If you’re a Red Sox fan, there is only one reason to watch the World Series:

To root against the Yankees.

And if you’re a Red Sox fan, there are at least 27 reasons to hope the Phillies thwart the Bronx Bombers in New York’s bid to win a 27th World Series.

If you can think of more, feel free to send them along. For inspiration, you might want to watch DVDs of Games Four through Seven of the 2004 ALCS.

•1. The Boss. And I don’t mean Springsteen.

•2. Hank Steinbrenner. Like father, like son. Or, from a Red Sox standpoint, dislike father, dislike son.

•3. The Yankees’ bloated payroll of more than $201 million. That’s $65 million more than that of the next-biggest spender, the New York Mets. To put that in perspective, there are seven teams whose payrolls are less than $66 million, and 21 teams with payrolls totaling less than $100 million. The Red Sox don’t happen to be one of bottom-spenders, but they spend much less than the Yanks.

•4. The new Yankee Stadium, a.k.a. the Evil Empire’s Edifice of Excess, with its $2,500 box seats. While the Yanks abandoned the legendary “House That Ruth Built,” the Red Sox have done a marvelous job renovating, as the late John Updike referred to it, their vintage, classic, “lyric little bandbox of a ballpark.”

•5. A-Rod. Which is a sweeter memory for Red Sox fans — Rodriguez’s oh-so-sweet slap at Bronson Arroyo, trying to knock the ball from the Boston pitcher’s hand, or seeing Jason Varitek’s mitt in A-Rod’s face?

•6. Kate Hudson. Better she should have stayed with Adam Scott.

•7. The Joba Rules. Rules were made to be broken.

•8. Roger Clemens. Bill Clinton “did not have sex with that woman,” and Roger never, ever, not once, used performance-enhancing drugs.

•9. John Sterling. Yankees win! Thu-uh-uh-uh Yankees win!

•10. They play in New York City. Which isn’t Boston.

•11. The Straw That Stirs The Drink, a.k.a. Mr. October. Compared to Reginald Martinez Jackson, Pedro Martinez is a shy and retiring model of modesty.

•12. Billy Martin. The fiery former Yankees second baseman was fired no fewer than five times as manager of the Yanks by similarly short-fused owner George Steinbrenner. Martin once said of Jackson and the Boss: “The two were meant for each other. One’s a born liar. The other’s convicted.” Ah, yes, lest we forget — George is a felon.

•13. Yogi Berra. Actually we love Yogi. But another reason to root against the Yankees is that after he won the pennant in his first year as manager, he was fired for losing the World Series to the Cardinals in seven games in 1964. Hired again by Steinbrenner in ’84, Berra led the Yanks to a third-place finish, then was fired just 16 games into the ’85 season.

•14. Mike Kekich and Fritz Peterson. In what ranks as the most infamous trade in baseball history, the two Yankees pitcher swapped wives.

•15. Steve Howe. Steroids weren’t his drug of choice. Had they been, it would have been much better for him.

•16. Darryl Strawberry. Yeah, he played for the Yankees, too.

•17. Ed Figueroa, who threw at Red Sox catcher Carlton Fisk in 1977 after Pudge had blasted two home runs, nearly inciting a brawl. “You can’t tell me,” Fisk said angrily, “that the man throws 57 sinkers in a row, two get blasted 900 feet, and then one slips.”

•18. Red Sox pitcher Bill Lee, after injuring his left shoulder in a melee around the mound with the Yankees in 1976, famously proclaimed: “I was assaulted by Steinbrenner’s Nazis, his Brown Shirts. They’re led by Bill Martin — Herman Goering the second.” Wow. Talk about a truly Evil Empire.

•19. Carl Mays. The only pitcher in major league history to have killed a man — Cleveland catcher Ray Chapman — by hitting him with a pitched ball

•20. The Bronx Zoo. As in the Yankees’ clubhouse in the late ’70s, not the popular menagerie.

•21. Dave Winfield, who was dubbed “Mr. May” by Mr. Steinbrenner.

•22. Hal Chase. New York’s first baseman in the early years of the 20th century, he was the Pete Rose of his era, wagering on his own team’s games. Unlike Rose, he sometimes bet on his team to lose.

•23. Hearing the recording of Frank Sinatra, singing “New York, New York” every time the Yankees win. Although, truth be told, I’d rather hear ol’ Blue Eyes croon than listen to Sox fans sing along to Neal Diamond’s “Sweet Caroline.”

•24. Jim Bouton. Tell us again, Jim, just what it was you and your buddies in the bullpen were using those binoculars for.

•25. Don Larsen. Trying to explain why he is the only one to have pitched a perfect game in the World Series is like trying to explain why Julia Roberts married Lyle Lovett.

•26. Marvelous Marv Throneberry. Hard to believe he couldn’t beat out Bill “Moose” Skowron for the first baseman’s job in the late ’50s. Unless, that is, you saw him play. When The Marvelous One and former Yankees manager Casey Stengel were with the amazin’ Mets in the early ’60s, ol’ Case once had to explain to the Throneberry that he wasn’t given a piece of cake in the clubhouse between games of a doubleheader because “we was afraid you’d drop it.” Marv wasn’t much of a hitter, either.

•27. Bucky Bleeping Dent. ’Nuf said.