The Blunder Years: The Dark Ages Of The New York Yankees (1965–1973) 5b4fo

The Blunder Years

The Dark Ages of the New York Yankees (1965–1973)

Ron Quartararo

Copyright © 2016 by Ron Quartararo.

ISBN:

Softcover eBook

978-1-5245-5141-4 978-1-5245-5140-7

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CONTENTS

I. Tribute and Introduction

II. Dedication

III. Glory Days (Pre-1964)

IV. The Sale

V. The End of a Legacy – 1964

VI. Initial Descent – 1965

VII. Hitting Bottom – 1966

VIII. Burke Takes the Helm

IX. Rebuilding – 1967

X. Some Glimmer of Hope – 1968

XI. Not so Amazin’ – 1969

XII. Throwback – 1970

XIII. New Digs

XIV. High Hopes – 1971

XV. Pomp & Circumstance – 1972

XVI. The Divorce – CBS Divests

XVII. The Swap

XVIII. Reconstruction: 1973-1975

XIX. Stars of the Blunder Years

XX. Voices of the NY Yankees (1965-1973)

XXI. Season Recaps 1965-1973

XXII. Bibliography/References

Tribute and Introduction

As I have been a life-long Yankee fan (please note my preference of the traditional phraseology here versus the contemporary, more politically correct “Yankees fan” which sounds awful), the last thing I would want to do is offend any past Yankee players or management, or even fans for that matter. While some of what I have written is opinion; most, for better or worse, is fact. If I may, let me start out by articulating what this book does not attempt to do. It’s not an attempt to chronologize the entire scope of this nine year period by filling it full of statistics or full of third party anecdotes. It’s not an attempt to showcase every Yankee who every played during this period. There are several books and reference materials available to do that. And it’s certainly not an attempt to denigrate one or more persons or organizations in an attempt to pin blame. It is an attempt to examine the events that led to the decline of the Yankees to try to understand what forces were at play. It is also an attempt to view the decade long period from several vantage points, including through my personal perspective and experiences as a fan. And finally it is an attempt to honor those great Yankee players who persevered during this period, gave their all, and tried their damnedest to resurrect this team, albeit unsuccessfully, and return them to their days of glory. With that said, I would like to pay tribute to my own personal heroes during this inauspicious era - Mickey Mantle, Bobby Murcer, Thurman Munson, Joe Pepitone, Roy White and Mel Stottlemyre. And to Mickey and Bobby and Thurman, may you forever rest in peace in green grass of the blue and white Yankee heavens!

Dedication

First and foremost, this book is dedicated to my dad, who, as a die-hard fan himself, shared his Yankee DNA with my sister and me, insuring (for better or worse) a genetic lineage of pinstripe fever in the family. We’d watch them together on TV, share the back page of the Daily News the morning after a victory, and soak in the sunshine at the Stadium at an occasional lazy Sunday afternoon doubleheader. To my cousin Peter, who ignited my ion for the Yankees at a time when there was precious little about the team to be ionate about. It would have been easier had I grown up in the 50’s or even early 60’s to bond with a team of perennial winners, who had played in just about half of all the World Series since the 1920s. Not so in the mid to late sixties. It was 1968 when, as a teenager, my identity would be forged, and my cousin Peter would play a major role in that process. He instilled in me an appreciation of an earlier generation - of Sinatra; Italian wine and food; family; and of course, the NY Yankees. By 1968, however, the “Bronx Bombers,” had run out of ordinance; their mighty offense depleted. Gone were Roger, Ellie, Bobby, Cletis, Tony, and Hector. Welcome Horace and Roy and Bobby and Jake. It was a time when you could attend almost any game and sit just about anywhere in the stadium by buying cheap seats at the ticket window, then waiting an inning or two before moving down to the pricier, unoccupied box seats by simply handing the usher a $5 bill. A time when 20,000 fans on Bat Day was considered a packed house. To my cousin Anthony, with whom I would ride the subways day or night to and from the Bronx and Long Island to attend the games. That included each opening day when we’d perennially cut class if the game happened to have the audacity to fall on a school day. This was our team. As bad as they were, no one could strip away the past. And we clung to that ionately with the hope that the glory would one day return. Nothing could dampen our enthusiasm. While these

may have been the Blunder Years for the Yankees, they were the Wonder Years for us. To my boys, Justin and Anthony, to whom I on my blue and white pinstripe genes. May you wear them well! And to my wife, who, like my parents, was forced to endure my spontaneous, yet thankfully temporary, moments of fanatical baseball insanity. (Fortunately for me, she too shared my Yankeephilia). My final dedication is to “the Boss,” for his vision, his ion and his commitment to deliver us from the depths of irrelevance. May the legacy of the NY Yankees forever transcend the temporary guardians of this great empire, most of whom would exhibit great stewardship, while others would leave the team hapless and rudderless and doom them to baseball purgatory.

Glory Days (Pre-1964)

“The Yankees don’t pay me to win every day – just two out of three” – Casey Stengel

Someone once said, “There once was a team so strong, that when a player hit a single, he was stopping the rally”. Such was the legacy of the New York Yankees through the early 1960’s. It was a legacy of winning, of great players, of class and dignity. It began with fortuitous acquisition of Babe Ruth from the Boston Red Sox – a successful pitcher who could also hit the ball out of any ball park. He had an outstanding career as a pitcher with the Red Sox with a record of 94-46 with a 2.28 ERA. He won 20 games in two of his six years as a full time pitcher, highlighted by a 1.75 ERA in 1916 with a record of 23-12. The Red Sox also took notice of his prowess as a hitter, and began playing him more frequently as a position player highlighted in 1919 by a 29 homerun performance and a .322 batting average in 130 games. Upon his arrival to the New York in 1920, the Yankees brilliantly and permanently transitioned him to the outfield to enable his potent bat to enter the lineup every day. He responded by hitting 54 homeruns that year – more than the combined totals of any team that year except Philadelphia! While the number 714 is easily ed by baseball fans, perhaps not as well known is that of the 15 years he spent with the Yankees, they won the pennant seven times. The Yanks had not won a championship before that. He led the American League in homeruns 12 times. And while his 714 lifetime homeruns have been sured twice, (once legitimately and once in the steroid era), he still holds the #1 spot in slugging percentage (.690) and OPS. With a well-publicized, larger than life persona, Babe Ruth transcended baseball. Women, booz, hot dogs and late parties were no match for the “Bambino” (a name affectionately bestowed upon him by the large Italian immigrant

population of New York who translated “Babe” into their native tongue). He loved the game; he loved the fans; he loved the spotlight…and most of all he loved kids. But more than anything, Babe was a competitor. For the Yankees, he would set in motion a legacy of winning unsured in sports. And for the Red Sox, they would be branded with his name as a curse that would plague them for the next century. The Yankees would be blessed with a sequence of immortal players as well as managers, with the “Iron Horse,” Lou Gehrig immediately succeeding Ruth, and the “Yankee Clipper,” Joe DiMaggio right behind Gehrig. Following in the footsteps of his immortal predecessors, Miller Huggins (Yankee manager in the Ruth/Gehrig era) and Joe McCarthy (in the DiMaggio era), Casey Stengel in the 1950s accomplished what no manager had been able to do before - winning five consecutive World Series championships - from 1949 to 1953, a feat that has not been repeated since. The Yankees would finish the decade with six World Series wins. Mickey Mantle ascended to his rightful place at the throne after DiMaggio’s retirement in ’51, and continued to write chapters in Yankee lore. The Yankees would enter the 60’s as they left the 50’s, winning the first two championships of that decade. Fresh off a thrilling homerun derby between Mantle and Maris in ‘61, the Yankees would go on to face the Cincinnati Reds, winning handily in five games. The following year, in ’62, the Yankees would meet and defeat the Giants, their old world rivals, who had traded their upper west side home at the polo grounds for their new digs in San Francisco. It would be their 20th World Series championship in 40 years. But this seemingly perennial string of world championships, which both tortured and thrilled baseball fans across the country, would end the next year, foreshadowing a much more ominous fate for the world’s greatest sports franchise. In 1963, perched beside a 19” black and white Emerson TV, I watched with my father in disbelief as Sandy Koufax sliced and diced the immortal NY Yankees with more efficiency than a “Vegematic”, (think Cuisinart ala 1960s). Koufax, along with his compadre Don Drysdale and the rest of the Dodgers, sent the Yankees unceremoniously back to the Bronx after an embarrassing four game sweep. My mom, an old time Dodger fan from Brooklyn, was thrilled; my father,

in disbelief. It was the first Yankee game I recall ever watching. That’s not to say I had not read and learned about the exploits of Mickey Mantle or Roger Maris, and like everyone else, had at least a cursory interest in their 1961 race to de-throne the immortal “Bambino” for the most coveted prize in baseball. But, in ‘61 at 7 years old, I was far from anything resembling a serious Yankee fan – and had no vision of what I would eventually morph into as a teenager a few short years later. It would not be until five years later in 1968 that I would come to appreciate the history, the legacy and the pride that the NY Yankees had to offer. The Yankees could not redeem themselves in ’64, losing to the Cardinals in seven games. Still, through that season, the Yankees were, by any standard, the most successful, the most revered, the most reviled franchise in baseball. Of the 60 World Series played from 1903 to 1964, the Yankees would participate in almost half of them, with 29 American League pennants, and would win a third of them (20), two out of every three that they played in. They would not actually enter their first World Series until 1921, a year after the Red Sox’ epic faux pas– (their sale of Babe Ruth’s contract to the Yankees for $125,000), making the Yanks’ winning percentage during that 43 year stretch even more remarkable. During that reign of glory (or reign of terror depending upon your perspective), the names of Gehrig, DiMaggio, Henrich, Lazzeri, Rizzuto, Ford, Mantle and Maris would be splashed on the back pages of countless (many now defunct) NY dailies, proclaiming the latest pillages by the Bronx Bombers. Young newspaper hawkers kept the city abreast of Lou’s 2,130 consecutive games and Joltin’ Joe’s 56 game hitting streak. They vicariously allowed the fans to experience the excitement encapsulated by Yogi’s leap into Don Larson’s arms as he pitched the only perfect game in World Series history, and share in the agony and ecstasy of Mickey Mantle’s multitude of injuries and achievements. The Yankees simply set an expectation of winning - to themselves, to their rivals, to the media, and to their fans. Unlike their Brooklyn neighbors (the “Bums”) who could never seem to win with one notable exception (1955), the Yankees would do it perennially with style, and grace and class. Even in years when the Yankees failed to reach the fall classic, they were always in the hunt. From the years 1919 through 1964, the Yankees would not finish below 500 except for one – 1925, the year of the infamous Babe Ruth “stomach ache”. (That year Ruth complained of fevers and stomach pains thought to be from

overindulgence of food and drink. He ended up in the hospital with an intestinal absence and missed a good chunk of the season). It would take 40 years for the team to repeat that failure, and this time the Yankees’ ailment would be near fatal. In 1965, after 40+ years ruling the baseball world, the Yankees would finish 7785. The following year they would sink to the bottom of the AL charts, finishing last in the league at 70-89. Having established an expectation of winning year after year, and having created a historical legacy of greatness, the notion of sinking to the depths of mediocrity was simply sacrilegious, an affront to the great city of New York and even worse, to the baseball gods. More than that, the Yankees had succeeded in transcending the sport. Few athletes have been able to accomplish this feat – to rise about the mere statistical achievements of the game, and jump from the sports section into the mainstream news as a topic of real conversation among even the most casual of fans. Mohammed Ali did it in boxing, Joe Namath in football, Michael Jordan in basketball. But no teams, lest one, have made the leap. And it was not only due to their winning legacy, but rather because so many of their warriors had done it. Babe Ruth had, of course, – redefining the game, and pulling it from the brink of extinction following the Black Sox scandal; as did Lou Gehrig, who’s brilliance was prematurely extinguished by a dreaded disease now bearing his name; as did Joe DiMaggio, who poise, grace and elegance both on and off the field captured the entire nation even after his career was over. His marriage to Marilyn Monroe, and eventual pitch man for Mr. Coffee made his a national icon. Ironically, “Where have you gone Joe DiMaggio” may have been a metaphor used by Paul Simon in writing Mrs. Robinson, but in 1968, a Yankee fan could take that line quite literally. After winning the AL pennant in 1964 before eventually losing in seven games to the St. Louis Cardinals, the NY Yankees would finish below .500 for four of the next five years. From 1965 through 1969 their winning percentage would drop to .473, with only one year (1968) breaking through for a +4 game winning season. With the exception of one notable anomaly in 1970 in which they won 93 ball games, the Yanks still struggled to remain at .500 with a total .503 winning percentage for the next three years.

For Yankee fans it was hard to wrap their heads around the fact that a historic franchise had reached an end of an era. And with the Mets coming to NY in ’62 they now had competition. The question was, who could claw their way out of the cellar first? And for the Yankees, how could this possibly have happened to their mighty dynasty?

The Sale

“A nickel ain’t worth a dime anymore” – Yogi Berra

Every empire is destined to fall. Even the great Roman Empire, whose august Coliseum was the conceptual model for Yankee Stadium, succumbed to forces they could no longer restrain. So why should we be so surprised that the great NY Yankees might suffer a similar fate? The reason, as usual, is complex. To understand the dynamics, we need to look briefly at the history of Yankee ownership. Before Sir George and before CBS, there were two other dominant ownership groups. Most baseball fans know the name of Colonel Jacob Rupert, best known for engineering the deal which brought Babe Ruth to the Yankees from the Boston Red Sox. Rupert was a successful businessman, having inherited a brewing company from his father, and in 1915 purchased the Yankees for less than half a million dollars. During the Rupert era, the Yankees became the dominant force in baseball g a litany of historic players including Gehrig and DiMaggio, and winning seven World Series titles. He retained ownership until he ed away in 1939 at the age of 71. In 1945 Rupert’s estate sold the Yankees to Del Webb and Dan Topping, for $2.8 million. (Former Dodger president Larry Mhail was also a partial owner and short term general manager, but would soon be bought out by Webb and Topping). Topping inherited his wealth from his grandfathers – one a former president of Republic Iron and Steel; and other making his fortune in the tinplate business. Before the Yankees, he also tried his hand in football, having ownership interests in professional football teams. Married six times, one of his more famous wives was world figure skating champion Sonia Henie. Following his acquisition of the Yankees with Del Webb, Topping became president and CEO of the team. Del Webb, on the other hand, while initially coming from wealth, saw his family lose their fortune and took up his hand at carpentry, becoming a very successful builder. He built a reputation building retirement communities, and although

eventually selling his company to Pulite, his brand is still highly visible in such communities across Florida and other states. Starting in Phoenix, Webb expanded his business to Las Vegas where he built casinos, including the Sahara as well as the Flamingo Hotel owned by mobster Bugsy Siegel. It is alleged that following the purchase of the Yankees, then baseball commissioner Happy Chandler expressed his intent on investigating the owner’s dealings in Las Vegas gambling casinos, which, many believe led to Chandler’s ouster as commissioner. While a ionate baseball man, having played in semi-pro ball, Webb reportedly did not necessarily view wins/losses with the same level of ion as his predecessor. He was a businessman/builder first and foremost. It is said he was not afraid of occasionally bending the rules, or apparently not much concerned with perception either. When a partner/colleague (Arnold Johnson) purchased the Philadelphia Athletics, he and Webb instituted a litany of trade deals which brought great young talent to the Yankees over the years, in return for older veterans – moves that new commissioner Ford Frick apparently did not seem to mind. Apparently, other owners recognized the monetary value the Yankees brought to their stadiums when they played in their cities, and perhaps looked the other way at these practices which today might garner more scrutiny from Major League Baseball, as well as the media. With a wink and a nod, Kansas City was sometimes referred to as a Yankee “farm” team. During that time the two teams exchanged 55 players with 14 major trades. But things would change in 1960. The death of Johnson spelled the end of the great player exchanges between New York and Kansas City. The Yankees would lose that year to the Pirates, and soon afterwards also lose both GM George Weiss and manager Casey Stengel to their new National League rivals, the Mets. During most of their storied history, the Yankees had had only two long, tenured general managers - Ed Barrow & George Weiss. Weiss was hired by the Yankees in 1932 to build their farm system, a concept created by the St. Louis Cardinals of the National League. The “farm” created by Weiss which ultimately consisted of over a dozen minor league teams, and was responsible for churning out great players year after year, a major factor in the Yankees’ continued success. Weiss was eventually promoted to president and general manager in 1947.

Manager Casey Stengel was hired by Weiss in 1949, and although Weiss was skeptical of Casey’s prior managerial expertise, Stengel proceeded to manage the Yankees to a record five consecutive World Series titles from 1949 to 1953. The two would combine for a total of seven World Championships. Weiss left the Yankees in 1961 to the Mets as their general manager the following year, as did former Casey Stengel to become their first field manager. With Weiss gone, the Yankees’ highly acclaimed farm system, which he created, faltered. In addition to being under-funded and under-managed by the ownership, part of the blame lied in Weiss himself - in his alleged reluctance to recruit black ball players. Elston Howard was the first African-American player on the Yankees roster, making his majot league appearance in 1955, eight years after Jackie Robinson made his major league debut with the Dodgers in 1947. With a dearth of new talent, and with Yankee Stadium, now almost 50 years old, crumbling and in dire need of renovation, Webb and Topping lost their fervor in the team and the game. With the upstart Mets beginning to generate new excitement in the city and draw fans to Queens, they decided the time was right to cash out, and readied the team for sale. Following the 1964 season, Webb and Topping entered into negotiations to sell the NY Yankees to CBS. Whether they simply read the tea leaves or actually facilitated the Yankee demise is left for historians. Perhaps there was a perception that a new wind was blowing and a recognition that the Yankees were a team whose better days were behind them, whose superstars were being stalked by the specter of age and injuries, and their ability to replace them more difficult. Or was it their loss of interest, poor trades, and the languishment of their once vaulted farm system that exacerbated the problem? In all likelihood, (at the risk of providing an overtly politically correct answer), it was a combination of all those factors. But clearly, whatever the underlying root cause, unlike the Gehrig/DiMaggio/Mantle succession of talent, the 1964 Yankees had precious few superstar caliber assets in the wings to replace Mickey’s ailing legs, Whitey Ford’s rifle-like arm in the mound, or Ellie’s stellar performance behind the plate. The idea of purchasing a sports team had been discussed at CBS, but it was Frank Stanton, then president of CBS who proposed the idea of buying the Yankees to Bill Paley, CBS Chairman and Mike Burke, a CBS broadcast

executive. Paley, a friend of Yankee president Dan Topping, was a pioneer in broadcasting, and succeeded in building CBS into a powerhouse communications empire. By the early ‘60’s the CBS television network dominated the program ratings and CBS News was the most respected broadcast journalism venue in the world. Of course, these were the days of only three TV networks - before cable, and even before Fox entered the fray. Hit shows like Bewitched, The Ed Sullivan Show, and The Beverly Hillbillies anchored the CBS program lineup in 1964 while Walter Cronkite, one of the world’s most respected newsmen, anchored the evening news. Paley, looking to further diversify his empire, had lunch with Topping, who agreed to work out a deal. Apparently Paley knew that Topping and Webb were looking for an exit. They agreed to sell the team to CBS for $14 million. While there was some opposition from other baseball owners (both current and former, such as Larry Mhail, who were concerned about CBS’s financial might), the deal was inked, and with that, the Yankees’ fate was sealed for the next decade. Topping and Webb would each retain a 10% interest in the team which CBS could buy back within five years. As it turned out, Webb made a quick exit taking a discounted $1 million and left town. Soon after the sale, another factor emerged, believed by some to have hastened the Yankees’ downfall. The introduction of the Amateur Draft in 1965 would allow teams to have the opportunity to select players based on a league supervised process in which teams finishing lower in the standings would have a preferred position in making selections. This replaced the ad-hoc method in which the Yankees could sign whomever they liked, exercising their financial muscle, as they had done so successfully in the past. While this system of awarding the “booby prize” for poor performance could have potentially aided in the Yankee’s rehabilitation, with the exception of Thurman Munson (’68), the Yankees’ first round picks were unexceptional. Beginning with Bill Burbach in 1965, the list included such household names as Jim Lyttle, Ron Bloomberg, Charlie Spikes, Dave Cheadle, Terry Whitfield, et al. Enough said. There would be no magic pill for the Yankees it would seem.

Clearly the perception that the fault of the Yankees train wreck in the mid-sixties lied solely with CBS ownership was overly simplistic at best and inaccurate at worst. While they were certainly late in trying to steer around the ice-berg, they could not avoid hitting it. They simply unable or unwilling to assess and address the systemic problems quickly enough. That delay in taking remedial action clearly exacerbated the problem causing a head on collision rather than a less mortal derailment. The Yankees won the 1964 on “fumes” – pure momentum. By the time CBS purchased the team, they were a rust-filled shell of their past. But it was not until after the 1966 season, a full two years after the purchase, when Mike Burke was appointed team president, that any effort was made to rejuvenate the ball club. By that time the team was in the cellar on life , and CBS could do little to stop the bleeding. What ensued were the dark ages of baseball, what I call the Blunder Years which lasted until the CBS “reign of errors” finally ended a decade later. As we know, all was not forsaken. Not many great empires have the chance to resurrect themselves. Rome was a rare exception, by virtue of the Renaissance albeit a thousand years later. The Yankees rebirth would thankfully come much sooner, through a Da Vinci-like visionary; a “savior-in-chief” from Cleveland. But until then, they would suffer, as Rome, did, a dark, traumatic and precipitous descent.

The End of a Legacy – 1964

“If we’re going to win the pennant we have to start thinking we’re not as good as we think we are” – Casey Stengel

Following three consecutive American League pennants and back to back World Series wins, former manager Ralph Houk, (affectionately called the “The Major” for his service in the military in World War II), was moved into the front office as general manager in 1964, while Yogi Berra took over as manager on the field. Houk, accustomed to moving up in rank in his military career, said his main qualification for his promotions was his “ability to stay alive”. In baseball, however, his forte would prove to be on the field, and not in the front office. He was a poor negotiator and was more adept at providing a steady hand on the field, working with his players, than squabbling over contracts. By all s the Yankees had a great year in 1964. They finished the season with 99 wins (99-63) for a .611 winning percentage. But rather than blowing away the rest of the league as they had done in ’63 when they finished 10 ½ games ahead of the White Sox, the pennant race had tightened up. The Yankees finished only a game ahead of Chicago and only two games ahead of Baltimore. Sometimes the ominous winds of change start out as a benevolent breeze. The Yankees won it all in ’61 and ’62 following the Bill Mazeroski debacle in 1960. That year Mazeroski hit a game 7 walk-off home run on a 1-0 pitch off of Ralph Terry in the 9th inning to give the Pirates the Series victory over the Yankees. Terry, however, rebounded with stellar years in ’61 and ’62 with a combined 3915 record. But after the sweep by the Dodgers in ’63, the Yankees would battle in a heartbreaker of a series against the St. Louis Cardinals in 1964.

The series featured three homeruns by Mantle, who set a new career World Series homerun record with 18, suring Babe Ruth (15). It was about one of those homeruns that Mantle said had given him the biggest thrill of his career. Before the at-bat, Mickey had told Elston Howard sitting in the on-deck circle that he “might as well go home, since he [Mantle] was going to hit one out”. Sure enough, Mickey hit one in the upper deck off Barney Schultz on the first pitch in the ninth inning of Game 3 to win the game. It also featured the first World Series pitting brother against brother – Ken Boyer of the Cardinals vs. Clete Boyer of the Yankees, both third baseman. Baseball legend Whitey Ford was matched against fellow legend and future hall of famer Bob Gibson. It would prove to be Whitey’s last great season (17-6 with a 2.13 ERA) with the Yankees with whom he would play for three more years. A rookie, Mel Stottlemyre, pitched in his first World Series winning Game 1, but losing Game 7 to Gibson, a game that Gibson started with only two days rest! Stottlemyre had finished the regular season at 9-3 after getting called up in midyear, and would eventually become the Yankees ace for many years that followed. Young Jim Bouton (of Ball Four fame) pitching in his second World Series, won two games with an astounding combined ERA of 1.56. In the end, the Yankees would simply run out of magic. Cardinals’ scouts had done their homework. St. Louis swung early in the count to take advantage of Whitey’s first ball strikes. In addition, the Yankees offense could not contend with facing Cardinal’s ace Bob Gibson in three games of the 7 game series which would have been a challenge for any team in the history of baseball. It would be only the second time the Yankees would lose back to back World Series since their first two appearances in 1921-22 against the Giants. Little did they know it, but the Yankees were about to begin a new era. Physically they would look the same with most of their regular players set to return in ’65. The one very notable exception would be the absence of well-liked Yogi Berra, who was fired as Yankee manager following the World Series loss. But a glance at their marquis roster would mask the underlying trauma that was about to grip this once powerful goliath. Soon the aura, magic and mystique that were seemingly under contract to perform year after year in the Bronx, were set to depart on a protracted hiatus. And the dark era of CBS ownership would

begin.

Initial Descent – 1965

“The future ain’t what it used to be” – Yogi Berra

Had you taken a snapshot of the Yankees in spring training of 1965, you would have seen a team who just won the last five American League pennants with an abundance of talent. The starting pitching rotation was touted to be one of the best in baseball – perennial all-star Whitey Ford, Jim Bouton coming off a 2-0 post season, rising star Al Downing, and young sinker ball ‘phenom’ Mel Stottlemyre. All their superstar players were returning to their powerhouse lineup. No one could have predicted what was about to unfold. As the season began, an eerie feeling befell Yankee-land. One month into the year, on May 13, the Yankees found themselves five games under .500 at 10-15. They rebounded by midyear, flirting just above or just below .500 until September, posting a record of 68-68 through September 3. But the Yankees would run out of gas in the final month of the season. Even with Yankee super stars Mickey Mantle, Roger Maris, and Whitey Ford, and Yankee stalwarts Elston Howard, Bobby Richardson, Clete Boyer, and Tommy Tresh, the Yankees finished 77-85, 25 games behind the Minnesota Twins. For the first time in what seemed like an eternity, there would be no pennant race, no home run competition, no one vying for MVP, no talk of the World Series. Thus marked the beginning of the Blunder Years for the NY Yankees. There was certainly a perceptible void in the world of New York sports; a feeling that the universe was out of synch. Not only were the Yankees in decline, the NY football Giants would finish 7-7, the upstart Jets even worse at 5-8-1, and the lowly Knicks at 31-49. The Mets provided some comic relief, having entered the National League just three years earlier during an expansion year, which may have taken some of the pressure off the Yankees - but not for long.

Many (over-simplistically) lay the blame on the sudden Yankee reversal of fortune in 1965 on their new manager. After firing popular Yogi Berra following their World Series loss the year before, the Yankees hired Johnny Keane who had managed the Cardinals in their Series victory over the Yanks. Keane reportedly quit the Cardinals after the organization lost faith in him half way through the ’64 season. Rumor was that they would replace him after the season ended. Ironically, the Cards came back and won it all that year, and Keane, taking the high road, resigned on his own . It was a tough adjustment in New York, and one which obviously did not fare well. Keane clearly had a different style and had challenges managing the Yankee power line-up (albeit a shell of what they once were). Keane’s strategy (today called “small ball”) – using the bunt, hit and run and stealing, did not fit in well with Bronx Bombers’ traditional power mentality. Keane was also very religious, and angered by some of the Yankee players late night partying and carousing. Pitcher Jim Bouton told the NY Times, “It was like Billy Graham being in charge of the Hell’s Angels”. In fact, Bouton sites Keane’s hire and ensuing clash of culture and style as a big factor in the Yankee collapse. Adding insult to injury for the Yankee players was the disappointing loss of one of their own (Yogi Berra) in the managerial shuffle. Yogi was thought of as a player’s manager, an on-field genius (contrary to his oft sited, quirky yet insightful Yogi-isms). His firing and subsequent replacement by Keane were inexplicable moves in their opinion. Johnny Keane took the heat for the Yankees worst showing in 40 years. He was a short lived manager, however, and when the Yankees got off to another slow start in ’66, losing 16 of their first 20 games, he was unceremoniously fired. In fairness to Keane, not only were the Yankees taking on rust, but new owners, CBS, with all their financial muscle, had little in the way of strategy or wherewithall, to fix it. The Yankees team batting average of .235 in 1965 was next to last in the league as was their OBP (on base percentage) of .299. They were seventh out of ten teams in the league in runs scored. Former Rookie of the Year Tom Tresh (’62) led the team with a .279 batting average and 26 home runs. Note withstanding Tresh’s good year both offensively

and defensively, (winning a gold glove), it was the astounding fact that a .279 average and 26 home runs would be the Yankees’ high water mark that year. Mantle’s average dropped to .255, 43 points below his eventual career average, with a respectable, but still well below average, 19 home runs. Elston Howard’s average (.233) was a full 80 percentage points below his .313 average in ’64. There were, however, a couple of notable bright spots. Whitey Ford at age 36 still won 16 games, while 23 year old Mel Stottlemyre surprised everyone with his first 20 game season, on a sub mediocre team. Signed in 1961, Stottlmyre worked his way up through the Yankee farm before breaking into the major leagues in ’64 with an impressive debut down the stretch. His sinker balling style lent itself well to what had been considered a stellar Yankee infield (at least during his first couple of years). Playing in an era just prior to the designated hitter, he was a decent hitter and also adept at fielding his position. With Mel’s star rising, 1965 would also be Whitey Ford’s last full season pitching for the Yankees. He would continue to pitch sporadically through pain and injury for two more years, and finish his career as the best pitcher in the history of the Yankees, with a record of 236 wins against only 106 loses. But aside from Stottlemyre and Ford the pitching staff was woefully disappointing. Highly regarded Jim Bouton won only 4 games after an impressive 18-3 the prior season. Al Downing was 12-14, after going 13-8 in ’64. Newly acquired reliever Pedro Ramos performed well with 18 saves and a 2.92 ERA. But he could not save the Yankees. He was traded to the Yanks by the Cardinals for pitcher Ralph Terry, who had come off two disappointing years (’63-‘64) after pitching brilliantly in ’61 and ’62. While many site the Yankees’ age in 1965 as the key antagonist in this plot, the answer is much more complex. In fact, some argue, aside from Mantle, Ford and Howard, the rest of the Yankees were 30 or under. What may have played a much more significant role than age were the mounting injuries. But unlike some who site a relatively healthy Yankee farm system that brought up the likes of Stottlemyre, Murcer and Munson, the replacement of Yankee “parts” did not come nearly soon enough and few with real superstar quality, and not in the positions they needed filled immediately (catcher, third base, shortstop, etc.,

etc.). While there may be more reasons that we have room to list, poor injury management may be at the top of the list of Yankee failures. Roger Maris played in only 49 games that year with a fractured hand, not realizing the severity of the problem until the end of the season. It was speculated that Yankee management allowed (or worse encouraged) Maris to play through the pain and not seek treatment sooner, making the problem even more severe and chronic. Complications from the injury are thought to have completely stifled Maris’ power and effectively ended his career. That did not stop some of the media to insinuate that Roger might be “mailing it in”. Those comments not so subtley masked an underlying resentment by many for his suring Babe Ruth as the home run leader in one season. And Roger would quietly endure that pain, a feeling of being unwelcome in his own “home.” Mantle’s years of injuries were taking their toll. But Mantle’s reduction in productivity was simply symptomatic. No longer a superstar player, he still performed adequately enough offensively, in comparative . Highly touted rookie Roger Repoz was brought up to fill some of the gaps in the outfield caused by the Maris and Mantle injuries, to no avail. A star college player who loved playing for New York, he never rose to the occasion and with limited playing time the following year, was traded to the A’s. Tony Kubek labored with a debilitating back injury, but in mid-May, also injured his shoulder. He was replaced at short by Phil Linz (perhaps better known for his harmonica playing than his on-field play). The combination of injuries forced Kubek into retirement the next year. All-star catcher, Elston Howard, injured his elbow in spring training in ’65. After just four games, he was forced to have surgery and missed a good chunk of the season. He never regained his MVP form. Jim Bouton, too, was plagued by injuries. After two brilliant years in ’63 and ’64, he developed soreness in his arm in ’65 which eventually became chronic, limiting his arm rotation. Having played through pain and injury before, he tempted fate once again (reported with the blessings of the team management), but this time with dismal results - both for the year and the remainder of his career. After enduring a couple of more fledgling years as a spot starter and

reliever, Bouton was eventually traded to the Seattle Pilots (the setting for his hit book Ball Four), where he became a knuckle-baller with a fair degree of success. The club had serious structural issues. Yet, for most Yankee fans who could not see through the Yankee veneer, this losing “spell” was an anomaly, a rash that, while irritating, would soon . They were living in their Yankee bubble. Little did they know that 1965 would clearly be the demark point in Yankee history. That infamous year is, in fact, still referenced by doomsday prognosticators whenever the Yankees get off to a dismal start. I vividly recall on more than one occasion, some popular New York radio sportscasters lament about the “collapse of the Yankees,” during some frustrating April seasons, such as what occurred in 2005 when they opened the season at 11-19. So too did the NY Times, and other media outlets in 2005 draw similar comparisons to the then current Yankees and their infamous 1965 reversal of fortune. But it was not to be. They finished the year at 95-67 tied for first in their division. As late as 2008, a NY Times headline read “Yanks’ Woes of ’08 Eerily Similar to ’65.” While we know history has a way of repeating itself, as Mark Twain once said “Rumors of my death have been greatly exaggerated.” The Yankees finished the year at a respectable 89-73, and went on to win the World Series the following year (2009). Of course, as the other adage goes, “One should never forget the lessons of the past.”

Hitting Bottom – 1966

“If people don’t want to come to the ballpark, nobody’s gonna stop them” – Yogi Berra

The 1966 season could best be summed up by Yankee broadcaster Red Barber, who, on September 22 announced the attendance at the Stadium at 413 as cameras panned the rest of the 60,000+ unoccupied seats. It was the lowest attended game in Yankee Stadium history. And averaging fewer than 12,000 fans per game, it was also the lowest attended season at Yankee Stadium since 1945. Many had believed, hoped and prayed that 1965 was simply an anomaly. But with a record of 70-89, the Yankees exacerbated their embarrassment from the prior year by finishing 10th in 1966 - 26 ½ games behind the first place Baltimore Orioles! It was the first time the Yankees had finished in last place since 1912! And they would not accomplish that anti-heroic feat again for another 24 years. The Yankees had hit rock bottom. Even the lowly Mets managed a 9th place finish, (albeit with a worse record), leaving the Yanks in sole possession of the baseball cellar in New York. Johnny Keane, a clear misfit with the Yankee veterans, continued on as manager until the Yankee brass had seen enough. “Enough” came early, as the team started off the season as they would end it, losing 16 of their first 20 games. Dan Topping, who remained as team president for a short time after the sale to CBS, moved Ralph Houk back on the field, replacing Keene, who continued to clash with players. That move, however, would prove to have no effect on the Yankees’ fate that year. The Yankee magic, it appeared, had bit the dust. Again, the blame game was in full swing – poor general and field management; aging players; Dan Topping and Del Webb prepping the team for a sale and holding back on investment in new players. But injuries, again, highlighted the list of failings.

Tom Tresh, who sustained a torn a cartilidge in his right knee in spring training, continued to play through the pain in a utility role, lowering his average to .233. He was replaced in left field by rookie Roy White, who would later blossom as a future Yankee star. Hector Lopez also saw playing time as a fourth outfielder. Mantle would never match his last great season of 1964 but did rebound a bit, leading the team with a .288 average and with 23 homeruns. But it would be a temporary uptick. Beginning with a torn knee cartilage in his rookie season of 1951 through four knee surgeries and countless other injuries during this career, Mantle would apply thick wraps to his legs each day and played in constant pain. Roger Maris continued to play through pain and injury – both physical and emotional. He hit only .233 and managed only 13 home runs. The arm injury to Bouton continued to siphon steam from his fastball, and ed for his dismal performance once again in ’66. He finished the year at 3-8 Tony Kubek’s back injury in 1965 ended his career. He would later go on to an acclaimed broadcast career with NBC, teamed with Bob Costas. Kubek received the distinguished Ford Frick Award in 2009 by the Baseball Hall of Fame for his outstanding broadcast contributions to the game. Aside from injuries, overall pitching was in dire straits. Stottlemyre, who had been brilliant coming off a 20 win season, suffered through his worst year in the majors with a 12-20 record and 3.80 ERA. Aside from Bouton and Stottlemyre, the remaining three starters – Downing, Fritz Petersen, a rookie and Fred Talbot, acquired that year from Kansas City all finished the year at around .500. On the offensive side, the Yankee team batting average of .235 matched their dismal performance of 1965. And it would only get worse the next two seasons. Behind Mantle, the second highest batting average on the team was an infielder by the name of Horace Clarke, coming off his rookie season in 1965, who batted .266. Clarke replaced Tony Kubek at short, but would best known as the Yankees’ future second baseman. An under-rated player, Clarke would play a major role in the forthcoming Blunder Years. Aside from him and Mantle, however, the rest of the formerly fearsome lineup hovered at about .250 or lower. Add to this the increasing tension between players and management and it all

spelled disaster for the Yankees. Houk, who was considerably more popular than Keene, had none the less caused some friction in the front office by taking a hard line with some of the players’ contract negotiations, something not immediately forgotten during his transition back onto the field. By the end of the season, CBS thought it was finally time for a change in leadership. (You think?) On September 20, Dan Topping sold his remaining equity position to CBS (for the same discounted $1 million as his former partner), and was replaced as president by CBS executive Mike Burke. Burke was a flamboyant president, who represented (or hoped to represent) a new chapter in Yankee history.

Burke Takes the Helm

“In baseball, you don’t know nothing” – Yogi Berra

Following the close of the 1966 season, CBS cemented its reign on the Yankees by installing one of their own, Mike Burke, as the new president. Burke was a most interesting and remarkable figure, a true 20th century Renaissance man. His resume included decorated service in World War II, an advisory position at Warner Brothers, a stint at Ringling Brothers, and espionage service with the CIA. Just prior to his new role with the Yankees, Burke was a CBS executive, responsible for diversification. Burke vividly details his diverse and extraordinary life in his book Outrageous Good Fortune, which begins in 1944 with an impromptu dinner with Ernest (‘Papa’) Hemmingway at the Ritz Bar in Paris, after having parachuted into and almost being killed. He was there to help organize the French Resistance. (He and Hemmingway would become good friends during and after the war). But his exploits begin even earlier than that. Born in Connecticut, Edmund Michael Burke grew up with his grandparents in Ireland. An outstanding athlete, he was awarded an athletic scholarship to attend the University of Pennsylvania where he excelled in football as a running back. After graduating he was offered an opportunity to play for the Philadelphia Eagles, but opted instead to the CIA (then called the US Office of Strategic Services or OSS) in 1941. Burke was engaged in a number of campaigns in Algeria, Italy and in various covert operations. Following his service he received a number of commendations including the Silver Star and Navy Cross for his heroism. His work was so ired, he was hired by Warner Brothers in 1946 as a technical advisor during the production of Cloak & Dagger, a World War II thriller directed by Fritz Lang, and staring Gary Cooper. Part of his work was instructing Cooper in the art of fighting mano a mano (i.e. hand to hand combat).

Following the movie, the CIA (the post war incarnation of OSS), ed him about returning to the agency in an espionage role during the new “Cold War”. His responsibility was to manage clandestine operations, in this case to destabilize an existing regime. He later operated out of , managing covert operations over Russia, testing their radar defenses. Ultimately losing his appetite for espionage, Burke was asked by his good friend John Ringling North with whom he had worked closely at the OSS, to Ringling Brothers as general manager. Apprehensive at first, he was taken in by the “kaleidoscope of sensory images” which he described it as “unlike anything on earth.” Unbeknownst to him was the extent to which the Greatest Show on Earth was losing money and the level debt it had incurred. Burke also had to tangle with the “Sneeze Mob”, a group of management employees within the circus involved in kickbacks and organizing their own internal “rackets” business. After firing the lot, he then had to stave off an attempt to unionize by none other than Jimmy Hoffa. He resolved the problem by moving the circus to fixed arenas (like Madison Square Garden) and eliminated the “tent shows” which were the major source of their labor problems. Even so, Burke had soon had enough. In 1962, CD Jackson, publisher of Fortune Magazine, introduced Burke to Frank Stanton, then president of CBS. They immediately hit it off, and Burke was hired to run several international operations before taking on role as VP Diversification. He was later promoted to president of the Yankees in 1966. Mike Burke became the “face” of the new Yankee owners and was introduced to the media at a press conference in September 23, 1966. It was immediately clear to the press that the new boss was different – not only in his hip style in hair and dress, but in his much more open and accessible approach, a much warmer persona than that of his predecessor Dan Topping who, like most of the previous Yankee brass, avoided the spotlight. It also didn’t hurt that Burke was a former athlete himself, inspiring reporters to call and interview his former football coach at U. Penn. Burke went so far as to give out both his office and his home phone number at the press conference, prompting then NY Post sports writer Maury Allen to take him up on his offer. That earned Burke and the Yankees favorable reviews in his next column – an immediate return on his investment in good media relations.

Burke writes that “the Post described the [new] Yankee leadership as young, vigorous, smiling, gregarious and exciting.” Even the venerable NY Times began throwing positive accolades their way! It was all part of Burke’s plan to counter the perception of CBS as a huge impersonal corporate owner (whose corporate headquarters was and still is nicknamed “Black Rock”) and relate directly to the “man in the street.” And it worked. He decided to relocate the Yankee’s executive offices from Topping’s posh Fifth Avenue location to Yankee Stadium. Burke would move out of Black Rock and establish his new office in the Bronx. He did not want the Yankees to “smack of absentee ownership.” Burke truly loved his new role, and was ionate about baseball and the Yankees. The loved the “unpredictability” of the game, “the emotional excitement of winning and losing; [his] empathy with the players…the awareness that [his] own success or failure was riding on the outcome. For Burke it was “an addictive potion.” He also loved the city and loved the people. He sincerely believed the Yankees belonged to the city and wanted every New Yorker to share the joy (to the extent the Yankees could produce any in those days). When Consolidated Edison became a sponsor of the Yankee telecasts, Burke developed the concept of the “Con Ed Kids” – providing free access to Yankee games for underprivileged children in the city. But while his PR prowess was valuable commodity, at the end of the day, he would be judged, for better or for worse, on performance. While some of his efforts at rebuilding were credited toward helping lift the Yanks out of the cellar, including the hiring of Lee Mhail as the new general manager during his tenure, the period of 1965-1973 was and is still regarded as the low point in the history of the franchise, and perhaps the low point in Burke’s remarkable career. But in fairness to Burke, CBS had clearly bought a wreck, an empty hull of ship that was gutted by age, injuries, and benign neglect. Allowing Weiss and Stengel to leave and not restocking the farm with Yankee-grade talent sealed the Yanks’ fate for the next decade and there would be nothing Burke could do in the short term aside from putting more lipstick on the pig. But in the long view, Burke did take measures to fix the strategic deficiencies

with the team. For one thing, Mhail repaired the devastated farm system and filled it with new talent, particularly young pitchers. Unfortunately, however, time was not a friend, and Burke would not be around long enough to reap the fruits of his labors. Much of what he was able to accomplish, while not reflected in wins and losses or short term success, did set the stage for the resurgence of the Yankees in the mid ‘70s. Following Steinbrenner’s acquisition of the team from CBS in ‘73, Burke’s role and status was significantly reduced forcing an unceremonious departure. He then moved on to run Madison Square Garden. Burke was a patron of the arts, and later relocated to his beloved Ireland in 1981. He ed in 1987 at the age of 70 with most Yankee fans not realizing what a remarkable life he led.

Rebuilding – 1967

“Without losers, where would the winners be?” – Casey Stengel

If CBS brass had any hope that Mike Burke could parlay his military heroics in Europe into baseball victories in the Bronx the next year, they were sadly mistaken. He did not; and in fairness, could not, in one season improve the Yankees’ dismal 1966 performance in his first full year at the helm. The Yankees would finish 9th, behind on the Kansas City Athletics (now the Oakland A’s), with a record of 72-90, 20 games behind the pennant winning Boston Red Sox. 1967 was, in Burke’s words, “Year One of the new Yankee era;” a year to commence rebuilding. During the off season Burke brought back Lee Mhail as general manager to rebuild and restock the Yankee farm. Mhail, son of former minority Yankee stakeholder Larry Mhail, had been with the Yankee organization before, directing the top notch farm system in the 1940s that George Weiss has developed. He then moved on to Baltimore as GM and club president where he transformed the Orioles into pennant contenders. Mhail initially focused on adding good pitchers to the minor league roster including Stan Bahnsen, Ron Guidry and Scott McGregor. Ralph Houk, highly regarded by Burke, remained on as field manager (despite Houk’s vocal desire have dual roles as both field and general manager). Burke, ever the showman, tried desperately to change the perception of the Yankees as a crumbling franchise. Before the start of the ‘67 season, Burke gave the stadium a face-lift by repainting the exterior from grey to white, and repainting all the old dingy green seats to bright “Yankee blue”. It would be the official Yankee color to this day. Yet all the paint in the world, and all the newly designed Yankee brochures, could not mask the mold. While, according to Burke, (and contrary to popular belief) Paley was intent on buying new talent as he had done to launch the CBS radio network, no one would sell them players. Nor was there anyone to trade.

With Whitey’s aging arm, Mantle’s ailing legs, and baseball fans’ animosity toward Maris for breaking Babe Ruth’s record, their marquis players were not marketable. The perception of the Yankee fans was quite different, however. They ultimately felt insult was being added to injury, as they saw management contributing to the erosion of their franchise by trading away cornerstone players such as Clete Boyer and Roger Maris for practically no return. In exchange for Boyer, the Yankees acquired outfielder Bill Robinson from Atlanta– a player on whom the Yankees had high hopes. In three seasons with the Yankees, Robinson hit a whopping .206, and averaged only 5 homeruns a season. I recall at one point the Yankees’ PR machine announcing that Robinson had acquired new eyeglasses to help his hitting. Unfortunately it would take a lot more than new lenses to improve his performance. In fairness, Robinson was a respectable, likeable player, popular with the fans, but succumbed to injuries and perhaps the pressures of playing in New York. He later went on to play with the Phillies and the Pirates, where he flourished, batting .276 in 8 seasons with Pittsburgh, four times hitting 20+ homeruns. Unlike the high expectations for Robinson, the Yankees were not banking on newly acquired Charlie Smith to fill Boyer’s pristine cletes at third (no pun intended). Rather, they were looking for Smith who was obtained from St. Louis in exchange for Maris, to simply fill the void. Due to the Yankees’ poor management of Maris’ fractured hand, leading to ligament damage, his trade value by this time was minimal. St. Louis offered him an opportunity to play and compete for a championship, as well as a beer distributorship, which may have proved to be the most valuable prize in the deal. Although no longer able to drive the ball due to his injured hand, he remained a great fielder and helped lead the Cardinals into the post season. As for Smith, everyone knew that Clete Boyer, considered by many to be the first or second best defensively third baseman in the American League, could not be replaced, certainly not be Charlie Smith, which left Yankee fans and beat writers scratching their heads. Smith played two years with the Yankees batting .224 and also averaging just 5 homeruns a year. At the time, no Yankee fan could have imagined any worse pair of trades in the history of the franchise.

Likely the Yankees were banking on some of their “rising stars” such as Bobby Murcer (SS) and Jerry Kenney (3rd base & SS) as the next gen heroes. As fans, we’d heard their names bantered about by the Yankee PR machine, along with others like catcher Thurman Munson, as the new breed of rising stars being cultivated through the newly rejuvenated farm system – waiting in the wings to rise up and resurrect the Yankees from the depths of their depression. It was all to appease the impatient fans, and keep the fans from deserting to Queens. While Bobby Murcer would become a Yankee icon, Jerry Kenney would never be mentioned in the same sentence as Tony Kubek or Clete Boyer. Kenney made his debut with the Yankees in ’67 as shortstop at started off on a high note, batting .310, albeit playing in just 20 games that year. It was all downhill from there. In a total of 5 years with the Yankees he would bat .237 with a total of 7 HRs and 101 RBIs. He would retire from baseball in 1973 at the age of 28. Yankee star second baseman Bobby Richardson would retire after the ’66 season at the ripe old age of 31! Richardson had been paired with Tony Kubek, not only as the team’s premier double play combination, but also as close friends and roommates. Richardson started as the Yankees 2nd baseman in 1957 replacing Billy Martin. Martin had been traded to Kansas City following the infamous Copa Cabana incident, fearing he would be a bad influence on the team, most notably Mantle, a close pal of Martin’s. Conversely, Richardson was very religious – a devout Southern Baptist. The unexpected retirement of Bobby Richardson led to Horace Clarke being moved over to play second base, a position he would remain at for the next decade. Clarke led the team in hitting that year with a .272 average. Clarke was in turn, was replaced at shortstop by young prospect Ruben Amaro, who had injured his knee the prior year missing most of the ’65 season. Batting just .223, his career with the Yankees was short lived. But that was just two points below the Yankee team batting average in 1967 of .225 – 10 points below their dismal averages in ’65 and ’66. It was the worst hitting of any team in the American League except the Washington Senators. The Yankees experimented, trying whatever magic they could muster to right the ship. Mickey Mantle was moved to first base, a move designed to salvage his fragile legs and extend his longevity at least one more year with Joe Pepitone, (Pepi as he was called) moving to center field. Joe had been with the Yankees

since 1962 replacing the popular Moose Skowron at first base. A gold glove winner three times, he was also a power hitting lefty, ideal for Yankee Stadium. Mantle is reported to have lamented to the Sporting News that year that “losing was no fun.” He was looking back on the pressures he had faced when playing for teams in contention for the pennant versus teams like Boston who did not have those pressures. He concluded, “It’s harder to play without the pressure.” While Mickey would never again recapture his glory (batting just .245 and hitting only 22 homeruns that year) he did stay healthy and earned one of his many career highlights. On May 14, 1967 Mantle hit his 500th career homerun, becoming only the 6th person (at the time) to achieve that remarkable feat. He hit it off of Stu Miller of the Baltimore Orioles. It would be one of his final moments of glory in pinstripes. Two other iconic Yankees would see their last pinstripe appearance in 1967. The first to go, Yankee catcher Elston Howard was traded to the Boston Red Sox during their pennant run. Burke agreed to the Howard deal, but only if Tom Yawkey, then GM of the Red Sox, would send him back to the Yankees as a coach after the season was over. In his 13 years with the Yankees, Ellie batted .279 with 161 homeruns and 733 RBI’s. He would finish his career in ‘67 helping the Red Sox win the pennant, before returning to the Yankees as a coach. Howard’s departure would leave a gaping hole in the “battery” which the Yankees tried to plug with back-up Jake Gibbs. Gibbs was a former All American quarterback from the University of Mississippi. Unfortunately his prowess on the gridiron did not translate well to the baseball diamond. While he did a reasonable job managing the pitching staff, his lifetime .233 average in ten years with the Yankees left a trail of unfilled expectations. Howard was sorely missed. Whitey Ford, would, sadly, be the next great Yankee star to depart. On May 21 Ford faced the first place Tigers in Detroit. After allowing one run in the top of the inning, Ford never returned to the mound, leaving the game with a sore shoulder. Distraught, he flew back to New York before the game had even ended. It would be the last game he would ever pitch. The son of a bartender from Queens, Ford was a gritty, good humored, likeable

player, and of a close friend of Mantle’s. They shared a deep respect and affection for one another – both on the field and off, including some of their well-publicized exploits. Mantle most ired DiMaggio, but loved Whitey. The street savvy Ford and Mantle, the country kid from Oklahoma played together for 17 years as Yankee brothers in arms. Whitey Ford would go on to become a legendary hall of famer and the greatest Yankee pitcher of all time. In 16 years with the Yankees, he would become their winningest pitcher with 236 wins, an ERA of 2.75 and starting in 22 World Series games. Following in Ford’s footsteps was another increasingly bright star for the Yankees’ pitching staff. Through thick and thin Mel Stottlemyre would continue to baffle hitters with his amazing sinker-ball. He won 15 games with an ERA of 2.96, and continued to garner more and more respect. Teammate Al Downing also excelled with a .263 ERA and 14 wins. Al Downing was a highly touted prospect for the Yankees when he was signed in 1961. Between ’63 and ’64 he was a combined 26-13 and led the American League in strikeouts with 217. But his early success was dampened by elbow pain for the next two seasons before rebounding in ’67. Downing was later traded to Oakland, eventually landing with the Dodgers. He would be perhaps best known for serving up homerun number 715 to the great Hank Aaron who, with that shot, sured the Babe as the all-time homerun king in 1974. Still, it would take much more than Stottlemyre’s steady arm and Downing’s resurgence to fix the Yankee train wreck. The Yanks added pitcher Bill Monbouquette to the roster, who had won 20 games for Boston in 1963, but to no avail. When the torment ended in September, the Yankees had, for the first time since 1915, succeeded in stringing together three consecutive losing seasons. But with the Yankees finishing in last place the year before, they were awarded the first pick in the draft in 1967. And with highly touted Bobby Murcer in the wings, (then on leave for military duty), there was a ray of hope!

Some Glimmer of Hope – 1968

“When you come to a fork in the road, take it” – Yogi Berra

I suppose if I had to pick a year to make the leap into Yankee fan-hood, 1968 would not be considered the worst possible choice (although I could think of many others that would warrant a higher rank). After three years mired in baseball purgatory, the Yanks showed some glimmers of hope in ‘68. Mickey was on his last legs, literally, but would still manage to hit 18 home runs, and continued to remind the broken-hearted, yet faithful, of what was, and what could be. No matter how terribly the Yankees played, no one could erase their legacy, no one could dispute Mantle’s place in history. Yet in 1968 the Yankees did make a legitimate attempt at regaining some respectability as they clawed their way out of the cellar to finish in the “First Division.” With expansion and east/west divisional playoff structure still a year away, the First Division was a virtual “at-a-boy” for finishing within the top five of the ten teams in the league. In the absence of divisional play, it meant nothing except for bragging rights. The Yanks that year finished at 83-79, a stellar achievement considering their 1965-1967 resume. 1968 was a pivotal year in many respects. Not only was it my transitional year from a casual Yankee observer to rabid fan, but it set in motion events which would pave the way for the resurgence of the pre-Steinbrenner Yankees. Due to their dismal performance in ‘67 the Yankees had the benefit of the 4th overall pick in the new draft. Their first round selection was a promising catcher from Canton, Ohio named Thurman Munson. A star athlete, Thurman had been named captain of his high school Baseball, football and basketball teams. Opting to attend local Kent State on scholarship, Munson had only one full minor league season in ’68 batting .301 for the Birmingham Triplets. He would be called up by the Yankees the following year and become a fixture behind home plate. In addition to Munson, the Yankees had high hopes for Bobby Murcer, heir

apparent to Mickey, who was fulfilling his final year of obligation in military service. The new Yankee PR machine would make sure we well fed with anticipatory fodder about their new power hitting left-hander. Roy White, who came up with the Yankees in 1965, had his first solid year offensively, batting .267 with 17 homeruns and 62 RBIs, and establishing himself firmly in left field. In addition to this steady, consistent offense, he was best known for his defensive play, arguably the best defensive left fielder in the history of the team. Former Yankee shortstop turned broadcaster Phil Rizzuto often lauded White as playing the best left field at Yankee Stadium, (with its tough sun and tricky caroms), of any player that he had ever seen. He four times led the American league in fielding percentage (1968-1971). He would go on to play with the Yankees until his retirement in 1979. Spanning three Yankee eras from the end of the dynasty through the Blunder Years and into the new Steinbrenner years, Roy White was “Mr. Consistency”. Little noticed at the time, the Yankees also signed a skinny kid from Ohio whose contract they purchased from the LA Dodgers that offseason. Nicknamed “Stick” for his svelte physique, Gene Michael would play shortstop for the Yankees from 1968 to 1974. Much more importantly, Michael would eventually play many key roles within the Yankee organization during the Steinbrenner reign, helping rebuild the franchise. From coach and manager in the ‘80s, to general manager in the ‘90s, to vice president and senior advisors in the 2000s, Gene Michael would leave an enormous imprint on the NY Yankee organization. Little known is the fact that in his GM role, he was responsible for either drafting or g no less than the “core four” - Mariano Rivera, Andy Pettitte, Derek Jeter, and Jorge Posada. These and other key acquisitions such as Paul O’Neill (in 1993), formed the basis of the Yankees resurgence from 1995 to the present day. The Yankees picked up Andy Kosco in the offseason, an outfielder who held promise but had not yet established himself. While he only batted .240 for the Yankees that year, he had a spurt during the middle of the season where it appeared to us fans as if he was delivering one clutch hit after another. He ended up with 15 HR’s and 59 RBI’s, which, in pre-steroid era, and in a year in which pitching dominated, and on the ’68 Yankees, was not considered to be too shabby a season.

Mel Stottlemyre continued to shine, even with little run . He posted a 2112 record with an ERA of 2.46. Managing to win 20 games in three years during the Blunder Years is perhaps one of the most stunning achievements of this era. Mel’s continued to dominate opposing batters with his sinker ball, a pitch which seemed to get better as the game progressed. Another notable pitching performance was that of rookie Stan Bahnsen. Bahnsen had been drafted two years earlier, spending time in the minors before starting his major league career in earnest in ’68. He finished the year with a record of 17-12 which earned his Rookie of the Year honors. During the Yankees surge to “first division” in the latter part of the year, they swept the first place Detroit Tigers during a four game series at Yankee stadium in August. A month earlier the Yankees had signed veteran outfielder, and former Cleveland Indians star Rocky Colavito who would play a pivotal role in the series. So too would another forgotten acquisition - that of Bobby Cox who was traded to the Yankees in 1967 to help replace legend Clete Boyer at third base. Cox, best known for his many years as the manager of the Atlanta Braves, spent only two (unremarkable) years in the majors – both with the Yankees. It was toward the end of the season and due to rain-outs, the Yankees were forced into playing a series of double-headers, stressing their pitching staff. On August 23, 1968, the Yankees were scheduled to play a four game series against the Tigers. The first two were part of a twi-night double headers on Friday evening. Stan Bahnsen won the first game easily. But in the second, the game was tied 3-3, when Yanks bullpen ace Lindy McDaniel came in and pitched 7 scoreless innings, exhausting his arm. McDaniel, a veteran reliever who posted some great years in the National League, was traded to the Yankees from the Giants during the season and proved a great addition to the bullpen. The game went until 1:07am and due to a curfew the game was recorded as a tie, with the makeup being another doubleheader on Sunday. After winning again on Saturday, the Yankees’ starter Steve Barber got off to a shaky start. Barber had been an all-star pitcher with the Orioles before being acquired by the Yankees the prior year by which time he was hampered by shoulder problems.

Soon down 5-0 the Yankees decided to spell their ailing bull pen by sending in outfielder and rocket-armed Rocky Colavito into the game as a reliever. I recall Colavito taking the mound and starting to launch a succession of gravity defying RPG-like fastballs to the plate that no Tiger batter could touch. For two and two thirds innings under a steamy August sun, Colavito mowed down the Tigers, including all-stars Al Kaline and Willie Horton to the roaring applause and standing ovation of the crowd after each inning. That included those, like myself, watching the game from home on TV. In the bottom of the final inning of Colavito’s pitching debut, down 5-1, the Yankees rallied, topped off with a homerun by unlikely hero Bobby Cox to tie the game. A later RBI single by Jake Gibbs give Rocky Colavito his first and only win as a major league pitcher! Colavito would go on to punctuate his accomplishment with a home run in the second game in his more comfortable role in right field. Ironically Colavito was born in the Bronx, and grew up a Yankee fan idolizing fellow outfielder Joe DiMaggio. Mike Burke later said that of all his days as a Yankee executive, this was “unquestionably the most lovable single day of the lot.” Another unique and quite memorable moment that summer also took place against the first place Detroit Tigers – this time in Detroit. On September 19, 1968 while in high school recess, I listened intently on my small transistor radio as Mickey Mantle stepped up to the plate to face 30 game winner Denny McClean. The sound was a bit fuzzy (as have been various recollections of this story), but I could make out that something was going on between the two opponents. Mickey was sitting at 534 home runs – one behind the great Jimmy Fox on the all-time home run list, when McClean thought he’d hand Mickey a surprise. With a five run lead in the eighth inning of the game and no one on base, and with Detroit having clinched the pennant, McClean proceeded to groove a few fastballs to the slugger. Mickey was even reportedly tipped off tipped off by catcher Jim Price. While initially in disbelief, Mantle then fouled off a couple of pitches before smashing the following ball into the upper deck in right field! But just play it straight, the following night Mantle blasted one more homerun, on this own , to seal the deal against Jim Lonborg of the Boston Red Sox, capping his homerun total at 536.

But unbeknownst to the fans, yet not surprisingly, it would be Mickey’s final season in Yankee pinstripes. Mantle was both proud and humble, and knew he could no longer perform on the field at a level he deemed worthy of the fans, the team and himself. Years of injuries and (and perhaps boozing) had taken their toll on the great slugger, but it would not be until 1969 that he would say his final farewell.

Not so Amazin’ – 1969

“Never make predictions, especially about the future” – Casey Stengel

No matter how negative the outlook for the Yankees appeared, there always existed an underlying optimism that “next year” would be or at least could be better. After all, we [Yankee fans] had a legacy no one could refute. Whenever things looked gloomy, we fell back on the past. There was no “feel-good” potion as potent as Old Timers Day. The Yankees would roll out the red carpet and march out Yogi, Whitey, Frank Crosetti, Don Larson, Moose Skowron, and of course legendary Joe DiMaggio to remind us all of our heritage. And if that weren’t enough, there was Yankee broadcaster and former all-star shortstop, Phil (Scooter) Rizzuto to refresh our memories on a daily basis. So, after an exciting finish to 1968, and rumors of new talent in the Yankee farm system, my cousin and I attended opening day with new optimism and encouragement. We painted banners (the first and only time we ever did) and hung them from the upper deck. We watched the Yankees take batting practice on Jimmy Esposito’s meticulously manicured grounds. And we were entertained and energized by Eddy Layton’s magical keyboard as we prepared for the opening of a great new year. But it was not to be. 1969, as it turned out, would not be the year of the Yankees. Rather, it would be the year of the Miracle Mets. There were many changes in baseball that year. In order to generate more offensive punch, Major League Baseball lowered the pitching mound and narrowed the strike zone. Baseball also introduced a playoff system, creating two divisions in each league and adding two new expansion teams to each. Mickey Mantle decided to retire in the spring of ’69 and the Yankees honored him with his own Day – a game which I attended and vividly .

Standing in front of 60,000 plus die-hard fans, a choked-up Mantle offered a heartfelt thank you, saying “Now I know how Lou Gehrig must have felt when he said he was the luckiest man in the face of the earth.” That day Mickey’s #7 was retired next to Ruth’s #3, Gehrig’s #4 and DiMaggio’s #5. A plaque was presented to him by his idol Joe DiMaggio, which was placed on the wall in centerfield (now in Monument Park). Mickey then hopped in a golf cart and was driven around the stadium along the warning track as he waved goodbye to his legions of teary-eyed fans. I shot the entire emotional ceremony on old “Super 8” video, which I still have. Mickey’s departure foreshadowed what would be perceived by many as an ominous development in New York City sports. The upstart New York Mets, whose baseball buffoonery was the laughing stock of the sports world in 1962, had in a short seven year span, built a first-rate team comprised of dominant pitching and solid offense to win the pennant. Competing for the baseball cellar (albeit in separate leagues) had been the norm since 1965 and bets abounded as to which team would win the pennant first. It was an easy bet for Yankee fans… or so we thought. In 1969, Mets manager Gil Hodges, ex-Dodger great, led the “Amazin’ Mets” to 100 victories winning the National League pennant. It was a silent year for the Yankees, eating proverbial humble pie; no longer able to look at the cross town rivals as the lesser of the two losers. No, to the chagrin of Yankee fans, these Mets were truly amazing. Their pitching staff rivaled any in baseball, before or since – Tom Seaver, Jerry Koosman, Nolan Ryan, Gary Gentry; (yes, boys and girls, all on the same team at the same time); with an offense that truly overachieved. And perhaps a bit of good luck to boot. For the Yankees, it was another year of mediocrity and misery. Without Mickey’s once powerful bat in the lineup, the Yanks could muster only 94 homeruns, the first sub 100 homerun performance since 1945. Andy Kosco, who had performed so well at the end of 1968, and became a fan favorite, was traded to the LA Dodgers for Mike Kekich, who, albeit a mediocre pitcher at best, would none the less leave his mark on the Yankee legacy. (More about that later). Tom Tresh also bid adieu to the Yankees after injuries resulted in several disappointing years offensively. He was traded to the Tigers for Ron Woods. Woods, while only batting .175 for the Yankees in 72 games that season,

surprised everyone with a spectacular spring training the following year. Unfortunately that did not carry forward as he finished the next season at .227 and was eventually let go in ’71. Joe Pepitone took over the leadership of the team offensively, representing the last vestiges of the Yankees’ winning years, with a team leading 27 home runs. Joe was always popular with the fans (including my cousins and me) with his flamboyant aura, hip hair style, and Brooklyn Italian roots. He was the first player known to have brought a blow dryer in the locker room. That led to some good natured practical jokes – such as Fritz Peterson and his buddy Fred Talbot filling Joe’s blow dryer with talcum powder one day. A good friend and roommate of Mickey Mantle for a time, Joe loved the night life and loved to have fun. Joe’s many off-the-field exploits are detailed in his 1975 book, “Joe You Coulda Made Us Proud”, a wink and a nod to the widely held belief that Joe never lived up or played up to his full potential. It was a book that would have made Jim Bouton blush. While Bouton published his blockbuster tell all book, Ball Four in 1970, which was the first of its kind, Rolling Stone called Joe’s “the best baseball book you’ll ever read”. Despite the Met’s dominance in the news media, 1969 was the first full year for Bobby Murcer who returned from military duty. Dubbed the “heir apparent” to Mickey in center field (both were top power hitting prospects from Oklahoma, signed by the same agent), it was probably an unfair expectation for anyone to live up to. Yet Murcer got off to an impressive start, hitting 23 homers and knocking in 82 runs. And his understated, warm and genuine persona was a huge hit with the fans. Murcer had been called up for a few games in both ’65 and ’66 before leaving for military duty in ’67 and ’68. His original position was shortstop. But after committing 11 errors in just 29 games (what equated to 60 errors over a 162 game season), he was wisely moved into the outfield when he returned. This was also the year when Thurman Munson made his long awaited major league debut. From Akron, Ohio, Munson was a top prospect, selected 4th in the 1968 draft and batting over .300 in his first two seasons in the minors. He and Murcer would become good friends over the years and would be nicknamed the “M&M” boys (a term borrowed from the days of Mantle and Maris), as their value to the team and popularity with fans were quickly recognized. Besides his

offensive abilities, Munson would come to be known for his ‘quick release’ of the baseball, enabling him to gun down runners attempting to steal. That same year, highly touted strong-man, Johnny Ellis, made his major league debut with the Yankees as a reliable back-up catcher, but would remain in the shadows of Thurman Munson until his departure in 1972. His right handed power was no match for the Yankee Stadium left center field wall. His first homerun in Yankee Stadium, ironically, was a mammoth inside the park job which reached the monuments. Roy White continued to put up solid offensive numbers batting .290. And unbelievably, Mel Stottlemyre finished the year with a 20-14 record – his third 20 game winning year in five seasons! Stottlemyre would also pitch one of his best games in 1969. On April 12, facing the prior year’s 31 game winner Denny McClain of Detroit, Stottlymyre, who had won 21 of his own in ’68, took a no hitter into the 5th before Jim Northrup hit a double on a good pitch, down and away. It would be the only hit Detroit could muster that afternoon, and earned Stottlemyre a one-hit shut-out. It always bothered me when, later that year, after Tom Seaver pitched his own one-hit gem against the Cubs, giving up a solo hit in the ninth, he would receive considerably more “ink” than Mel for their respective brilliant performances. But, then again, Tom Terrific was part of the Miracle Mets, and the ’69 Yankees were yet to be revived. A new addition to the Yankee bullpen also paid major dividends for the Yankees. Jack Aker was acquired in May from the Seattle Pilots, and proceeded to rack up 33+ scoreless innings in relief. Aker was a dominant figure in the Yankee bullpen until 1972. Still the Yankees finished just below .500 at 81 and 80 and could only look to “next year” to regain some semblance of respect. 1969 was the year of the Mets, Jets and Knicks. The Yankees would have to wait their turn.

Throwback – 1970

“It’s déjà vu all over again” – Yogi Berra

1970 proved to be a “throw-back” year for the Yankees, who ended the season winning 93 games – the most since their last pennant year of 1964. While they would have been a shoe-in to secure a playoff berth today, it was winner-take-all in each division in 1970. The Yankees finished the season 15 games behind the first place Baltimore Orioles who won 108 games, and with no wild card, they were relegated to honorable mention in the Wikipedia of Major League Baseball. It was also, in a sense, the shedding of the last vestiges of the past glory for the Yankees, having traded the popular Joe Pepitone for Houston’s Curt Blefary; and Al Downing for Oakland’s Danny Cater. The Pepitone/Blefary, trade, which most angered Yankee fans, proved to be one of the worst in Yankee history. Blefary, proclaiming he would lead the Yankees in homeruns that year, struggled early on and throughout the season, failing to reach the seats with his first four bagger until June 2. He finished the year with a dismal total of 9 homers. The Downing/Cater deal which also included Staten Island born catcher, Frank Fernandez (nicknamed the “Staten Island Strong Boy”), proved much more productive. Cater excelled with the Yankees batting a career high .301 with, with 76 runs batted in matching his career high, taking some of the pressure off of the Pepitone/Blefary debacle. In addition to Cater, Thurman Munson and Roy White added offensive muscle each batting around .300 (Munson at .302 and White at .296) and Murcer belting 23 homeruns. In addition, starting pitching was solid, led by Fritz Peterson with 20 wins, Stottlemyre with 15 and Bahnsen with 14. Their team ERA at 3.21 was respectable, while their offense scored 4+ runs a game. By all measures the Yankees had an excellent year and had a wildcard playoff berth been available, who knows? 1970 also featured one of the classic double-headers of all time. It was June 24,

against the Cleveland Indians (which my cousin and I were fortunate enough to attend) during which Bobby Murcer hit four consecutive home runs, tying a major league record (one in game one and three in game two). That awesome feat had been accomplished by a several other players, it turned out, including Mickey Mantle, who did it in 1962. That double-header also featured a cherry bomb being thrown from the upper deck landing near the foot of catcher Ray Fosse. (Fosse is perhaps best known for his collision with Pete Rose a few weeks later in the 1970 All-Star game, all but ending Fosse’s career). The finale included a fight between Yankee pitcher Stan Bahnsen and Cleveland star outfielder Veda Pinson. Bahnsen put a high tag on Pinson who was trying to score from second base on a wild pitch. Pinson was tagged out but decided to give Bahnsen a right hook in exchange. Pinson was both out at the plate and out of the game as he got ejected while ranting and raving! To add a bit levity to such a melodramatic afternoon, Yankee reliever Steve Hamilton used the occasion to show-off his “folly floater”, a high, lofty, slow, soft-ball like pitch to Cleveland first baseman Tony Horton. Horton took a big swing each time, popping several of Hamilton’s “floaters” foul before Munson caught one for an out. Horton, looking completely foolish, literally crawled back to the dugout in mock disgust! The folly floater was to become Steve Hamilton’s signature pitch. And with the Yankees in the gutter, it presented some comic relief during the Yankee doldrums. Equally impressive was the performance of veteran bullpen ace Lindy McDaniel, who had one of his best years in 1970. McDaniel, whose famous “forkball” became the latter day split finger, racked up 29 saves with 9 wins, against 5 loses and a stellar 2.01 ERA. His 29 saves tied a team record set by Luis Arroyo in 1961. It was his 16th year in the majors! Prior to the Yanks, McDaniel spent time with Cardinals, Cubs and Giants when his career was thought to be over, before being traded to the Yanks where his career was rejuvenated. The month of June also featured another unlikely Yankee hero, Yankee second baseman Horace Clarke. The Blunder Years, as I have appropriately named this period, has also been referred to as the Horace Clarke era. Clarke, from the Virgin Islands who worked his way up the Yankee farm, was actually an over-

achieving second baseman on a losing team with few heroes. Signed in ’58, he came up to the big leagues in 1965 and took over as regular second baseman in 1967. One of his signature moments was breaking up a no hitter on June 4 in the ninth inning against Kansas City pitcher Jim Rooker. Clarke followed that by breaking up a second no-hitter on June 19 in the ninth inning against Red Sox pitcher Sonny Seibert; and a third two weeks later on July 2, also in the ninth inning, against the Tiger’s Joe Niekro! Clarke bears no ill will for being branded with the Yankee’s decade long debacle. I still don’t know if that was a testament to Clarke’s perseverance through that entire period or simply symbolic of the Yankees’ unwelcome transition from superstars to mere mortals. In either case, looking back, Clarke was perhaps one of the more under-rated Yankees during that era. He received a bad rap by the press for not turning the double play as adeptly as his predecessors or contemporaries, but he and Gene Michael can refute those arguments easily by looking at the stats. Reviewing both his fielding and offensive stats over 10 years (.256 average; .308 OBP and .983 fielding average), Horace Clarke deserves more respect than he has received.

New Digs

“The trick is growing up without growing old” – Casey Stengel

Recognizing that the Stadium was literally crumbling, the City of New York under Mayor John Lindsay, and the Yankees, led by president Mike Burke began talks aimed at renovating the ballpark. The Mets had recently moved into a new facility in Queens at a cost of around $24M. The Yankees felt they deserved equal treatment. Yankee Stadium was indeed a venerable, national monument, playing host to some of the most historic events in the world - papal visits; Joe Louis’ defeat of Max Schmeling; New York Giants football championship games, among others. (Unfortunately, the Beatles decided on Shea for their outdoor concert in 1965). But in 1970 the stadium was in decay, and Burke urgently needed to address that. Burke arranged to speak with Lindsay at a post-game cocktail reception following the annual Mayor’s Trophy game with the Mets (an annual exhibition game between the cross town rivals for charity and bragging rights). A formal meeting was then held at City Hall the following week. Burke had leverage. The City had recently built Shea Stadium for the Mets and leased it back to them. Burke simply wanted the City to play fair. So, after considerable “what if” discussions, Lindsey agreed to do for the Yankees what it had done for the Mets – invest $24 million in its renovation. It wasn’t all that simple. Opposition from the City bureaucrats created hurdles – but nothing that the former secret agent was unaccustomed to vaulting over. More than once Burke played the “getting out of town card” (i.e. vacating the city for New Jersey), and it worked. The city, on the verge of bankruptcy at the time, could ill afford to lose the Yankees. He also laid out a convincing case for public funding. Millions of anonymous

New Yorkers could not afford club hips, or attend the opera or the theater. But they could all be part of the legendary franchise simply by branding themselves a Yankee fan. And all they needed is to don a Yankee cap to prove it. In Burke’s schmaltzy words to the Council, later quoted in the NY Times following the planned renovation announcement, “A baseball club is part of the chemistry of the city. It’s not merely an athletic contest; It’s a picnic; a kind of a town meeting.” The Yankee Stadium co-tenants were not so convinced about the City’s gesture and their ability to deliver on their plan. Wellington Mara, owner of the NY Giants was weighing an even better offer – to move across the river to New Jersey into a brand new stadium – built just for football. This was a time in NY when corporations were fleeing the city in droves. While the New Jersey Sports Commission would have loved to have the Yankees the Giants, it would have been a blow to the city that was already being kicked in the groin by just about everyone. Of course, Burke never really intended on leaving, but it proved a great negotiating tactic. Once final approvals were obtained, Mike Burke was personally engaged in the details of the Stadium’s redesign and reconstruction. He maintained the “Yankee blue” seats and insisted that the façade remain. When told that the new structure could no longer the façade, he told them to move it to the bleachers and find a way to get it done. They did. Renovation began on September 30, 1973 and for the next two years the Yankees played at Shea Stadium. On April 15, 1976, the Yankee home season would open with new owners and new “digs.” (CBS would eventually sell the team in 1973). The cost had ballooned from the $24 million originally approved to $160 million, an overrun of over $130 million (the debt ultimately transferred to New York State). From an aesthetic point of view, some felt the new façade over the bleachers, while preserving some of the old Yankee Stadium charm and tradition, did not have the same cache as the original design. “Death Valley”, the deepest part of Yankee stadium encoming both center (461') and left center field (457') was dramatically shortened to 417' and 430' respectively. (Both were shortened again several years later). The old monuments of Babe Ruth, Lou Gehrig and Miller Huggins, stationed in center field were moved to a newly created “Monument

Park”. And all the interior columns which had blocked many fans viewing angles were removed with modern day cantilever construction of the mezzanine levels. With the approvals executed for the Stadium to be retrofitted after 50 years, so too would the Yankees be ready to show off their new look on the field that their new owner would create. But that occur more than five years after the initial discussions began in 1970, and both Burke and Lindsey would be long gone. Until then, for the 1971 Yankees, it was, unfortunately, business as usual.

High Hopes – 1971

“Finding good players is easy. Getting them to play as a team is another story” – Casey Stengel

High Hopes! [Queue Sinatra]. That’s how the NY Yankees entered the 1971 season. Fans had awoken from what seemed like an endless coma to see the Yankees finish with 93 wins the prior year. Their lineup had new punch with AL Rookie of the Year Thurman Munson, newly anointed star Bobby Murcer, and perennial pillar of consistency Roy White coming off great seasons. Their pitching rotation featuring Mel Stottlemyre, Fritz Peterson and Stan Bahnsen were also returning from solid performances the prior year. While Yankee brass did not feel the need to make any major structural changes, they did acquire all-star outfielder Felipe Alou from Oakland for Yankee pitchers Rob Gardner and Ron Klimkowski. Alou was one of the first Dominican players in the majors and was soon ed in the big leagues by younger brothers Matty and Jesus. All three were two-time all-stars. Felipe had his best year was with the Braves when he finished second in the batting title to his brother Matty! Alou, whose popularity with the fans prompted cheers of “Felipe” (loud enough to make today’s Bleacher Creatures proud), proved to be a major contributor to the Yankee offense, batting .289 with 69 RBIs. The Yanks also added former Mets outfielder Ron Swoboda to the roster as a utility player. Best known for his overachieving .400 batting average and spectacular diving catch during the 1969 World Series, he managed a respectable .261 in ’71 but overall batted a paltry .235 in his three years with the Yankees. Roy White continued his consistently solid play, batting .292 with 84 RBIs and 86 runs scored.

Bobby Murcer had one of his best years with the Yankees, hitting 25 home runs, solidifying his role as a cornerstone of the Yankee offense. His .331 average earned him a second place finish in the AL batting race behind Twins Hall of Famer Tony Oliva (.337). Munson, however, suffering from a bout of sophomore jinx, ending the year batting just .251 with 10 homeruns. It was perhaps his only sub-par year with the Yankees in his 11 year career, tragically cut short in 1979. He did however, lead all catchers in fielding percentage, committing only one error the entire season! Stottlemyre turned in another excellent performance going 16-12 with a 2.87 ERA. Peterson and Bahnsen also had respectable years with 16 and 14 wins respectively. But any illusions that the Yankee funk had ended and their fortune had turned the corner was just that. Their malaise continued, trudging through another year of mediocrity, finishing the season with 82 wins, 21 games behind Baltimore and in fourth place behind Detroit and Boston. Much of the blame resided with the bullpen which was disappointing compared to the year before. Lindy McDaniel, the Yankees’ dominant closer coming off a great 1970 season, finished with a 5.04 ERA with 5 wins and 10 losses. Jack Aker while effective with an ERA of 2.59 was clearly not as dominant as the prior year. Overall the bullpen was subpar with Aker and McDaniel combining for only 8 saves (compared 45 the prior season). Still, as the year ended, Yankee execs and fans alike had some things to be hopeful about. Murcer had an all-star season leading the Yankees in just about every offensive category and leading the league in On Base Percentage (.429). And all indications were that Munson would return to form the next year. Stottlemyre’s stalwart pitching and Roy White’s bat and glove were the epitome of reliability. And the addition of Alou, if he could stay healthy would bode well the next year. Yet the Yankees knew they would have to do more to extricate themselves from the muck of mediocrity than stay the course.

Pomp & Circumstance – 1972

“Baseball is 90% mental. The other half is physical” - Yogi Berra

After yet another disappointing year in ’71, it did not take a rocket scientist to conclude the Yankees needed an infusion of adrenaline if they had any hopes of regaining any semblance of self-respect. The Yankees made two notable trades going into the ’72 season. The first goes down as a dismal failure – trading pitcher Stan Bahnsen for Rich McKinney, a utility infielder from the Chicago White Sox. The Yankees slotted him at third base, a position he had never played regularly in the majors, and one at which he was clearly uncomfortable. From the get-go, McKinney was a disaster at third manifested by a four error performance on April 22 against the Boston Red Sox at Fenway. By the end of May the Yankees had seen enough. He was demoted to Triple A Syracuse and eventually traded to the A’s in the off-season. With only seven professional seasons and a career total 20 homeruns, it is no wonder the McKinney deal left Yankee fans scratching their heads yet again. Yet, with two out of the last three years yielding less than 100 homeruns, the once mighty “Bombers” were desperate for offense, and one supposes that desperate times call for desperate measures. McKinney, however, finished his short lived career with the Yankees batting .215, with one homerun and 7 RBIs! Oh, and Stan Bahnsen? He finished the ’72 season with Chicago going 21-16 with 41 starts! The second trade proved to me much more fortuitous. The Yankees traded popular Danny Cater, a solid hitter whose numbers had declined, to the Red Sox for reliever Sparky Lyle. Drafted by the Red Sox organization in November of 1964, Lyle became a dominant closer for Boston from 1969 to 1971. He added a slider to his fastball/curveball/change-up repertoire which he is purported to have learned from Ted Williams in spring training one year. Lyle reportedly recounted “He told me it was the best pitch in baseball because it was the only pitch he couldn’t hit even when he knew it was coming.” Sparky’s slider would

become infamous and devastating to opposing hitters. Lyle was more than a pitcher; he had a dominant persona that intimidated hitters. A rugged fearsome look with a long bushy mustache, he’d ride up to the mound to the tune of Pomp & Circumstance, bite off a piece of his famous chewing tobacco and get to work striking out opposing hitters. Lyle saved 35 games for the Yankees in 1972, a record at the time, and would go on stardom as the Yankees progressed through the decade. (Lyle would also be known for writing his book, “The Bronx Zoo”, detailing the wild and wooly Billy Martin era that was still to come). The Yankees starting pitching, however, did not fare as well as the newly infused bullpen. Mel Stottlemyre posted his first losing season since 1966 going 14-18 albeit with a still respectable 3.22 ERA. Fritz Peterson turned in a sub-par 17-15 record, while surprise starter Steve Kline acquired by the Yanks in the 1966 draft posted his first and only winning season in the majors with 16 wins against 9 losses. The Yankees had hoped to get some mileage from newly acquired outfielder Johnny Callison and second year man Ron Bloomberg (DH/first base). Blomberg, one of the original players to start in the new “designated hitter” role, finished his first full year with the Yankees in ’71 with a .322 with just under 200 at bats, and did add some juice with 14 home runs in 1972. Callison, however, who had been put up some solid numbers during his ten year career with the Phillies, hitting over 20 homeruns in four of those years, could not produce for the Yankees. He batted just .258 with 9 home runs in the ’72 season. Despite the so-so outcome on their trades, new “M&M” boys – Murcer and Munson continued to mature. Murcer continued his hot hitting with 33 homeruns, batting .292 with 96 RBIs, arguably his best year with the Yankees. Munson continued to garner respect for his quick release in throwing our runners attempting to steal second, and his command of the pitching staff. He also raised his offensive production batting .280 with 16 homeruns. And fan favorite and newly acquired Felipe Alou picked up his 2000th hit, which combined with his career 200+ homeruns, made him a border-line Hall of Fame candidate. The Yanks finished the ’72 season at 79-76, in fourth place in their division, 6 ½ games behind the Detroit Tigers. It was however, their third consecutive year of .500+ baseball, and we fans grew accustomed to celebrating small victories.

Those tuned to their crystal balls, however, would see their fortunes markedly changing the next year.

The Divorce – CBS Divests

“We made too many wrong mistakes” – Yogi Berra

Mike Burke writes that, in the summer of 1972, Bill Paley approached him asking if he were willing to put together a consortium to buy the Yankees from CBS. In just seven short years, CBS had not only failed to rebuild the franchise, but had begun to see the most storied business in sports, as a liability. With the stadium renovation plans now underway, Paley did not want CBS, a wealthy corporate giant, to be seen as profiting from the city’s funding of the renovation. The press had not looked favorably upon the initial purchase, and would be even more hostile toward public funding of the project. In addition, the Yankees did not fit neatly into Paley’s highly structured media empire. It was clearly an anomaly. Burke, however, welcomed the move and set off to assemble a new group of owners, himself included. First approaching a number of prominent New Yorkers, he was surprised to find little if any interest. No one it seemed, would buy into Burke’s vision of a Yankee Renaissance (perhaps because in the prior seven years there was little evidence to it). One day Burke received a call from Gabe Paul, the GM of the Cleveland Indians, offering an introduction to a Cleveland shipbuilder and entrepreneur by the name of George Steinbrenner. Having failed at an attempt to buy the Indians, Steinbrenner was intrigued with the Yankees, and had the depth of vision to appreciate their significance as a prize piece of Americana and, with that, their intrinsic investment value. A lunch meeting was set in New York, and Burke was clearly impressed with the brash yet affable Steinbrenner. George and Burke would be partners, and Steinbrenner would assemble the rest of the ownership team from his personal network of wealthy investors. He and Burke would be general partners; the

others limited partners. Burke would continue to run the baseball operations leaving the Yankee management structure intact. While Burke would recall that he had been accustomed to doing “handshake” agreements, in this case he had Steinbrenner initial the deal he laid out for himself which he had written in long hand on a piece of paper. On December 19, 1972 Mike Burke and George Steinbrenner met with Bill Paley on the 35th floor of “Black Rock” (CBS headquarters on 6th Avenue). Having had prior discussions with Paley, Burke knew what offer he would accept to buy the team, and with that foresight, George offered the CBS president $10 million. The negotiations were short. While Paley tried to shake them down for another million, Steinbrenner coolly stood pat and within a few days Paley accepted the $10 million offer. The deal was announced at a press conference in New York on January 3, 1973. CBS would receive $10 million in cash, of which Steinbrenner himself would contribute only several hundred thousand dollars. In fact, the actual “net” value of the deal has been revealed to be only $8.8 million, as the original sale included two parking garages which CBS eventually re-purchased for $1.2 million. The team was valued by Forbes in 2016 at $3.4 Billion, a multiple of 386 times the original investment! The Steinbrenner/Burke marriage, however, did not last long. Shortly after the deal was announced Steinbrenner brought in Gabe Paul from the Cleveland Indians. George told Burke it was just an interim move as Paul was getting ready to retire in a couple of years. That’s how it would be sold to the New York media. But it was soon revealed that Paul would play more than simply a cursory role in the team’s operations. He would be appointed by George as the team president, a role which was pre-determined to be Burke’s. The deal that had been worked out between Burke and Steinbrenner was rejected by George through his lawyers. After numerous attempts at working out an agreement, and with Gabe Paul taking on the lead role in the chain of command of operations, Burke decided he would make a graceful exit. But not before giving Steinbrenner fits. That spring, he would give Bobby Murcer a welldeserved raise to $100,000, up from the $85,000 he received the prior year. Murcer had hit 33 homeruns in 1972 with nearly 100 RBIs. George called Burke from Cleveland screaming when he learned of it. “ this partnership is not a money tree” George reportedly told Burke.

Three weeks into the season, Burke wrote Steinbrenner with a proposal for him to exit the Yankee front office and remain a limited partner. George was apparently relieved, and as such, that break actually helped repair the relationship to some degree, or at least stem the bleeding. As they talked about the loose ends, including Ralph Houk’s decision to leave (apparently unable to adjust to Steinbrenner’s close monitoring of the club’s performance), Burke had one final recommendation when asked who should manage the team. “Get Billy Martin” Burke told the boss. It would be a fortuitous piece of advice for the new Yankee owner and one which would shape the next generation of Yankee history.

The Swap

“There comes a time in every man’s life, and I’ve had plenty of them” – Casey Stengel

On March 6 of 1973, as the spring training was just getting underway, splashed on the headlines of the NY Daily News was as story about two Yankee pitchers. No, not about a combined perfect game, nor a no hitter, nor back to back shutouts. No, nothing to do with baseball at all, except, perhaps for their notoriety of the principals involved. Fritz Peterson and Mike Kekich, two of the Yankees core starters, announced to the world that they had swapped wives, families – even pets in what became the most sensational sports scandal of the time. This was blockbuster news. this was a time when scandals were kept under wraps, a time before social media, before shock jocks, when the press was cozy with players and respected their privacy. Happening only two short months since his purchase of the Yankees was announced, George must surely have been cringing! Fritz Peterson was the proverbial #2 starter, behind Mel Stottlemyre, with a phenomenal home ERA of 2.52 – still a Yankee record for a starting pitcher. From Arlington Heights, Illinois, Peterson signed with the Yankees in 1963. After working his way up the minor league ranks with impressive performances, Peterson was invited to the Yankees spring training camp in 1966. According to then manager Johnny Keane, he had average three strike-outs for every walk in the minors. Peterson won his first game as a Yankee starter in 1966, beating Baltimore Orioles 3-2. He went on to have solid starts during the Blunder Years, the highlight being 1970 when we went 20-11 with an ERA of 2.90 and 127 strikeouts. He made the All-Star team that year as well. In his Yankee career, spanning nine years, Peterson had a record of 109-106 record, with a 3.10 ERA

and 893 strikeouts, and was one of the most successful left-handed pitchers in the league during the 1969-1972 period. In 1974, the Yankees traded Peterson to the Cleveland Indians. Mike Kekich, a #3 starter with somewhat lesser stature, was none the less a solid addition to the rotation (given Yankee standards at that time). From San Diego, California, Kekich first played for the LA Dodgers before being traded to the Yankees in 1969. Although integral to the rotation, he averaged a rather mediocre 4.31 ERA during his five year career with the Yankees. Kekich was traded to Cleveland in 1973. Both Mike and Fritz were good friends, having spent four years together with the Yankees before the new “arrangement”. It all apparently started at a party in July of 1972. While “the swap” took place that year, they decided to hold off on announcing it until the following year when word started to spread. In March of the 1973 they held back to back press conferences announcing the “trade.” The scandal apparently impacted both pitchers, whose performances never reached the levels they had achieved with the Yankees earlier. Peterson went on to have a happy marriage to Susanne Kekich, while his first wife Marilyn did not fare as well with Kekich. They separated only a few years after moving in together, never getting married. As of 2015, a movie about the swap was in development for Warner Brothers by devout Yankee haters Matt Damon and Ben Affleck. Reportedly neither Peterson, Kekich nor their former teammates were cooperating.

Reconstruction: 1973-1975

“It ain’t over till it’s over” – Yogi Berra

1973 represented the 50th Anniversary of Yankee Stadium. The first pitch of that season was thrown out by a Mr. Bluestone, an African American gentleman who was the pharmacist at the Plaza Hotel, an acquaintance of Mike Burke. Mr. Bluestone had been in attendance on Opening Day of Yankee Stadium in 1923. Burke orchestrated that event to the great delight of Whitney Young, president of the National Urban League who brought his parents up from the Carolinas to see the game. It would be one of Burke’s last official acts as Yankee president as his role would be severely curtailed by the new owner in the days that followed. In this, the first year of the new Steinbrenner era, the Yankees’ performance would continue to lull fans to sleep. They finished 80-82, and played their last year in the original Yankee Stadium as renovations would commence the following year. Ralph Houk would leave at the end of the year, as would Yankee president Lee Mhail to become AL President. Mhail’s approach of restocking the farm and supplementing his new young players with trades was a long term strategy – not well understood by the legions of discontented and impatient fans. He recognized that the Yankees were not so much competing against the teams in their division as they were against their own “ghosts” of their past. Clearly, 1973 was a year of transition. George and his new ownership team were contemplating the best moves to rebuild, realizing there was no short term fix, and planning for the future. Still, a few good things emerged aside from the psychological boost to fans who escaped the torment of CBS rule. The addition of Craig Nettles in the fall of 1972 in a six player trade (one of the last initiated by Mhail following the acquisition of Lyle) is one of the best trades in Yankee history. Arguably the best overall Yankee third baseman (with credits to Clete Boyer), he played stellar defense and possessed a powerful left-

handed bat ideally suited for the short porch in Yankee Stadium. In 1974 he set the record for the most homeruns in the month of April to kick off the season. He would make the All-Star team 6 times beginning in 1975. His later defensive prowess in the 1978 World Series against the Dodgers propelled Nettles into the highlight reel of greatest plays in Series history. Murcer and Munson continued their offensive leadership in 1973 batting .304 and .301 respectively. The addition of Felipe’s brother Matty Alou also added some excitement and punch as he averaged .296 with 59 runs scored. On the pitching front, while Stottlemyre finished with a subpar year of 16-16, the addition of Doc Medich, drafted by the Yankees in 1970, paid immediate dividends as he went 14-9 with a 2.95 ERA. Medich would continue his winning ways in ’74 when he would finish with 19 wins – a career high, before posting a more mediocre performance in ’75 at 16-16. In 1974 the Yankees played at Shea Stadium as the renovation of Yankee stadium was underway. They added popular Lou Pinella to the roster during the offseason, acquiring him for former bullpen ace Lindy McDaniel. Pinella would become a cornerstone of the new Yankee era, and play for the Yankees for 11 years, through four pennants, and two world championships. During that offseason Steinbrenner also tried to hire Oakland A’s manager Dick Williams. Unfortunately the deal was blocked by the league as Williams was still under contract by the A’s. Instead, Bill Virdon was brought on to manage the club. The Yankees finished 89-73, a significant improvement over the prior year, and only two games back of the Baltimore Orioles in first place. This was the first real evidence that the Yankees had turned the corner and the new era was in full swing. The Yanks continued to play at Shea in ’75 posting another winning record (8377), albeit 12 games back of Boston. The year was bitter sweet. On a somber note, one of the most revered Yankees, Bobby Murcer, was traded to the San Francisco Giants. While clearly a star player, he could not have been expected to fill the giant shoes of his predecessor in center field. While he excelled at Yankee Stadium with the shorter right field porch, he struggled at Shea, hitting only two homeruns there.

Still, it was as much a shock to Bobby as it was to his fans that he was no longer a New York Yankee. Gabe Paul delivered the news. Murcer later said that “I wasn’t as shocked learning about my brain tumor in the parking lot in Oklahoma City in 2006 as I was at hearing Gabe’s words in 1974: ‘We’ve traded you to the Giants.’ ” Yogi, like millions of others considered Murcer “a class act with a big heart.” He would make a return engagement with the Yankees from 1979 to 1983, in a part time role, where he would end his career as a player. A clutch player and wellliked and respected teammate, Murcer would go on to become a popular Yankees’ broadcaster before being diagnosed with brain cancer in 2006. To the heartbreak of his legends of fans, it proved to be fatal. Murcer was traded for Giants’ star Bobby Bonds (father of Barry), who performed irably with 32 homeruns, scoring 93 runs and knocking in 85 RBIs. Yet, he only played one year for the Yankees and was traded in the off season for future Yankee stars Mickey Rivers (who would become a fixture in centerfield), along with starting pitcher Ed Figueroa 1975 was also the year when George Steinbrenner, as a result of the nullification of the reserve clause, was able to open up his checkbook and acquire free agent Catfish Hunter. Hunter, who would win the Cy Young Award in 1974, got into a contract dispute with Oakland A’s owner Charlie Finley that year. Hunter then challenged Finley through the Players’ Association executive director, Marvin Miller. The dispute went into arbitration, and when the result came back in Hunter’s favor it paved the way for free agency, changing baseball forever. Catfish Hunter ended up g the biggest contract in baseball history and donned Yankee pinstripes the next season. The final ingredient was now in place for Steinbrenner to lead the Yankees back to their rightful place as the dominant force in major league baseball. He would initiate that by taking Mike Burke’s advice and hiring one of the best managers in baseball, Billy Martin, in 1975 who would mix those ingredients into a potent, (sometimes volatile) cocktail for success. Steinbrenner, that strategist and Martin, the tactician became an unstoppable, dynamic, yet bombastic duo. Yankee fans, like me, could finally exhale. George had a ion for the Yankees and a determination to win that the fans had not seen from their team’s owners since the Casey Stengel era.

And win he did. 1976 was the year the Yankees would once again rule the American League, followed by two back to back World Championships in ’77 and ’78 against their old rivals the Dodgers. And as long as George was at the helm, they would never look back. The rest, as they say, is history!

Stars of the Blunder Years

(Career Stats with Yankees with at least two years playing time)

Jack Aker, #22

Set the Yankee record for pitching 33+ scoreless innings in relief.

Born: Tulare, CA, 1940 Yankee Affiliation: 1969-1972 Position: Relief Pitcher W-L: 16-10 ERA: 2.23; Saves: 31

Felipe Alou, #24

Traded to the Yankees after 13 years in the majors. One of three baseball brothers who played contemporaneously.

Born: Bajos de Haina, San Cristobal, Dominican Republic, 1935 Yankee affiliation: 1971 - 1973 Position: Outfield BA: .271 Runs: 110 RBIs: 133 HRs: 18

Stan Bahnsen, #45

Highly touted 1968 Rookie of the Year

Born: Council Bluffs, IA, 1944 Yankee Affiliation: 1966; 1968-1971 Position: Starting Pitcher W-L: 55-52 ERA: 3.10

Ron Bloomberg, #12

First “designated hitter” in baseball.

Born: Atlanta, GA, 1948 Yankee affiliation: 1969; 1971-1976 Position: DH BA: .302 Runs: 168 RBIs: 202 HRs: 47

Jim Bouton, #56

Straddling two eras, his career was cut short by injuries. Best known for his tellall book, Ball Four.

Born: Newark, NJ, 1939 Yankee Affiliation: 1962-1968 Position: Starting Pitcher W-L: 55-51 ERA: 3.36

Danny Cater, #10

Played only two years with the Yankees, but put up solid numbers.

Born: Austin, TX, 1940 Yankee affiliation: 1970-1971 Position: First base; Outfield BA: .290 Runs: 103 RBIs: 126 HRs: 10

Horace Clarke, #20

Horace Clarke has long been associated with this era. A solid second baseman considered by many to be under-rated in his contributions.

Born: St. Croix, US Virgin Islands, 1940 Yankee affiliation: 1965-1974 (10 years) Position: Second Baseman BA: .257 Runs: 543 RBIs: 300 HRs: 27

Al Downing, #24

Best known for serving up homerun number 715 to Hank Aaron as a Dodger.

Born: Trenton, NJ, 1941 Yankee Affiliation: 1961-1969 Position: Starting Pitcher W-L: 72-57 ERA: 3.23

John Ellis, #23

Played in the shadows of Thurman Munson as back-up catcher.

Born: New London, CT, 1948 Yankee affiliation: 1969-1972 Position: Second Baseman BA: .260 Runs: 55 RBIs: 96 HRs: 16

Whitey Ford, #16

The “Chairman of the Board” is the winningest pitcher in Yankee history.

Born: New York, NY, 1928 Yankee Affiliation: 1950-1967 Position: Starting Pitcher W-L: 236-106 ERA: 2.75 10x All-star Cy Young – 1961 Hall of Fame - 1974

Jake Gibbs, #41

Honorable Mention. Star college football All American…did not translate into baseball.

Born: Grenada, MS, 1938 Yankee affiliation: 1962-1971 Position: Catcher BA: .233 Runs: 157 RBIs: 146 HRs: 25

Steve Hamilton, #39

Best known for his “folly floater”, Hamilton amassed an impressive record during this 8 years with the Yankees.

Born: Columbia, KY, 1934 Died: Morehead, KY 1994 Yankee Affiliation: 1963-1970 Position: Relief Pitcher W-L: 34-20 Saves: 36 ERA: 2.78

Mike Kekich, #18

Honorable Mention. Better known for his swapping wives with Fritz Peterson than his pitching.

Born: San Diego, CA, 1945 Yankee Affiliation: 1969-1973 Position: Starting Pitcher W-L: 31-32 ERA: 4.32

Sparky Lyle, #28

One of the premier closers in Yankee history, with a devastating slider.

Born: Du Bois, PA, 1944 Yankee Affiliation: 1972-1978 Position: Relief Pitcher W-L: 57-40 ERA: 2.41 Saves: 141

Mickey Mantle, #7

Most would not necessarily associate Mantle with this era, having only played three of his eighteen years during the team’s downturn. This in no way diminishes his superstar stature during the first 15 years of his illustrious career. The successor to DiMaggio in centerfield, Mantle’s is the last monument to be added to those of Ruth, Gehrig, Huggins, and DiMaggio memorializing his incredible lifetime accomplishments and value to the team.

Born: Spavinaw, OK, 1931 Died: Dallas, TX 1995 Yankee Affiliation: 1951-1968 Positions: Centerfield; First Base BA: .298 HRs: 536 RBIs: 1509 Runs: 1676 10x All-star 3x MVP (1056, 1957, 1962) Triple Crown – 1956 AL Homerun leader – 1955, 1956, 1958, 1960 HOF Induction: 1974

Lindy McDaniel, #40

Known for his split fingered “forkball,” he had a great stint with the Yankees after 13 years in the majors. His 29 saves in 1970 tied a Yankee club record.

Born: Trenton, Hollis, OK, 1935 Yankee Affiliation: 1968-1973 Position: Relief Pitcher W-L: 38-29 Saves: 58 ERA: 2.89

Gene Michael, #17

The “Stick”, was a versatile shortstop and utility infielder whose major contribution came off the field following his player career. In various capacities under George Steinbrenner, he played a major role in the Yankees’ future success.

Born: Kent, Ohio, 1938 Yankee affiliation: 1968-1974 Position: Shortstop BA: .233 Runs: 205 RBIs: 204 HRs: 12

Bobby Murcer, #2

A power hitting left-handed hitter, and one of the most beloved Yankees. Played during two tenures with the Yanks and continued later as a broadcaster. His playing time was interrupted from 1967-1968 due to military duty. Played a total of 13 years with the Yankees and spanned two eras. His broadcast career and his life ended prematurely in 2008 when he ed away from a brain tumor.

Born: Oklahoma City, OK, 1946 Died: Oklahoma City, OK, 2008 Yankee affiliation: 1965-1966; 1969-1974; 1979-1983 Position: Outfield BA: .278 Runs: 1231 RBIs: 687 HRs: 175 5x All-star

Thurman Munson, #15

First round draft pick in 1967. All-star catcher, Rookie of the Year, and Yankee Captain from 1976-1979 until his life was cut short in a tragic plane crash.

Born: Akron, OH, 1947 Died: Green, OH, 1979 Yankee affiliation: 1969-1979 Position: Catcher BA: .292 Runs: 696 RBIs: 701 HRs: 113 Rookie of the Year - 1970 7x All-star AL MVP 1976

Joe Pepitone, #25

A bridge between Yankee eras, Joe will always be known for his hair style, gold glove at first base, left handed power, and his bad boy image!

Born: Brooklyn, NY 1940 Yankee affiliation: 1962-1969 Position: First base; Centerfield BA: .252 Runs: 435 RBIs: 541 HRs: 166 3x All-star

Fritz Peterson, #19

A solid number 2 starter, Fritz will still be best known for his swap of wives with teammate Mike Kekich.

Born: Chicago, ILL, 1942 Yankee Affiliation: 1966-1974 Position: Starting Pitcher W-L: 109-106 ERA: 3.10

Mel Stottlemyre, #30

We’ll never know how great Mel could have been with more offense behind him. With a great sinkerball, he racked up three 20 win seasons during the Yankees worst period in their history. He returned as Yankee pitching coach from 19962005.

Born: Hazelton, MO, 1941 Yankee Affiliation: 1964-1974 Position: Starting Pitcher W-L: 164-139 ERA: 2.97 5x All-star

Tom Tresh, #15

Switch-hitting shortstop and Rookie of the Year in 1962, who, like Mantle and Ford, spanned two eras.

Born: Detroit, MI, 1938Died: Venice, FL, 2008 Yankee affiliation: 1962-1969 Position: Shortstop, third base BA: .247 Runs: 549 RBIs: 493 HRs: 140

Roy White, #6

Mr. Consistency, Roy White was one of the most reliable Yankees – both offensively and defensively. A switch hitter, with a .988 lifetime fielding percentage, he was also considered by many to be the best at playing left field in Yankee Stadium. It was revealed in a book that White authored, that he had to contend with the harsh realities of racism in the South during his time in the minors in the early ‘60s before breaking into the big leagues in 1965.

Born: Los Angeles, CA, 1943 Yankee affiliation: 1965-1979 Position: Left field BA: .271 Runs: 964 RBIs: 758 HRs: 160 2x All-star

Voices of the NY Yankees (1965-1973)

In the pre-cable era of the 60’s, many games were not televised, and our only alternative was good ole-fashioned radio. The transistor radio became our traveling companion, the prehistoric precursor to our cell phone buddies today. Through either medium, the Yankee announcers became not only our access to the team but our intimate friends, sharing in our euphoria when they were winning, but more often soothing our psyches when they were not.

Mel Allen

1964 did not only spell the end of the Yankees as we knew them, but it marked the departure (actually “firing” to be more politically incorrect) of the long time “Voice of the Yankees”, Mel Allen. It is said that Dan Topping called Mel into his office one day after the season, and told him his contract would not be renewed – but failed to provide any explanation other than “It was nothing you did wrong.” With a distinctive, elegant southern drawl, Mel Allen was a class act, known throughout the country for his broadcast work during the World Series on Gillette’s “Cavalcade of Sports” as well as the All- Star Game and other national events. But Mel was best known as the Voice of the Yankees. With a down-home personal appeal to fans, he was the Yankees. And his signature calls, like the “Ballantine Blast” were integral to the Yankee experience for 18 years. I had the pleasure of meeting Mel at a NY Yankees Foundation reception shortly after George Steinbrenner bought the team, and he was a friendly and genuine in person as he appeared to be on air. George had hired him back in 1976 to work some of the cable telecasts and special events. The following year, Mel was offered the opportunity to host This Week in Baseball, a popular syndicated television show featuring baseball highlights of the preceding week. Mel hosted the show for 20 years, until he ed away in 1996 at the age of 83. Allen was inducted into the Baseball [Broadcast] Hall of Fame in 1978 along with his broadcast partner Red Barber.

Red Barber

Another southern gentleman of class and distinction, Walter Lanier “Red” Barber (acquiring the name “Red” from the color of his hair) was originally the acclaimed voice of the Brooklyn Dodgers. He ed Mel Allen broadcasting Yankees games on both the radio (WINS) and television (WPIX) booths in 1954, where they worked side by side for 11 years. He stayed on for two additional years, partnered with former Yankee stars Phil Rizzuto and Jerry Coleman until 1966. Like Mel, Red too was dismissed by the Yankees – in this case after having the audacity to announce the paid attendance at the Stadium in September of 1965 at under 500 fans, and describing the desolate scene at the stadium that day. And like Allen, Barber entertained fans with his folksy style and colorful analogies. His signature call was “Oh Doctor!” after an amazing play by either side. But that in no way diminished his highly regarded professionalism as a sports announcer. Vin Scully of the Dodgers, to whom Barber was a mentor, was quoted in Barber’s 1992 NY Times obituary as being “perhaps the most literate sports announcer I had ever met.” Barber received numerous awards including the Peabody and Ford Frick Awards for broadcasting excellence.

Phil Rizzuto

As great a legacy as Mel Allen and Red Barber earned during their tenures with the Yankees, Phil (Scooter) Rizzuto was the voice of our generation of Yankee fans. A former all-star shortstop with the Yankees during the 1940s and ‘50s, Phil Rizzuto was as good at that position as any Yankee prior to Derek Jeter. Perhaps not as polished as Mel or Red in his broadcasting prowess, Phil was none the less one of the most popular, down to earth men of his time, with a smooth, soothing voice that was not afraid to reflect his ion for the team. But that ion was always tempered by fairness and his great knowledge and respect for the game. Phil would “call it as he saw it”. Here is another example of a Yankee I had the pleasure of meeting – an impromptu encounter as he emerged from parking his car before a game to which I arrived early. There I was, my arm in a cast having broken my wrist a few weeks earlier, and Phil was more than eager to sign it for me. And yes, he actually did start off the conversation with “Holy Cow” (his signature call), followed by, “What happened to you?” Phil had his share of quirky behavior – like leaving the stadium before the game ended to “beat the traffic across the [GW] bridge;” sending birthday wishes out to fans who would write in; thanking them on air for sending him his favorite cannoli; or vacating the booth suddenly if he happened to see a flash of lightning! Phil entered the broadcast booth in 1957 to be the color man for Mel Allen and Red Barber. In ’63 he was ed by his double-play partner, former Yankee second baseman Jerry Coleman, and in ’65 by Joe Garagiola. Rizzuto took over the lead announcer for both TV and radio in 1967 and remained as the new voice of the Yankees until he left in 1996 – a career spanning 40 years as a broadcaster with the team! Perhaps I best Phil for his jovial jostling with Bill White, who entered the broadcast booth in 1971 and with whom he maintained a close, affectionate relationship with through the years.

Rizzuto was elected to the Baseball Hall of Fame, as a player, in 1991.

Jerry Coleman

A part time infielder for the Yankees, Jerry Coleman had his best year with the club in 1950 when he became Rizzuto’s regular double-play partner. Unfortunately Coleman’s baseball career was rather unspectacular when compared to his contribution as a fighter pilot in both World War II and the Korean War. He is perhaps best known in New York as the Scooter’s broadcast partner from 1963 to 1967. He went on to become a popular broadcaster for the San Diego Padres starting in 1972, receiving the Ford Frick Award by the Baseball Hall of Fame in 2005.

Joe Garagiola

Like his lifelong friend, Yogi Berra, Joe Garagiola hailed from St. Louis. Both shared a love of baseball and went on to play in the majors as catchers. But unlike Yogi, who had a Hall of Fame career, Joe would not be ed for his baseball stats. After nine years in the “big leagues”, mostly with St. Louis, he began a second career as a baseball announcer in 1955 doing play by play for the Cardinals. He ed the Yankees broadcast booth alongside Phil Rizzuto and Jerry Coleman for a short time between 1965 until 1967. A very colorful and gregarious personality, Garagiola was best known for his association with NBC for 30 years. He was teamed with former Yankee Tony Kubek as well as sports legend Vin Scully for network baseball telecasts in the ‘70s and ‘80s. He received numerous honors including the Peabody Award in 1971 for his work at NBC and the Ford Frick Award in 1991.

Frank Messer

Frank Messer ed the Yankee broadcast booth in 1968 following Garagiola’s departure to pursue his other broadcast activities at NBC. Messer, a more traditional “play by play” announcer, was known for his very professional broadcast style and articulate voice, and was often used to emcee special events such as Old Timers’ Day and Mickey Mantle Day. Starting out as a partner to Rizzuto and Coleman, he continued to broadcast Yankees’ games with Rizzuto and newcomer Bill White until 1988. Two of his most famous calls were of the Bucky Dent homerun in the Boston playoff game in 1978, and the Dave Righetti no-hitter in 1983.

Bob Gamere

His signature homerun call, “High, far and gone” aptly describes where we felt Bob Gamere belonged. With little in the way of personality, he lasted only one year, 1970, and we could not have been more pleased to see him go. Gamere’s subsequent ventures included hosting a game show in Boston and serving time in prison on felony charges.

Bill White

After a successful baseball career with both the NY and San Francisco Giants, Bill White started his new career as a sportscaster in Philadelphia, before ing the Yankees in 1971. Teamed with Phil Rizzuto and Frank Messer, he broadcast for the Yankees for 18 years, frequently engaging in a good natured way with Rizzuto, who was known to go “off script” on occasion. In 1989, White was unanimously elected to become National League President, replacing A. Bart Giamatti, who became the new Baseball Commissioner. Bill White was the first African American sportscaster to do regular play by play, and the first to hold such as high executive level office in baseball.

Bob Sheppard

The “voice of God”, Bob Sheppard was public address announcer for the NY Yankees for 56 years beginning in 1951 until 2007. Mickey Mantle is said to have told him once that whenever he announced his name “it sent shivers up his spine.” Receiving numerous accolades, including a plaque in Monument Park, Sheppard participated in over 4,500 Yankee ball games. He ed away just shy of his 100th birthday in 2010.

Eddie Layton

A popular fixture behind the organ at Yankee Stadium, Eddie Layton serenaded fans over three decades. One positive thing coming out of the CBS ownership was their installation of an organ in 1965, and Mike Burke’s hiring of Layton in 1967. While on hiatus for a few years in the ‘70s, Eddie Layton performed for Yankee fans until his last performance in September of 2003.

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Bibliography/References

• Baseball-almanac.com: o NY Yankees - 1965; 1966; 1967; 1968; 1969; 1970; 1971; 1972; 1973 • Diamonddusk.com; The Demise of the NY Yankees 1964-1966; by Al Featherston • Hubpages.com, May 1, 2016, Del E. Webb: Biography of the Man and His Construction Business • NY Times, End of the World as the Yankees Knew It; by Richard Sondomir, March 16, 2014 • NY Times Archives May 20, 1974, Dan Topping Dead at 61: Yankee Owner 22 Years • NY Times, The Day the Tigers Tipped Pitches for the Mick, May 8, 2009, Alan Schwarz • Ourgame.mlblogs.com; The Day Rocky Pitched; Bill Ryczek, December, 2013 • Outrageous Good Fortune, by Mike Burke; Little Brown & Company; 1984 • Then Roy Said to Mickey; Roy White; Triumph Books, 2009 • Thespitter.com; The Most Disappointing Season for the New York Yankees; March 21, 2016 • Thisgreatgame.com; 1965 The Fall of the Yankee Empire • When the Yankees Were on the Fritz; Fritz Peterson; 2014 • Wikipedia:

o New York Yankees - 1964; 1965; 1966; 1966; 1967; 1968; 1969; 1979; 1972; 1973 o Jack Aker; Mel Allen; Reuben Amaro; Stan Bahnsen; Red Barber; Steve Barber; Yogi Berra; Ron Bloomberg; Jim Bouton; Mike Burke; Rocky Colavito; Horace Clarke; Jerry Coleman; Bobby Cox; John Ellis; Frank Fernandez; Whitey Ford; Bob Gamere; Joe Garagiola; Jake Gibbs; Steve Hamilton; Ralph Houk; Elston Howard; Mike Kekich; Tony Kubek; Mickey Mantle; Lindy McDaniel; Lee Mhail; Frank Messer; Gene Michael; Bobby Murcer, Thurman Munson; Joe Pepitone; Fritz Peterson; Bobby Richardson; Phil Rizzuto; George Steinbrenner; Casey Stengel; Mel Stottlemyre; Ron Swoboda; Dan Topping; Tom Tresh; Del Webb; George Weiss; Bill White; Roy White • Yankee for Life; Bobby Murcer; Harper Collins, 2008

Ron Quartararo is a senior level business development executive for a global technology company. He has spent the past 20 years in a variety of planning & development, strategy, solutions and sales roles in the media & entertainment industry. Quartararo is also an accomplished writer with OpEd articles appearing in the NY Times, Daily News, Barron’s, Newsday, Business & Society Review, TV Executive, Broadcast Engineering and Broadcasting & Cable. His first book, La Famiglia: The Power & ion of Family was published by Xlibris in 2010. His second, Exploring the Mafia Mystique, was published in 2014. A life-long Yankee fan, Quartararo grew up during the late 60’, a period when Yankee heroes were hard to find and championships were relics of the past. Yet, despite the team’s reversal of fortune, this time was filled with memorable, (albeit sometimes frustrating) days, when Quartararo and his cousin would rediscover this remarkable franchise, whose achievements were and are unprecedented in sports. Now, more fully appreciating this era in Yankee history, Quartararo attempts to uncover the roots of the decline while sharing his personal experiences with the reader.