Masked Fan

Fauci was born in Brooklyn in 1940, and when he wasn’t delivering prescriptions by bike for his parents’ pharmacy he was playing sports. He played baseball in the Brooklyn sandlots and later captained the Regis High School basketball team.

His athletic career came to an end when he enrolled in the College of the Holy Cross in Worcester, Mass., where he melded study of the classics and philosophy with pre-med classes. Medical school marked a return to New York, where he attended Cornell University Medical School, graduated first in his class and served his internship and residency at what was then known as the New York Hospital-Cornell Medical Center.

In 1968, Fauci was hired as a clinical associate in the Laboratory of Clinical Investigation at the National Institute of Allergy and Infectious Diseases, and he swiftly rose through the ranks first as Head of the Clinical Physiology Section, then Chief of the Laboratory of Immunoregulation. In 1984, he was named director of the NIAID.

A press release from that appointment cites the then-43-year old as “an internationally renowned expert on the immune system” and whose “unique background, particularly in the fields of immunology and infectious diseases, will be of key importance in maintaining and accelerating momentum in these crucial areas of research.”

Dr. Fauci has remained in this role and has been instrumental in leading the United States’ efforts to combat HIV/AIDS, SARS, the swine flu pandemic and COVID-19.

In 2020, he became a member of the White House Coronavirus Task Force, created to address the COVID-19 pandemic within the United States. It was in this capacity that he donned a Washington Nationals facemask to testify before a House Committee.

The mask features the distinctive “curly W” and the team name in various typographies on a red background. Face masks are recommended by the Center for Disease Control (CDC) to prevent the spread of COVID-19, and are currently required for all visitors at the Hall of Fame and Museum.

Dr. Fauci is a self-professed Nationals fan – dating from when the franchise relocated to Washington D.C. in 2005.

“It kind of triggered in me that kind of fierce affection for a team that I hadn’t had since I used to idolize all the Yankees,” he told the New York Times. “I just fell in love with the Nats. I don’t consider that I’m being disloyal to the Yankees. I consider it as sort of a replacement for my boyhood love for baseball, which I still have.”

In an April interview with the Nationals’ Ryan Zimmerman, Dr. Fauci remarked that he had “been a fan of [Zimmerman’s] since he was drafted out of the University of Virginia,” and expressed his hope for the return of the sport.