An Afternoon with Yogi

He walks more gingerly than he used to, and he talks more softly than he once did. But his smile, his sense of humor, and his easygoing manner are all still there, as they’ve been for the 65 years that he’s been in the public eye.

I got the chance to meet Yogi Berra yesterday, thanks to the generosity of a friend and colleague. My friend Hedy invited me to the Yogi Berra Museum & Learning Center on the campus of Montclair State University to watch the 86-year-old Yankee legend respond to interviews from high school students, as part of a sports broadcasting camp. The camp, which Hedy helps coordinate, is run by her brother, David Siroty, as well as sports journalists Bruce Beck, Ian Eagle, Dave Popkin and Mike Quick. It’s an extraordinarily impressive camp, as evidenced by the quality of the students’ work and the dedication of the experienced teachers.

So as a guest of the camp, I sat in the auditorium of Yogi’s museum and watched him sit down in a white folding chair, a Yankees cap atop his head and a Yankees jacket over his polo shirt. He held his cane in his hands and listened closely to every student’s question.

It was fascinating to watch Yogi handle the questions. Sometimes, he’d give a direct answer, such as when one student asked, “Yogi, was Jackie Robinson safe or – ” “Out!” the former catcher barked before that question could even be completed. Robinson’s famous steal of home during Game One of the 1955 World Series between the Yankees and Brooklyn Dodgers still stokes the competitive fire within Berra. Another student asked, “Yogi, what did you tell Derek Jeter after his 3,000th hit?” Yogi: “I told him it was about time.”

Most of Yogi’s answers, though, were not as direct. More often than not, Yogi took the student’s question as more of an invitation to tell a story. Somewhere in that story was an answer to the question. But in essence, the question was more of an opportunity for Yogi to reminisce. For instance, after sharing his humorous compliment to Jeter about that 3,000th hit, Yogi then started telling the students that he’s also joked with Jeter in the past about swinging at (and missing) high fastballs: “I asked him, ‘Why did you swing at those high ones?’ ” Yogi recalled. “[Jeter] said, ‘Well, you swung at them.’ I said, ‘Yeah, but I hit them.’ ” When asked about his batting style, Yogi didn’t speak about his three MVP awards or his 358 home runs. Instead, he brought us back to 1950, and told us that he’d come to bat 597 times that year and struck out only 12 times. He said he retired in 1965 after just nine at-bats because he struck out three times in one game. That’s how he knew it was time. “I retired that day,” he said.

When asked about his best and worst moments with George Steinbrenner, Yogi smiled, sighed, and brought his listeners back to the early 1980s. He told stories about young players whom the late Yankees owner traded away (such as outfielder Willie McGee) or threatened to demote (such as Dave Righetti). Yogi eventually got around to sharing his good moments with Steinbrenner, but only after telling us that Willie McGee (who retired when these students were toddlers) was a great talent, and that he was traded to the Cardinals for a pitcher named Bob Sykes. McGee smacked more than 2,000 hits in his career, while Sykes never pitched a game for New York. Yogi remembers that.

It’s the details like this – McGee for Sykes – that always amaze me when I’m listening to one of my elders talk. For years, the vivid storyteller in my life was my grandfather, Warren Mueller. Many of my grandfather’s stories were about baseball, too, as he played professionally in the Boston Braves’ minor-league system during the 1940s, then played semipro ball for years afterward. My brother and I would ask my grandfather so many questions about his playing days, and he’d remember the details of a game in 1944 better than he could recall what he’d eaten for breakfast that day. He always seemed grateful that his grandchildren wanted to know so much about his life, and he never stopped telling us stories. He told us about the tryout he had with the Brooklyn Dodgers at age 18, about the games he pitched with the Hartford Senators in 1944 and ’45, about the exhibition game in which he pitched against Joe DiMaggio in ‘46, and about the flourishing semipro baseball scene on Staten Island in the 1940s (done in by television, he’d always say). Just two days before he died, my grandfather told me for the first time that he’d pitched against Jimmie Foxx.

Warren Mueller has been gone for almost five years. My brother and I miss his voice, his laugh, and the stories he told. I didn’t know what to expect from yesterday’s visit to hear Yogi Berra – I’m not really big on star-gazing, and I had plenty of interviews with famous people during my work as a journalist. But what I ended up hearing from Yogi was some of my grandfather’s voice inside of his. Sure, the details were different, and they involved the most famous team in the history of American sport. But the rhythm and the purpose for these stories were the same.

