On Wednesday, New York mayor Bill de Blasio appeared on the Jonah Keri Podcast. In addition to politics, the pair discussed a few sporting items, including de Blasio's experiences with being a Boston Red Sox fan who serves as the New York mayor.

Keri asked de Blasio about not attending Yankee Stadium, and about continuing to be true to his original fandom. Here's what de Blasio said on those topics:

"This is what I learned along the way. There's a big difference between [Michael] Bloomberg and I on this front. With real respect for him -- and I mean it -- he actually once said to me that he was a Boston Braves fan originally, before they left, which is not impossible chronologically. I would say whatever he was, baseball was not particularly central to his life. Whereas for me, it's quasi-religious. I remind people I came by it very naturally because my family moved up to Massachusetts in 1966 and then, if you know anything about the 'Impossible Dream' year of 1967 -- if you were a sentient being, you were going to be moved by that. And then 1975, which I still would argue is the great World Series of all-time. 

So, my feeling begins with a deep kind of fandom that I think real fans understand. First, if you truly love the game; and second, if you believe in your team and that's not a transferable fungible thing. So, what I found is, when I started running for mayor, it was just like, let's get this over with. I am who I am, I'm not changing, it's not like something I could change -- I couldn't fake it if I wanted to, it's too deep in me. So, I just kind of came out with it. What's amazing is people liked -- this is what I got all over the city -- they didn't like my choice, but they did like my honesty. And that's what I found ever since is that pretty much people are like, 'okay, at least you're not -- unlike, unfortunately, some people in public life -- you're not lying to us, you're certainly not doing it for political advantage, maybe it's just the truth."

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Listen to the complete podcast with mayor Bill de Blasio here: