Add Sonny Gray's hypocritical letter to fire that's engulfed Red Sox-Yankees rivalry

Either Sonny Gray has a terrible PR rep or a short memory. Gray, the former Yankee who flamed out in New York back in the mid-2010's, is now a member of the Boston Red Sox. The narratives write themselves, but Gray did all of us a favor by providing the quote of the offseason as it pertains to this specific rivalry.

Gray wasn't the pitcher the Red Sox asked for this holiday season. Boston still has more work to do, but Gray gave them just a taste of his inner Yankees hatred. Some players just aren't meant to play in the Bronx – but it wasn't always that way.

What Sonny Gray said about his time pitching with the Yankees

Gray had just a 1.1 bWAR during his time with the Yankees, which lasted almost two seasons. He was acquired to be the top-of-the-rotation starter New York desperately needed. Sound familiar, Boston?

“When I was there (from mid-2017 through 2018), it just didn’t really work for who I am," Gray said.

During his time in the Bronx, Gray claims he had to hide his Yankees hatred. That's no longer the case in Beantown, where Gray won his introductory press conference by wearing a Red Sox World Series cap and filling the conversation with various rivalry talking points.

“What did factor into my decision to come to Boston, it feels good to me to go to a place now where, you know what, it’s easy to hate the Yankees, right?” Gray continued. “It’s easy to go out and have that rivalry and go into it with full force, full steam ahead. I like the challenge.”

As much fodder as Gray provided Boston beat writers on Tuesday, he probably didn't expect anyone to look back at his 2017 Players Tribune article, headlined 'New York, Let's Go' after he was dealt to the Yankees.

Sonny Gray was once grateful to be a Yankee

Gray waxed poetic in that article about how he 'grew up' with the 2009 Yankees World Series team, influenced by key characters like CC Sabathia and AJ Burnett. I'll let Gray tell you himself.

"One of the baseball teams that really meant something to me growing up was the 2009 Yankees — the World Series winner, with CC and A.J. Burnett at the top of the rotation. That was the year after I’d graduated high school, and had gotten drafted, but then decided to go to college — and it was right around the age where I was really trying to figure out if baseball was something that I could turn into a career. And I just remember loving to watch that Yankees team, as they made their run that year, and being so impressed by them, and I guess kind of pumped up about baseball by them — just getting very caught up in it," Gray wrote.

So, what happened between 2017 and now? First, Gray didn't perform up to par. While he says he appreciated his time in New York and it helped turn him into the pitcher he is today, if Gray could go back in time, he wouldn't be a Yankee – period. That's despite statements to the contrary in his Players Tribune piece, when he admitted he bought his then-2-year-old son a Yankees cap. To put it simply, something doesn't add up here.

How does Sonny Gray really feel about the Yankees-Red Sox rivalry?

Gray wasn't a good fit in New York. That shouldn't come as a huge surprise, as he admitted as much, grew up in the south and has spent much of his career pitching on small-market teams. Pitching for the Yankees helped prepare him for Boston, in a way, as the Beantown media can be just as tough as New York's when the Red Sox are losing. Gray will find that out the hard way.

The 36-year-old appreciate the experience of playing with the Yankees because he discovered New York wasn't for him. Some players embrace the spotlight until they realize it's too much for them. Those Yankees teams failed to live up to expectations, and Gray followed suit.

“I do appreciate my time” in New York, Gray said. “I do feel like the last seven years of my career, my life and everything, I’ve been a better baseball player, husband, everything from having that experience and going through that. I just feel like I learned so much after going through that."

Gray's comments will undoubtedly feed the media firestorm that already exists around anything Yankees-Red Sox related. These two teams hate each other, and their rivalry transcends sports. Gray's feelings aren't so simple.