All the campers and teachers took pictures with Yogi afterward, and David got me in for a photo as well. My photo looks silly, as I’m not posing and smiling for the camera. Instead, I’m standing there talking with Yogi. I shook his hand, introduced myself, and blurted out a few sentences about how much I appreciated the job he had done managing the 1984 Yankees. That team was out of contention early and brought up their best prospects in the summer for a long audition. I was 13, and at the apex of my childhood fascination with baseball. “You let the kids play,” I told Yogi, “just like the Mets have to do this year.” He smiled back, and said something that I couldn’t hear amid the din of the auditorium.

It may seem strange that I botched a photo with Yogi Berra. But I think I know what was going on there. I wasn’t really trying to talk with Yogi in that moment. I think I was just trying to get in a few more words with my grandfather.

Yogi, I’m sure, understood. When one student asked him how he felt about being honored at Yogi Berra Day more than 10 years ago, the man in the Yankees cap started to choke up as he remembered the day. “I’m getting emotional right now,” he said.

Mortality is more real and lasting than any home run or tag at the plate. That’s why we tell stories, and that’s why we listen.

Closers & Connections (One Sixty-Two: Day 162)

Writer’s note: One Sixty-Two is a season-long series of blog posts connecting baseball’s major-league players to life’s universal themes. Just as there are 162 games in a season, so there will be 162 posts in this series. Let’s play some ball.

Day One Hundred Sixty-Two: Mariano Rivera, New York Yankees

When I was taking journalism courses in college, I studied many of the great American sportswriters. It didn’t take long for Roger Angell to quickly become a favorite. Angell’s breathtaking New Yorker essays showed me the extent to which baseball writing can be literature. I studied Angell’s stories and noticed his attention to detail, as well as his willingness to go beyond balls and strikes and into the larger stories taking place in a ballpark every day.

Thanks to writers like Angell and the incomparable Gary Smith of Sports Illustrated, my life as a sports fan, sports reader and sports writer is framed by the dual observations of the game itself and the stuff of life surrounding that game. My heart pounds when Mariano Rivera enters a Yankee game in the late innings of a playoff matchup: He’s out there, after all, because New York is trying to protect a razor-thin lead against a formidable foe. But amid the nail-biting suspense, I try and see the big picture as well. I view the cool with which a man like Rivera goes about dispatching elite hitters every day, and wonder how different his nerves are from those of a man who welds together steel beams 100 stories above Manhattan, or a woman who defuses bombs for a living. As Rivera finishes off a hitter for the final out, I wonder what it says about the man that he is able to smile and shake hands while also maintaining a composure that seems to say, “The win was great, but it’s not everything.”

When Rivera closes a game, as he’s done better than anyone in history, he seems to enjoy the moment while also looking ahead. Even after he’d finished off the Philadelphia Phillies in last year’s World Series, Rivera stood on the dais at Yankee Stadium and announced that he was ready to play ball for another half-decade. The man can finish things, but he knows that every ending is really just another beginning.

“Baseball is not life itself, although the resemblance keeps coming up,” Roger Angell wrote in his book Season Ticket. The great part about this aphorism is that you don’t have to force it. My wife bought some Turkey Hill ice cream today at Stop & Shop, and it came in a Yankee-themed box with a flavor titled “Pinstripe Brownie Blast.” Now that is an example of a forced baseball-to-life connection. We didn’t need the brownie blast to see baseball and life interweaving – clearly, my wife had gone food shopping without eating a full breakfast today, and her hunger had left her buying food items in a manner befitting George Steinbrenner’s free-agent splurges of the 1980s: She was eagerly snatching up the fancy-looking stuff, buying on impulse rather than deliberate planning. Amy may not like this ice cream in the end, but for the moment it was a headline-grabbing purchase in our house.

Another arduous regular season draws to a close this weekend, with the playoffs set to begin in a few days. Sometime during the week, I’m sure Amy and I will find ourselves sitting in our living room, watching nervously as Mariano Rivera takes to the mound in the ninth inning. Our hearts will race a bit, but I’m sure we’ll calm ourselves down with a nice bowl of Pinstripe Brownie Blast. It will taste good enough to remind us both that baseball, like life, is about far more than the drama of the moment. In my final days of life, I don’t know that I’ll be able to recall what the Yankees did in 2010. But I know I’ll be able to remember what it felt like to sit next to my wife, eating some ice cream with her, while watching a ballgame together in our home.

