Steve Buttry writes about Yankees of yesterday and today


Joe Torre is a Hall of Famer finally


I actually intended to write a post sometime this year making the case for Joe Torre election to the Hall of Fame. But the Expansion Era Committee chose Torre to enter the Hall of Fame this year, along with his managing peers Tony LaRussa and Bobby Cox.


Torre was a strong candidate for the Hall of Fame as a player and probably should have been chosen on that basis, regardless of his performance as a manager. He and Elston Howard were the best catchers of the 1960s and most people who were best of their era at a position are in Cooperstown. He was a nine time All Star and most eligible players who made that many All Star teams are in the Hall. He also was MVP in 1971 (after moving to third base), leading the league in batting, RBI and hits.


No Hall of Fame catcher topped Torre career figures in all of the triple crown categories (.297, 252 HR, 1185 RBI) as well as his 2,342 hits, and each of those figures ranks in the top half of all Hall of Fame catchers. Among third basemen, only Troy Niklas Authentic Jersey George Brett topped Torre in all four categories, and his totals again measure up as a Hall of Famer compared to the third basemen in Cooperstown. And he won a Gold Glove as a catcher, so he wasn being kept out of Cooperstown because of defensive deficiencies (though he wasn good defensively at third).


Yes, when the Yankees are playing the Red Sox, I hate them and revel in every win against them (and felt pain at this year losses). But when they not playing each other, the Red Sox are among my favorite non Yankee teams. And certainly this year, when they played classy after last year debacle and all of the nation was feeling strong, I enjoyed watching the Red Sox play and win. (I think sports get exaggerated as healing for a city, but I got caught up in the Yankees near win after 9/11, and I was glad to see Boston have this to feel good about.)


I a cancer survivor who enjoys the success of Jon Lester. I always enjoyed watching David Ortiz play (well, maybe not always; 2004 wasn so enjoyable) and enjoyed both his post Marathon exhortation and his post season hitting (and walking) binge this year.


If the Hall of Fame ever starts admitting players who been tainted in the performance enhancing drugs scandals, I probably be cheering for Big Papi to get his place in Cooperstown. The Hall of Fame needs some DH and Papi might deserve to be the first pure DH to win enshrinement.


Of course, the Red Sox hired a good manager and acquired some good players, but mostly I think this year established once and for all that Bobby Valentine is a horrible manager.


Farewell to Mo!


I blogged before about why Mariano Rivera is one of the most unique baseball players ever and why he one of the most incomparable pro athletes everin any sport.


I might not take note again of Mo retirement except for thepost by ESPN Jim Caple(I considered not linking to it here because it was pure click bait, but I believe in linking, so I did) that twisted and selectively used stats to pretend that Rivera and closers in general are overrated.


I presume Caple was not watching the post season, where was the biggest reason that the Red Sox beat the Tigers to make it to the World Series.


Here how important closers are (and specifically how important Rivera was): The Atlanta Braves of the 1990s had a strong offense, including certain Hall of Famer Chipper Jones. They hadthreecertain Hall of Fame starting pitchers in their prime (Greg Maddux, Tom Glavine and John Smoltz) and some other pretty good pitchers and players.


The Yankees of that period had Derek Jeter, a certain Hall of Famer in his prime, and some pretty good players and some pretty good pitchers (Roger Clemens would be a sure Hall of Famer if not tainted with suspicion of using performance enhancing drugs). But they didn have anything as fearsome as that Braves rotation. Except for Mo. The Braves had weak closers (until Smoltz moved to the bullpen, when the team was on the wane). And the Braves won one World Series to four for Rivera in the same stretch (and another later, when Mo was still going strong and the Braves starters had scattered).


ESPN should have higher standards than publishing ignorant click bait nonsense.


Farewell to Andy Pettitte


I noted the first time he retired that Pettitte had a strong case for being a Hall of Famer but wouldn make it. In his return to the game, he added a few wins, but he still won make it. He has more post season wins than anyone and a better career than quite a few Hall of Fame pitchers. I reserve my Hall of Fame outrage for those who absolutely belong in Cooperstown.


But as a Yankee fan, I remember Pettitte 15 years in pinstripes fondly. He always pitched with grit and class.


Good riddance to A Rod


When the Yankees traded Alfonso Soriano for Alex Rodriguez after the 2003 season, I said I rather have Soriano over the next seven seasons (the time remaining on A Rod 10 year contract). Well, A Rod won two Most Valuable Player awards for the Yankees and finally contributed to a World Series championship in 2009 after (and before) several post season disappointments.


The Yankees won four World Series and played in six in the 10 years before A Rod arrived. They made it to one World Series on his his watch. He also had two drug scandals. That not a successful tenure, not for one of baseball best ever players on the most successful sports franchise ever.


One of A Rod most memorable moments as a Yankee was a fight he didn even start, when Jason Varitek of the Red Sox followed A Rod down the first base line after Bronson Arroyo hit A Rod, probably on purpose. A Rod didn charge the mound, but he was jawing at Arroyo on his way to first base, as many hitters do after being hit. Varitek was certainly OK to stay between the hitter and the pitcher in that situation, but if there going to be a fight here, the guy who got hit by the pitch should start it.


Amazingly, Varitek hit A Rod with both hands while still wearing his catcher mask and helmet. It was perhaps the most cowardly punch in the history of baseball fights. Can you imagine the outrage if Jorge Posada, protected by his catching gear, had taken a swing at Big Papi (or even Manny Ramirez)? But because a guy who was widely liked was swinging at the most hated player on the most hated team, Varitek was lauded for his grittiness and his leadership. It showed as clearly as anything how universal the A Rod hatred was.


And the dust up with Arroyo had an equally bizarre second chapter: In Game 6 of the 2004 American League Championship Series, A Rod hit a weak grounder with Jeter on first base and one out, with the Red Sox leading 4 2. Arroyo fielded and was reaching to tag A Rod near first base. A Rod swatted the ball away and was called safe and Jeter raced home to make it a one run game.


But after Terry Francona argued, the umpires conferred and reversed the call, invoking a weird rule I never seen cited before or since: You can knock the ball out of a guy glove with your hand. Base runners always try to kick the ball loose and you can knock the everloving crap out of a catcher (think Pete Rose) to knock the ball loose, but you can swat it. So A Rod would have been fine to run right through Arroyo, but not swat his glove.


But it was A Rod. And the Red Sox were about to sweep the Yankees on their way to breaking their supposed Curse. So there was no outrage about the stupid rule.