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Pinstripe Pandemonium as Jeter Crosses 3,000-Hit Mark

By DNAinfo Staff on July 9, 2011 8:34pm

By Olivia Scheck, Tuan Nguyen and Tom Liddy

MANHATTAN — He's a hit.

Yankees fans around Manhattan tipped their hats and glasses to the Bombers' captain, Derek Jeter, Saturday after he knocked in his 3,000th hit in front of a roaring home crowd.

"[It was] unbelievable — you're cheering, you're crying, everything you could possibly feel," said George Smith, 59, a Yankees fan from Maryland, who was celebrating at Mickey Mantle’s on Central Park South.

"He does represent everything that's good in baseball. [With] all that's happened with steroids and everything, it's just great to have a guy like Derek Jeter."

Jeter reached the milestone in superstar fashion, belting a homer to left in his second at-bat against the Tampa Bay, sending the throngs that packed into Yankee Stadium to their feet in a deafening cheer.

Jeter, the first Yankee to join the vaunted 3,000 club, went on to rack up a double and two singles, including an RBI that helped propel the Bombers to a 5-4 win.

Tricia Munson, 57, a California teacher originally from New Jersey and a huge Jeter fan, came to New York with her daughter Meghan, 26, for Sunday's game thinking the star shortstop would achieve the milestone then.

"I had tears in my eyes," she said at Mickey Mantle's. "He's like my kid."

Munson is such a huge fan that she covered her classroom "in Derek Jeter stuff — posters, bobble head dolls."

"I tell my kids, 'Use that young man as your role model'," she said.

Also at the Yankees watering hole was Rudy Pena, 51, from Dallas, Tex., who hasn't had lady luck on his side in watching his beloved Bombers.

He went to the game before A-Rod belted his 500th home run, came into town for Friday's game, which was rained out and then couldn't make it to Saturday's historic game.

"Everybody went nuts," he said. "I said we missed Rodriguez, we've got to catch Jeter's."

"He's got a very good persona about him — as a human being, as a role model," he added. "I think it's fantastic."

Fans also flocked to the Yankee Clubhouse Shop in Times Square.

“I think it’s wonderful that he got his [3,000th hit], especially the home run," said Ann Lenis, 72, of Westchester, a lifelong fan, who was picking up commemorative shirts for herself and some pals.

"Three things in one shot: a home run, his 3,000th hit and he tied the game. Three-for-one. Couldn’t be any better.”

And Emma Rivera, 36, of Brooklyn, said it's "good to be a Yankee fan right now."

“He has been the absolute leader of the Yankees for more than a decade. He’s got the big hit when the club needed it," she said. "Getting a home run as the 3,000th. Just classic Derek Jeter. Can’t say enough about him. He’s great. It’s amazing."