In the end, it’s always about the connections – with those we know, with those we meet, and with our own selves. It’s always more about the hug Rivera just gave to his catcher than it is about the final pitch he threw. You don’t build a relationship with a pitch. But you can do it just fine with a hug.

Old-Timers as Teachers (One Sixty-Two: Day 86)

Writer’s note: One Sixty-Two is a season-long series of blog posts connecting baseball’s major-league players to life’s universal themes. Just as there are 162 games in a season, so there will be 162 posts in this series. Let’s play some ball.

Day Eighty-Six: Chase Headley, San Diego Padres (via Jerry Coleman)

I read with deep sorrow the news today that former North Carolina basketball coach Dean Smith is suffering from memory loss. Smith, 79, is one of the giants in college basketball history, and he did it the right way, winning nearly 900 games while also graduating more than 96 percent of his players. While Smith has always been a very private man, those who’ve met him have had the chance to learn so much about life and about basketball.

It seemed somewhat fitting that this news was released today as the New York Yankees held their 64th annual Old-Timers Day at Yankee Stadium. In the same way that countless young basketball players have had the chance to learn from conversations with Dean Smith, the Yankees and Rays players had an opportunity today to learn from nearly 50 retired Yankees players who were honored during a ceremony before the game between New York and Tampa Bay. As the ceremony took place, the cameras showed current Yankees players chatting it up with men much older – and, in many cases, much wiser – than they.

It makes no sense to me that the Yankees stand alone in holding a baseball ceremony of this sort. We read so often of young ballplayers who lack perspective, maturity, and a true appreciation for the game and its history. What better opportunity than to walk into your clubhouse and find 50 former players right there, ready and willing to talk baseball and life with you?

In addition to honoring retired players from the ‘60s, ‘70s, ‘80s, ‘90s and ‘00s, the Yankees also celebrated the 60th anniversary of their 1950 championship team today with a handful of surviving members from that great team. Among those present today was Jerry Coleman, a former infielder for New York who had his best season in 1950. Coleman is now 85, but he’s still announcing San Diego Padres games on the radio. Coleman began working as an announcer in 1960, and he only stopped for the one year in which the Padres hired him to manage the team.

Those Yankees who chatted with Coleman today could have asked him about a lot of things. They could have asked how it felt to win five straight championships, and what it was like to turn a double play with Phil Rizzuto. They could have asked about his transition from the playing field to broadcasting booth, and how he handled that. They also could have asked Coleman about his service in the United States Marine Corps during both World War II and the Korean War. They could have asked him which of his accomplishments he’s most proud of, and what it all means as he looks back on nearly 86 years of living, playing, serving and talking.

Out in San Diego, the Padres players are incredibly lucky to have a guy like Coleman around them. A young infielder like Chase Headley can learn from his team’s announcer – learn a bit about the game of baseball, or learn even more about the game of life. This past week, with the deaths of Bob Sheppard and George Steinbrenner, Yankees players were reminded that no one stays around forever. And the North Carolina Tar Heel family has been reminded that as we age, our minds don’t always stay as sharp.

The seniors among us have so much to share. All we have to do is ask. Schools across the nation are constantly bringing youngsters together with older folks to learn from one another. Baseball can surely do more of the same. Old-Timers games are more than a chance for the old gang to get together again while they’re well enough to do so. These ceremonies allow generations to connect. You can’t go wrong with that.

When the Boss Listened (One Sixty-Two: Day 82)

Writer’s note: One Sixty-Two is a season-long series of blog posts connecting baseball’s major-league players to life’s universal themes. Just as there are 162 games in a season, so there will be 162 posts in this series. Let’s play some ball.

Day Eighty-Two: Andy Pettitte, New York Yankees (via George Steinbrenner)

What is strong leadership? Is it getting the job done, no matter what the cost? Is it setting a standard for dignity and effort, with the knowledge that others will watch and follow your example? Must a successful leader rule by fear and intimidation, or is it possible instead to lead more effectively through quiet determination and clear communication?

As dozens of baseball players, managers, executives and media types commented today on the death of New York Yankees Owner George Steinbrenner, they said many kind words about a man who was driven to win. But as they spoke of Steinbrenner, the underlying discussion these folks were having was one on leadership. Was Steinbrenner a positive leader, one to be honored for all time? Or was he a pushy, overly involved boss who instilled more trepidation in his employees than trust?

I’ve followed the New York Yankees closely for 33 years, and in my formative years I watched Steinbrenner blow through managers, third-base coaches and front-office executives like a fussy homemaker ever dissatisfied with his living-room furniture. What’s more, Steinbrenner would constantly trade young prospects for veterans past their prime, and he would publicly berate his players time and time again.

