The Yankees Suck!

Welcome to Safeco Field, where you won't even see the word "suck" in a vacuum-cleaner ad.

Welcome to the ballpark, where, unless you're Alex Rodriguez, you will never see a discouraging word.

Welcome to the first stadium in America with a dress code.

Where do these people think we live? Pleasantville?

What sport do they think we're watching? Cricket?

The Mariners denied yesterday that they were replacing the seventh-inning stretch with a tea interval.

Tonight's game with the Blue Jays will be the first Mariners home game since "The Great T-Shirt Controversy." The first game at Safeco since fans who bought "Yankees Suck" T-shirts outside the stadium and wore them into the game with New York were given the choices to turn the shirts inside out, remove the shirts or remove themselves.

Where are we living? Mayberry RFD?

Frankly, the message on the T-shirts was stupid. The idea that the Yankees suck is ridiculous. They have won 38 American League pennants and 26 world championships. They have played in the World Series five of the last six years and have won four of them.

Tampa Bay is coming to town in a couple of weeks. I challenge any censor to argue against the idea that the D-Rays suck. But the Yankees?

It reminds me of my mother complaining about the language at Connie Mack Stadium when we went to watch the Philadelphia Phillies play.

"I hate it when Steve hears fans around him yelling, 'Phillies Suck,' " my mother said. "He hears enough of that at home."

To be honest, the Mariners should have been celebrating the message on these T-shirts. It wasn't that many years ago that Seattle fans were more likely to wear "Mariners Suck" shirts to the game.

Wearing the T-shirt is silly, but it isn't obscene. It isn't the first step on the slippery slope to battery and beer-bottle throwing. To paraphrase former Cincinnati Bengals coach Sam Wyche: This isn't Cleveland.

Seattle is the epicenter of sports civility. You'll hear more catcalls at Disneyland than you will at Safeco Field.

Seattle fans aren't like the Detroit fans who booed the Canadian national anthem before the first game of the Pistons-Raptors playoff series. We won't boo the Canadian anthem tonight. We like the exchange rate too much.

Yo Mariners! Don't be so uptight. I checked with Ozzy Osbourne: "Suck" is not a vulgar world. Hey, I heard it used twice last night on "SportsCenter." It's so unvulgar, Mike Tyson wouldn't be caught dead using it in a conversation.

Hey, it's in Webster's. It's used on "Law and Order." It's in the "Congressional Record."

Obscene? I'll tell you what's obscene: Playing "Who Let The Dogs Out" 136 times a night, like the Mariners did during the 2000 playoff run.

Even though I grew up in Philadelphia, I'm all for decorum at the ballpark. I've seen enough drunken brawls at Veterans Stadium to last the rest of my sport-viewing life.

But, in Seattle, dissent can be squashed quicker than an anti-government rally in Tiananmen Square.

Last winter, in what was to become Bob Bender's last home game as Washington's basketball coach, several students brought signs to the game expressing their displeasure with another losing season.

But before the game, ushers descended on them and removed signs that read, "Thanks for the Memories," "We're No. 8," and "Bye Bye Bender." This happened on a college campus, where the free exchange of ideas is supposed to be encouraged.

You have to wonder what is next at Safeco, a stadium the T-shirt-buying public financed. Will concessionaires be forced to sell only non-alcoholic beer and decaf coffee? And shouldn't the sale of kettle korn be banned? Do we really want a bunch of children on a sugar high at the ballpark?

Welcome to Safeco Field, where the summer will be full of wondrous nights, where some of the best baseball will be played.

But be careful what you wear. Big Brother is watching.