I’m a Yankees fan. I was born in the Bronx and I grew up in love with the city and the team. As long as they’re playing, I can’t root for anyone else. But when the Yankees got $252 million shortstop Alex Rodriguez from the Texas Rangers for second baseman Alfonso Soriano and an unnamed prospect over the weekend, the deal even rubbed me wrong.

After three years in the heart of Red Sox Nation, I’m used to being spit on. But the Yanks signing the highest paid player ever two months after Boston’s bid for him fell makes me fear for my life. People who used to consider me a friend have already told me where to shove my A-Rod. The rivalry seems less friendly each season.

Maybe Yankees owner George Steinbrenner heard the Vegas odds had swung in favor of the Red Sox on the eve of spring training. Maybe General Manager Brian Cashman thought his Sox counterpart Theo Epstein looked a little too smug holding a pair of aces in his hand and Keith Foulke in his bullpen.

Maybe the Yankees front office decided it just wasn’t worth waiting for third baseman Aaron Boone’s leg, injured in an offseason pickup basketball game, to heal. Never mind that Boone – in just his 54th game in pinstripes – made history last October with the 11th inning shot that sent the Yankees to the Fall Classic and sent Red Sox fans home silent. With an injured Boone, why not go out and buy the best shortstop in the majors – and put him at third base?

I’m preparing for another season of hearing about how The Boss just wants to buy the World Series and how the Yankees payroll dwarfs all others. But deep pockets alone don’t win games – the Mets, with the second highest payroll in baseball, can testify to that.

Soriano is a Yankee through and through. This year, he would have entered his sixth season on the team – his fourth as a starter – and he has never played for another team in the majors. With Soriano gone, the Yankees have turned over more than half of their starting lineup and four of their five-man pitching rotation this winter.

The group of players they have put together looks great – A-Rod is just the jewel in the crown – and I’m sure they’ll win a lot of games. But I’d rather see them be a team – the way the Red Sox were at the end of last year, when fans cried “Cowboy Up” and players would run into the Landsdowne bars after games and spray beer on the patrons.

If a Yankees fan can be jealous of a Red Sox fan, it won’t be over Pedro Martinez or Manny Ramirez. It will be over Kevin Millar and Trot Nixon and the other Sox players whose clubhouse hijinks make Boston baseball thrilling, even to an outsider and outcast like me.

My favorite player growing up was Don Mattingly, who retired in 1995 after 14 seasons in New York – and not one championship. The Yankees I love the most and cheer the hardest are the guys who rose through the ranks to become true leaders of the team: Jorge Posada, Bernie Williams, Mariano Rivera – and yes, Derek Jeter. Hideki Matsui could be one of those guys down the road. Soriano was well on his way.

So when the Yanks face the Rangers this season (the first game is on May 21 in Texas), I’ll cheer for A-Rod if he hits a home run. But I’ll cheer louder for Soriano, because to me he belongs in a Yankees uniform.

I know baseball is about winning, and if you work for George Steinbrenner it’s about winning everything every year. And I know as a Yankees fan I’ll always be spit on in Boston. I’ll never stop rooting for my team, but as Yankees pitchers and catchers report to Tampa today, this seems less and less like my team.