This came to a head in 1990, when Steinbrenner was found to have paid a gambler in order to try and find incriminating information about his own player, outfielder Dave Winfield. Fay Vincent, who was commissioner of baseball at the time, banned Steinbrenner from the game for two years.

Yankee Stadium was a lonely place in 1990, as the home team was baseball’s worst franchise and fans could constantly be heard chanting “Steinbrenner Sucks” from the stands. I can recall feeling as though the suspension of Steinbrenner had given my team new hope. And indeed, that’s exactly what happened: The team’s front office executives worked to develop talented young players such as Derek Jeter, Bernie Williams, Mariano Rivera, Andy Pettitte and Jorge Posada. When these players matured, they were not traded, as had been the Steinbrenner way. Instead, they were inserted into the New York lineup.

By the time Steinbrenner returned, he could see that this plan was working. And so he did something that all good leaders do: He listened to his employees’ plan, accepted it, and changed his ways. By 1996, his Yankees were world champions again. Last year, New York won its fifth title in the past 14 years, three more than any other team has won in that time span.

In the early 2000s, Steinbrenner had one more relapse into his blustery ways, deciding strangely that Andy Pettitte – clearly his most reliable pitcher from 1995-2003 – was not worth signing anymore. He also went on to sign a few more of those big-name stars who looked good on paper but didn’t quite fit the Yankee mold. After he’d gotten Jason Giambi, Gary Sheffield and Randy Johnson out of his system and seen no titles as a result of it, Steinbrenner again listened as his general manager laid out a blueprint for developing from within and signing free-agent players who suited the Yankees’ needs. Again he listened, and agreed. So players such as Robinson Cano and Phil Hughes were not traded, and instead became All-Stars. Players such as CC Sabathia and, yes, Andy Pettitte were signed to free-agent contracts. Last year’s Yankees gave Steinbrenner one more championship – his seventh since buying the Yankees in 1973. Pettitte pitched the clinching game in all three rounds of the playoffs.

Today, as news of Steinbrenner’s passing spread throughout the country, Cano and Hughes and Sabathia and Pettitte all were in Anaheim to represent the Yankees as American League All-Stars. The plan is working, even if the Boss is not there to see it through anymore. I never met the man, so I can’t chime in on his character. But I think the sight of Andy Pettitte cruising through Inning 3 of tonight’s All-Star Game says something about this mercurial owner: He slowed down, shifted gears, and tried a new approach. He even stopped firing so many managers and coaches.

Ironically, early-21st century media have brought a reality-TV culture that thrives on intimidation, dismissed contestants and the words “You’re fired.” In the South Bronx, that’s so 1985. George Steinbrenner, dead at 80, learned patience. In doing so, he taught us all a lesson in leadership: It’s never too late to change.

The Moments That Matter

Tough economic times don’t seem to affect the New York Yankees, who have shelled out more than $400 million in recent days just to sign three baseball players. The Yankees may have ruined the Christmas plans of several other ballclubs in winning the bidding wars for those players, but no one is confusing the Steinbrenner family with Ebenezer Scrooge. No tightwads in the Bronx, that’s for sure.

But for those of us who have struggled with how much is too much in the realm of holiday giving, the Yankees’ decision to overpay for All-Stars encompasses a theme we know quite well. I’ve just said goodnight to my two girls on Christmas Day – a day in which they’ve received more presents than entire villages receive in many third-world countries around the globe. I helped select some of those gifts, and I feel some guilt that I’m helping to spoil my kids, as well as some concern that they’ll grow up to be takers more than givers. I want the joys of giving and receiving to be felt by everyone at this time of year, and in equal amounts. I want my girls to want that, too.

We’ve taken the girls caroling at the homes of elderly folks in our church, and they’ve helped us buy presents for people in need through our church as well. We’ve brought boxes of old toys to thrift stores with the kids in tow, and let them see the process by which their donations can be others’ blessings. I’ve taken them to events run by the community service club at my school, and they’ve watched teen-agers give of their time and energy to improve the lives of others.

They will get it, I’m sure. And my wife and I will figure out how many presents are enough. In the meantime, we snuggle together before bed and watch A Charlie Brown Christmas, listening to Linus put it all into perspective, and watching the mean kids find a heart in the end. We watch Charlie as he pays attention to the small details, and we think about the things that matter most.

We think about the moments that bring us together, for those are the gifts we can never replace or exchange. They are always on sale, and at great prices.

