Talk Bronx New York

 Whether you’re a Yankee fan or a Yankee hater, Thursday’s home opener in the Bronx was a can’t-miss event.

For Yankee fans (photo by James Keivom/Daily News), it was a chance to christen the new ballpark, while at the same time celebrate the 26 World Championships and incredible history of the Bombers.

For Yankee haters (aka Met fans) like myself, it was a chance to get infuriated by the pomp - or in this case pompous - and circumstance of another glorious Yankee opener. You know, the 26 World Championships, the great legends of the past and the new shrine to baseball on full display.

But as much as I was hoping for the celebration to be so over the top that I could goof on it for months to come, I have to admit it was very tastefully done.

John Fogerty was a nice touch, the Bernie Williams song - was it on tape? - was classy, if not a wee bit boring, and the parade of former Yankees was great.

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Allerton Ballfield in the Bronx renovated before All-Star Game

Cal Ripken Jr. works with Outsiders’ Edison Montalvo on his swing as Hall of Famer helps over revamped Allerton Ballfields with brother Billy and Bernie Williams

Emmanuel Fabre is a middle infielder from the Bronx, a wiry, 5-7, 140-pound kid who steals bases and hits balls in gaps, and is a key player for a fine youth baseball team called the Outsiders.

He is walking across the freshly renovated infield of the Allerton Ballfield in the Bronx, eyes wide with enthusiasm. The bumps and craters that made every ground ball an adventure have given way to evenly graded clay - the very same dirt used at that field a few miles away, Yankee Stadium. The new pitcher’s mound is pristine, the dugout benches upgraded and painted, the massive poison ivy patch climbing up the first-base fence a withering brown memory.

There may be a gala, and emotionally loaded All-Star Game, being played at the Stadium on Tuesday, but if you ask the Outsiders and the other ballplayers from the neighborhood, this $100,000 slice of urban renewal - courtesy of a public-private partnership between the city parks department and Nike’s Let Me Play initiative - is no small event, either.

“No more bad hops,” Fabre says. “They fixed the field totally.”

John Finck is the president of the Outsiders Baseball Association.

“The infield used to be a lunar landscape,” Finck says. “Now look at it.”

The new field - just off of Webster Ave. by 204th St. - was officially dedicated Saturday, after a whirlwind construction process that began on July 1 and was completed three days ago. Who says things can’t get done quickly in New York City? Of course, it doesn’t hurt when you have Nike capital and clout pushing for completion by All-Star weekend, or to have the services of Eve Burton - she’s VP and general counsel for the Hearst Corp., and John Finck’s spouse - navigating the labyrinth of city bureaucracy.

Bob Buono, whose company, Tri-State Athletic Fields and Services, did the contracting, says that it was one of the worst fields he has ever seen, not a surprise when you consider that the Allerton Ballfields, like most city parks, never get a rest, whether from soccer, baseball or softball.

Still, they got it done, and Nike was happy.

“When you promote sports and physical fitness, you make kids better and you make the world better,” says Nike spokesman Dejuan Wilkins. “That’s the philosophy behind Let Me Play.”

The ceremony Saturday featured Parks commissioner Adrian Benape, Bernie Williams, Cal Ripken Jr. and his brother Billy, and some 150 kids from various baseball clubs, including 40 Outsiders - almost entirely Latino kids from the Bronx between the ages of 16 and 18 who play in the competitive Westchester Baseball Association.

After the talking was done, the Ripken brothers and Williams ran the kids through a clinic. The kids got to work on their swings in prop-up nets, field grounders and shag flies.

“Every swing helps,” center fielder Eury Garcia of the Outsuders said. “Cal Ripken is helping us with bat speed, giving us tips - stay back, no lunging.”

Outsiders such as Emmanuel Fabre reveled in the care that went into the field. Edison Montalvo, the team’s star right fielder and cleanup hitter, imagined himself hitting his ropes and making his throws from right in a big-league field one day.

For now, the Outsiders play their home games at Roberto Clemente State Park. After the way the organization got the new field in, it has been assured of getting priority treatment when the Parks Dept. hands out permits next spring. There is an acute shortage of ballfields in the Bronx, and an even more acute shortage of good fields.

The shortage just got a little better, and you could tell just by seeing Emmanuel Fabre’s face.

“Compared to the way it used to be,” says Tony Reyes, the 33-year-old coach of the Outsiders, “this is like Yankee Stadium now.”

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Miriam Chan once lived in a house a few blocks from the one that Ruth built.

“Oh, what a player that Ruth was,” Chan said recently as she pulled a Yankee cap over her head. “What a beautiful swing.”

Chan, who was 6 when her family moved to Manhattan from the Bronx, has been around to celebrate all of the Yankees’ 26 World Series championships, including the first in 1923, which came at the expense of the New York Giants.

“I’ve been a Yankee fan my whole life,” she said, “and that’s a pretty long time.”

When asked how long, she balked.

“Let’s just say I’m in my 80s and I’m lying about it,” she said.

Chan, a widow and mother of two who lives on the Upper East Side, still takes the train to her old neighborhood to watch the Yankees play, and she plans to visit their new house next season.

“It’s kind of sad that my guys are moving to a new stadium, but time changes everything,” she said. “I guess I’ll just take my memories across the street.”

Those memories stretch from Babe Ruth to Lou Gehrig — “Oh, that poor man, that’s all we could talk about when he got sick,” she said — to Joe DiMaggio to Mickey Mantle to Bobby Murcer to Don Mattingly to Derek Jeter and Alex Rodriguez.

Chan has been a regular at Yankee Stadium since the mid-1930s, when she was an art student at Hunter College. She later became a sketch artist in the fashion industry.

“One year, there was a fire at Hunter, so the students were moved to an unoccupied building in the Bronx,” she said. “On the train ride home from school, my girlfriends and I would pass Yankee Stadium. We started getting off the train and going to the games, and I’ve been a die-hard ever since.”

Chan spends a good part of her year at her home in Palm Beach, Fla., but is back in New York before the start of each baseball season.

“A good dose of the Yankees and a little of that New York pollution keeps my system going,” she said.

Through the years, Chan has seen a number of great Yankees come and go, but her favorite is Bernie Williams.

“He carried himself with so much class and dignity,” she said, “and he was such a graceful player, kind of like DiMaggio in that way.”

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Robinson Cano Joins Yankees For 4 Year $30M Deal 

The Yankees traditionally have eschewed giving long-term contracts to their young players. Robinson Cano became an exception to that Thursday.

The Yankees finalized a four-year contract that guarantees second baseman Cano at least $30 million. With club options for 2012 and 2013, it could turn into a six-year, $57-million contract.

There have been times, general manager Brian Cashman said, that the Yankees have been on the path to getting something done, as with Derek Jeter years ago, but owner George Steinbrenner blanched. There have been other times, Cashman said, that the Yankees have wanted to do something but couldn’t get the player and agent to come to their negotiating neighborhood, as with a young Bernie Williams. But mostly, the Yankees simply haven’t tried to lock up players until they hit free agency.

“Robby is one of the emerging talents in the game,” Cashman said by phone. “He’s a tremendous hitter, and he’s dedicated to getting better and better … He has the chance, God willing, if he stays healthy and productive, he’s going to have a tremendous career. He’s already proven he can play in New York. When you have players that prove they can handle the stress and pressure of playing here, like Robby has, you’ve got to put your arms around them.”

Cano’s agent, Bobby Barad, said by phone: “We’re very happy. That was the goal when we started these conversations. We both knew each other quite well and had some conversations going back to as far as spring training. Just through those conversations, both of us had interest.”

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