the movie . . .

Robby Incmikoski: Yeah, years ago, but yeah.

Marc Chalpin: . . . know what I’m talking about. So one of the Japanese Bleacher Creatures told me the word, and it was in Major League, the same word, and it’s easy to chant: “Hetakuso.” So it means, “You’re an incompetent shit.” It’s a big insult in Japanese, so . . .

Robby Incmikoski: It means, “You’re an incompetent shit?” Is that what it means?

Marc Chalpin: Yes, yes. And here’s another one: “mano kachin chōsenjin”—[Anata no okāsan wa kangokujindesu is what came up on Google. dn] that means, “Your mother’s a Korean,” just stupid shit. But what’s really funny is that when Ichiro was there and Matsui was there—you know, you have a lot of Japanese people show up in the section. And when I would yell that stuff, they would crack up. Like, “How the hell do you even know Japanese?” And one time Ichiro made an error—and this guy never shows emotion—we went on him. He took a ball and fake-threw it into the crowd and walked off the field. So we knew we kind of got to him.

I mean, we like to go above and beyond the traditional just “you suck” chant. You know, it’s, we gotta be creative. I always say, in the bleachers, we innovate, other people imitate. That’s why we don’t do the wave. Or at least, it’s why I don’t do the wave. This is why we don’t even do the “Let’s go, Yankees” chant—other sections do—but whenever that happens, we’ll yell, “Where are they going?” Because we’ll do “Here we go, Yankees,” ’cause “Let’s go, Yankees” sounds too much like “Let’s go, Mets,” so I don’t like to do that one.

Robby Incmikoski: Right.

Marc Chalpin: But we’re a very unique section. I think we’re a very clever group of people, and we’ve got traditions that go back decades. But if you’re a true Yankee fan, and we see you a lot, we’ll start to get to know you, and it takes time to become a real Bleacher Creature. I always say the definition of a Bleacher Creature is—it’s not buying a shirt. You’re a Bleacher Creature when Tina says you’re a Bleacher Creature, and not before. Some people—you’re in the section a couple of years, and then she starts to see you. Chances are, though, she probably sizes you up right away and figures out who the real people are. There are people there who show up just for social purposes, but for the most part we care about the Yankees—we want to win, we want to see them win. We have the hunger that George Steinbrenner did and Derek Jeter did, you know—the best championship is the next one.

Robby Incmikoski: Yeah.

Marc Chalpin: And, right now I’m glad we won the Division Series, but I’m not jumping around like we won the World Series, ’cause we got more rounds to go, and we’re not even 30 percent done yet. So, good—that’s what we’re supposed to do. Now, win the next four, and then win the last four, and that’s what matters. And believe me, nothing would make me happier—I’ve never done the roll call in the World Series because we haven’t gone there yet, so I would love to do that.

Robby Incmikoski: And if that happens, I want to bring you back on for that. Hey, I have Alex Collins, I have Clark the Cub joining us here in about three minutes, so I gotta run on this, Marc.

Marc Chalpin: Okay, okay.

Robby Incmikoski: You are fantastic, man.

Marc Chalpin: Thank you.

Robby Incmikoski: And if you think of it, talk to them—my number is the 215 number. I can send you a text, or I can send you an email. You can connect me with Tina and with Milton—that would be unbelievable. That’d be great. We would love to have them tell their version of the Bleacher Creatures.

Marc Chalpin: Is this book all Yankee Stadium, or is it like a chapter?

Robby Incmikoski: It’s all thirty books. Eexcuse me, all thirty ballparks, not all thirty books. Each ballpark is a chapter, and we’re gonna do a bonus chapter on the Hall of Fame, and then we’re gonna have a user-submitted chapter from the one-off ballparks where we credit photos that people send me, and we just put them all there, and that’s it. And what I’m doing is, each ballpark is a chapter, and we’re putting three to five stories from each one. So I talked to Meredith Marakovits, I talked to you, I talked to Ariel, I’m gonna talk to the curator Brian Richards, and then the other two, and that’s gonna be enough angles for that. But then, in the book are gonna be QR codes. And the QR codes are going to take you to a site that has the rest of the pictures, because I have over 8,000 pictures between all the ballparks. A lot of “access” pictures, right? Like the tunnel, the dugout, the bat rack, the helmet rack. You know, just special. The concourses, the food stands, all that, right? Just kind of giving people a tour of each ballpark, using my access. And then the longer versions of each story are going to go into it, so we’ll be able to tell all three of your stories on the site. But in the book, as you obviously know, we can only fit so many words onto a page.

Marc Chalpin: Sure, sure.

Robby Incmikoski: So it’s kind of an interactive project where we’re catering—like, this book would be for . . . you would love this, because you’re a big fan of baseball, right? So you would be able to look at all thirty ballparks, see some really cool pictures, and then you can dive into it as much or as little as you want, right? Like, you’ll be able to, you know what I’m saying, you’ll be able to look at one chapter, and you can get lost in all the pictures, because I took it with a digital camera. It’s a really cool, it’s a good camera, takes good pictures, and it just kind of gives people a tour of each ballpark. Like people who can’t do it—how many people want to travel to all thirty ballparks? There’s probably hundreds [thousands? dn] of them, right? And they can’t do it for whether it’s financial, family, health, whatever the reason is, not everybody can do it. My best friend in Pittsburgh is six, five stadiums away, and it’s taken him probably twelve, fifteen years to do it—so he’s trying to do like two or three, one or two a year, he tries to do, and he’s five ballparks away.

Marc Chalpin: Yeah, we should definitely talk again, ’cause I’m sure there’s a lot more we gotta go over.

Robby Incmikoski: There are people we’re gonna revisit. So next week, I got a [?] fan, a Pirates fan, Jamey Carroll, Glen Perkins who got the save in the 2014 All-Star Game—he’s a Minnesotan—Neil Walker, former Yankee, he’s a close friend of mine. Gonna talk to him. So there’s a lot of different people we’re getting into this book, and we’re covering the gamut all over the place.

Marc Chalpin: You should talk to Jimmy Leyritz too.

Robby Incmikoski: I would love to talk to Leyritz . . .

Marc Chalpin: He’s in Chicago—he’s a good guy. [I didn’t hear this. dn]

Robby Incmikoski: If you connect me with him, I instantaneously would put him in—no question.

Marc Chalpin: Meredith has been out to the bleachers several times. I put her in the roll call .

Robby Incmikoski: Yep.

Marc Chalpin: Yeah, when, when a famous person, when a famous person comes out there, I try to put them in the roll call at the end.

Robby Incmikoski: Yep. Let’s talk, man. I gotta jump on this other call.

Marc Chalpin: Okay, I know you gotta go, okay.

Robby Incmikoski: Marc, you’re the man. It’s just that I booked one at ten and one at eleven. I don’t like to keep guests the waiting—I like to be waiting for them.

Marc Chalpin: I hear you, no worries.

Robby Incmikoski: Marc, thank you, my friend. It’s great meeting you. I enjoyed this, brother. Thank you.

Marc Chalpin: Likewise—talk to you later.

Robby Incmikoski: Take care, Marc. Amen. Bye.