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There was a time when baseball players didn't have to be extrinsically motivated to try to win the all-star game. The incentive was to win for the pride of the league without hurting your team. Tom Seaver started the 1970 All-Star game. Two events occurred then that could never occur today. New York's most beloved team, at least after the Brooklyn ...

After the 1950 season, Joe DiMaggio was asked to select his greatest game. DiMaggio explained that he had to choose two games because each involved the fans. "I will compromise and pair two thrills as my greatest. They have one thing in common: both were given to me by the fans." DiMaggio selected the penultimate game of the 1949 season played ...

A Difference Between Mickey and Joe DiMaggio In one way, Mickey Mantle was the antithesis of Joe DiMaggio. The Jolter was such an aloof individual that rookies dared not to approach him, much less attempt to speak to him. Mickey Mantle used to rush over to greet new players with an outstretched hand. "I'm Mickey Mantle," he would say, as if the young ...

Baseball history was changed forever on Nov. 28, 2003. Curt Schilling was traded to the Boston Red Sox by the Arizona Diamondbacks. Without Schilling, the Red Sox would not have been World Champions in 2004 or in 2007. Schilling didn't mince words. At the press conference announcing the trade, he succinctly summed up the situation. He told the world that he wanted ...

There have been many instances in which the team with the best record didn't win the pennant. In 1973, neither New York's most beloved team, the gutsy New York Mets, nor the New York Yankees' former unofficial farm team, the Oakland (Kansas City)  A's, had its league's best record, but both were pennant winners. The World Series, pitting two similar teams in what was to become a riveting ...

Mickey Mantle had a terrible season in 1959. He batted .285, with 31 home runs, 75 RBI, and a.517 slugging average. Most players would not consider that too bad, but Mantle was not most players.Yankees general manager George Weiss wanted to slash Mantle's $75,000 salary by $15,000. From his home in Dallas, Mantle agreed that his 1959 season "wasn't so good," but he felt the New York Yankees "cut my salary ...

Pedro Martinez was a better pitcher than Roger Clemens. The basic premise is that the pitcher's job is to prevent the opposition from scoring. Pedro did that better than Roger. Pedro Became Baseball's Best Pitcher in 1997 Originally signed by Los Angeles as an amateur free agent in 1988, Pedro was a young pitcher with great potential, but the Dodgers wouldn't wait. In one of the ...

  Mike Mussina once was a dominant pitcher, but never was he more masterful than on the night of Sept. 2, 2001 against the Boston Red Sox, when he came within one strike of pitching the fourth perfect game in Yankees’ history. Pitching coach Mel Stottlemyre noted, as he watched Mussina warm up in the bullpen before the game, that he was taken aback by the sharp drop on Mussina’s curve ball. "It ...

The New York Yankees' last World Championship was in 2009. For many Yankees’ fans, the eight years between World Championships seemed like an eternity of defeats, despite the team being in the playoffs seven times. Some Yankees’ fans, and of course, Mr. George Steinbrenner, consider the only successful season one in which the Yankees win the final game of the World Series. It is a position that is frowned upon by most ...

Barry Bonds has set some remarkable records. What is notable is not the fact that he set them, but that he broke the old marks by such a wide margin. Babe Ruth was the most feared batter in baseball history until Bonds, late in his career, discovered how he could become even more frightening to pitchers than the Ruth. Pitchers wanted to face Barry Bonds as much as a pudgy kid wants ...