Boston Red Sox vs New York Yankees
These days, the rivalry isn’t always as high-stakes, it’s more like the history of the two teams are being used as an excuse for high ticket prices for both respective towns. But, it used to have had a lot of heat going through in the 2000s when players like Derek Jeter and Pedro Martinez were active for both teams.
2004 was the year the Red Sox really stuck it to the Yankees by still being the only team in the MLB post season, to come back from a 0-3 deficit, win the series and eventually sweep the Cardinals for a World Series in 86 years at that time.
And while it was still a great feeling, for the Red Sox to win a few more titles in later years while the Yankees currently is in a 16-year drought for championships. You still have to weigh in the teams as to which team honestly is more successful and is able to make moves the other team can’t and even as a Red Sox fan, it still ends up being the Yankees. The Red Sox would need to win more titles than the Yankees to even contest the success rate of the Yankees. The Yankees do appear dominating every other season, including the current one, while the Red Sox either keeps squeaking in the Wild Card series or just outright not making the playoffs.
So what other rivalries, fiction or non-fiction, is still considered a rivalry, but it’s so one-sided that it makes you wonder why it is.


The biggest one I can think of in Football is probably RCD Espanyol vs. FC Barcelona. Even if you don’t follow football, you’ve probably heard of Barcelona - they’re one of the top football clubs in the world. You may not have heard of Espanyol, and if you have it’s probably as “the other club in Barcelona”.
To show how truly one-sided the rivalry is, Espanyol have finished higher than Barcelona on 4 occasions. Barcelona have finished higher than Espanyol 87 times. I don’t think you could find a Barcelona supporter who considers Espanyol to be a bigger rival to them than Real Madrid.
Espanyol - Barça was my first thought. One team is usually fighting for winning the league and the other for staying in the league.