I was at a taxi rally on Thursday in City Hall Park when my friend Lark from the Mayor's Office asked me for my business card so she could put me on the list to work the Yankee Parade after they win the World Series. I was elated to know that once again, I would be on a float going down the Canyon of Heroes to the cheers of hundreds of thousands of Yankee fans celebrating the Yankee's 27th World Series Championship.

But none of that will happen now - because the Yankees lost to the Florida Marlins last night in Game 6 of the World Series - and The Florida Marlins are now the 2003 World Series Champions.

While I am obviously very upset, I am also disappointed in the Bronx Bombers this year more than I have ever been before. The Yankees had this Series in the bag, especially after beating both the Minnesota Twins and the Boston Red Sox in two very heated battles. Honestly, I think they blew this series due to errors, sit-outs due to pain - and poor hitting. And we not only lost the last game - we lost it miserably. We lost the game to a pitcher who threw a five-hitter on only three days rest. And if that is not bad enough, not a single Yankee made it as far as third base - and of the two runs that The Marlins scored - one was unearned to due a bad throw by Derek Jeter and a missed tag by Jorge Posada. If it were any other team that lost last night's game, I would have chalked it up to a bad night - but not the Yankees. They are the team that is supposed to come from behind and beat anybody that gets in their way - anyone, but the Florida Marlins.

Whatever the reason for the loss, all I know is that last night, another team besides the Yankees were celebrating on the field at Yankee Stadium for the first time since the Los Angeles Dodgers beat the Yankees in the World Series in 1981. And as that other team was celebrating on the Yankee's home turf - the 55,773 fans in attendance and the millions at home were as silent as the Yankees were in the dugout while the Marlins reveled in their victory.

I know that most Yankee fans this morning are saying the old, "We'll get 'em next year" thing, but I am not so sure anymore. From 1996 to 2000, the Yankees were an unstoppable machine, winning every World Series in those five years except the one in 1997 - which was ironically won by the Florida Marlins. But after they beat the Mets in 2000, they seemed to never be the same again. They made it to the World Series in 2001 and lost to the Arizona Diamondbacks, they were embarrassingly defeated in the first round of the playoffs in 2002 - and now this. Whatever does come in the 2004 Baseball Season, it better be a return to the Yankees that destroyed their competition with little or no mercy - instead of the somber performances that we have seen in the last three years.

Suddenly this morning - New York seems a little colder than it did yesterday.