According to Newday's Ken Davidoff, the MFYs aren't doing their countdown any better than the Mets: ----------------------------------------------------------------------- Call Midweek Insider a cheesy sentimentalist, but back on Opening Night, I was looking forward to the Yankees "countdown," in which, after each game becomes official, a dignitary pulls a phony lever to notate the number of regular-season contests remaining at Yankee Stadium. If there's one team that could pull this off, after all - finding 81 people of interest - it's the Yankees. Yet the routine has become a parody of itself during this current homestand. On Sunday night, a man identified "the number one Yankees fan in Rochester" pulled the lever. There was no applause. So who was he? A pal of Hal Steinbrenner's. So close, in fact, that the gentleman received a ride from Rochester to New York on the Steinbrenner family plane Sunday. Which is fine. It's the Steinbrenners' team. But it's not quite having 81 Yankees legends - or even some old football Giants people, or someone like Billy Joel who has performed at the Stadium - doing the honor.