Ruth, DiMaggio, Gehrig, Berra, Mantle and Who?

When you think of great, all-time New York Yankees, what do you think of?

Murderers’ Row. The mighty 1927 lineups. The powerhouses of the ‘30s, ‘40s and ‘50s. The Stengel teams of the ‘60s. Names that are myths. Monuments and plaques in the outfield. Guys they made movies about. Wrote songs about.

I mean, we’re talking legends here. Hall of Fame. The warp and woof of baseball. Ruth. Gehrig. DiMaggio. Poosh ‘em Up Tony Lazzeri. Yogi. Bill Dickey. King Kong Keller. Mickey Mantle. Roger Maris. The window-breakers. The Bronx Bombers. The team that invented the home run, the big inning. The Force.

Their trademark was the home run, their stock-in-trade the long ball.

So, who would you guess was No. 6 on the all-time home run hitters’ lineup for these guys?

To make it easy for you, I’ll give you the first five: Babe Ruth, Mickey Mantle, Lou Gehrig, Joe DiMaggio and Yogi Berra.

You figure maybe Maris is next? Dickey? Lazzeri, Keller, Bob Meusel?

No, it’s Graig Nettles.

You heard me. The only guys to hit more home runs than Nettles for the New York Yankees were Ruth, Mantle, Gehrig, DiMag, and Yogi. Only eight Yankees got more RBIs than he did. Only 16 scored more runs and only 16 got more hits.

The Yankees had some great third basemen--Joe Dugan, Joe Sewell, Bobby Brown, Red Rolfe. But Graig Nettles is the all-time Yankee third baseman.

In the Yankee brochure, in the honor roll of achievement by Yankees of history, Graig Nettles is not only the only guy still active in categories he stars in, he’s the only one still alive.

He’s a walking trivia question. He not only wins games, he wins quizzes.

Not too many guys around the bar would put Nettles in the same lineup as the gloried Yankees of the past. But he belongs there. In fact, he will end up with more home runs than some of them, although he has not hit all of them as a Yankee.

Perhaps you noticed in the public prints the other day where Nettles, who is playing with the San Diego Padres and will be 41 in August, not only got his 2,000th hit but went 4 for 4 that day, got his 1,095th run batted in, scored his 1,028th run, and got his 1,105th walk.

Although Nettles was only the sixth guy in history to be named captain of the Yankees--Roger Peckinpaugh, Ruth, Everett Scott, Gehrig, and Thurman Munson were the others--Nettles may have been the most overlooked Yankee of all time. He was more famous for having a fistfight with Reggie Jackson than he ever was for the homers he hit, the doubles he saved or the runs he drove in.

Nettles, who went to the Yankees in a trade for an assortment of nobodies--John Ellis, Jerry Kenney, Charlie Spikes and Rusty Torres--in 1973, is probably the most dangerous .250 hitter who ever lived.

He led the American League in home runs in 1976, batting .254. He drove in 107 runs with 37 homers a year later, batting .255. He probably had the best home-run stroke this side of Roger Maris.

But, he couldn’t buy a headline.

He set records for most assists by a third baseman in a single season, 412, and most double plays, 54.

He set World Series records for most assists, double plays and chances. The public said: “Well, he’s no Brooks Robinson now, is he?”

He produced the most spectacular series of fielding plays in the World Series of 1977 and ‘78--but Reggie Jackson hit three home runs in the last game in ’77 and that’s what everyone remembers.

He made so many diving catches in two World Series that Dodger Manager Tom Lasorda said of Nettles at a banquet one winter: “That’s the first time I’ve ever seen him standing up.” Yet, when the Yankees retired Nettles’ old number, 9, last year, it was because Roger Maris had worn it.

Nettles’ 333 American League home runs are far more than any other third baseman ever hit in that league.

But the front office went around the country signing high-priced stars from other teams, and, when Nettles came in for contract discussions, wanted to talk only about averages. Not only the right fielder, catcher or relief pitchers on the Yankees got more ink than Graig Nettles, so did the owner.

Nettles’ dry wit and sophisticated humor didn’t serve him. Even in supposedly sophisticated New York it made people uneasy. They could never tell whether it was a needle or a laugh. “Graig Nettles, to me, was a man who was always uncomfortable with himself,” Jackson has written.

Graig Nettles may merely have been uncomfortable with New York. He played decades of impeccable baseball in an environment that, at best, irritated him, at worst, disgusted him.

Lou Gehrig may have thought himself lucky to be a Yankee, but if Nettles enjoyed being a Yankee, it didn’t show. Yet he was one of the best of them.

He went over the wall two years ago, escaping to his native San Diego and the Padres, who promptly got into the playoffs, thanks in part to 20 home runs by Nettles, and the World Series.

The World Series was his fifth, and the playoffs were his seventh.

But he’ll never be on a plaque in center field in Yankee Stadium, and the question: “Who ranks sixth on the all-time Yankee home run ladder behind Ruth, Mantle, Gehrig, DiMag and Berra?” may one day rank with “Who played third in the Tinker-to-Evers-to-Chance infield?” as a game-show blockbuster.

You may get to win a new car if you know. Because, if you don’t know, you’d never guess it.