I think of the new student I have, who just moved to America from Egypt a couple of months ago. Last week, we looked outside our classroom window to see snow beginning to fall. She walked up to me and said, “Mr. Hynes, I’ve never seen snow before.”

I jumped up from my seat, and called the rest of the class to the front of the room. We all escorted this new student out to the school courtyard. I led her out and she looked up into the white sky. She smiled, and spread out her arms to catch the thick flakes as they fell on her. “I have to get a shovel!” she said to me. I told her she could try to catch them with her tongue as well, to taste them. She said she’d like to try snow angels when she got home.

We stood there for a few more minutes, watching this young woman in her moment of discovery and wonder. It was a true joy to be there, sharing this all with her. It was a joy that no stocking stuffer can provide. As you celebrate the holidays, may you experience many moments like these with those around you. Happy holidays.

October 1993

It was the fall of ’93, and I was busy typing up resumes and cover letters in my parents’ basement as my stereo pumped out the music of Pearl Jam and Nirvana. I had just graduated from college, and was hungrily looking for my first newspaper job. With our country crawling out of a recession, I was casting a wide net, firing out resumes to papers in every mid- and major-size city in America, as well as to papers in Ireland, England and Canada. It was a time of anticipation and hope for a 22-year-old. While doing all this, I had half an eye on the TV screen, where the Chicago White Sox were playing the Toronto Blue Jays in the American League Championship Series, and the Philadelphia Phillies were taking on the Atlanta Braves for the National League pennant. Bo Jackson was challenging his White Sox teammates to bring their games to a higher level, while the Phils’ Curt Schilling was pitching like a man who knew what the postseason was all about.

I’ve been thinking of that period, 15 years ago, as I reflect on the impending reality that 2008 will mark the first autumn since’93 that Major League Baseball is holding a postseason and the Yankees are not a part of it. Like any baseball fan, I’m disappointed that my favorite team doesn’t seem to have enough muscle to push their way into the playoffs. And yet, as I think back on 1993, I remember surviving that year just fine. So as I think ahead to next month, I also see much room for personal fulfillment even without a Yankee playoff game.

As a baseball fan, I’m eager to see young teams like the Brewers, Twins, Rays, Diamondbacks and Cubs vie for a playoff spot and a title. As a Yankee fan, I’m looking forward to watching the team unload some of the high salaries and re-tool. And I must say, some of the New York playoff rituals were getting a bit tiresome – the Irish tenor singing “God Bless America,” Rudy Giuliani clapping from his seat behind home plate, the Joe Torre investment commercials, even – dare I say it – the Jeter fist-pump.

When I think back to ’93 and the Yankees, I remember that being a year in which the team’s future started to unveil itself. We realized that year that it wouldn’t be long before New York returned to the playoffs for the first time since ’81, as the superb young players they’d grown from within had actually not been traded during George Steinbrenner’s two-year exile from baseball. The organization had realized that if you drafted great talent and nurtured it, you could be in pretty good shape once you added the right mix of veterans. In 1993, no Yankees player epitomized the future more than the guitar-playing center fielder, Bernie Williams.

Number 51 was still figuring out how to avoid pickoffs on the bases and when to lay off the breaking pitches at that time. But man, he could hit and run. And as time passed, we realized that this man possessed a brilliant combination of talent and class. He was the kind of player who could hit a walk-off home run in a tension-filled playoff game, then put his head down and run the bases without showing off the opposing team. He was a man who seemed to know that his intense passion on the field would only be maintained by having other interests (such as classical guitar) off the field. He never showed up the fans, and always maintained his cool under the hot lights.

As the Yankees close up their old ballpark and prepare for the new one, there has been no tribute to Bernie Williams. The old center fielder last played in the major leagues during the 2006 season and had a falling out with the team during spring training last year. Whatever was said during that time, the Yankees organization should be fully capable of moving beyond it and retiring No. 51 before the stadium closes. When a man helps his employer make billions of dollars with skill, effort and integrity, he deserves to be honored. When he’s not, the employer looks ungrateful.

Until I see No. 51 hanging up in left field with the other retired numbers, I won’t be too teary-eyed about the Yankees missing out on any playoff series. I’ll keep an eye on Ryan Braun, Alfonso Soriano, Evan Longoria and Chris Young, as they vie for a title. I’ll listen to my music – more Wilco and Beck these days than the grunge music of ’93. I’ll keep up my writing and my teaching. And life will indeed go on.