New Amendment to an Old Tradition

NEW YORK —  The New York Yankees have had managers get into bar brawls, players arrested for public urination, and an owner convicted for making illegal campaign contributions.

They have had Steve Howe, Darryl Strawberry and Doc Gooden--three drug offenders--playing on the same team.

They hired and fired manager Billy Martin five times. They once traded Fred McGriff, Dave Collins and Mike Morgan to the Toronto Blue Jays for two minor leaguers named Dale Murray and Tom Dodd. They went 14 years without reaching the playoffs despite maintaining baseball’s highest payroll.

Yet, the day of Oct. 21, 1996, will live in infamy in Yankee history.

This is the day they suffered perhaps their most humiliating moment in their proud history.

This is the day they were embarrassed in the World Series, losing, 12-1, to the Atlanta Braves at Yankee Stadium.

This is a team that had played 186 games in October during 34 years in the World Series, but, never had it lost by more than eight runs.

“That was an old-fashioned butt-kicking,” Strawberry said. “When you take a butt-kicking like that, it can wake up a lot of guys.

“Well, we better wake up in a hurry or this could be a short series.”

The Braves, who have outscored the opposition 44-2 in the last four postseason games, made it look like batting practice.

“It was tough to be out there and watch it,” Yankee second baseman Mariano Duncan said. “It just seemed like we were flat. We didn’t look comfortable out there. And by the time we did, it was over.”

The game was so lopsided that the fans resorted to chanting, “Let’s Go Rain,” in the fifth inning, hoping for a rainout.

Too late.

It started raining in the sixth.

The Braves, the first team since the Brookyn Dodgers to play in four World Series in a five-year span, showed no mercy. They limited the Yankees to only four hits. It was the fewest hits by a Yankee team since the late Don Drysdale pitched a three-hitter for the Dodgers in Game 3 of the 1963 World Series.

The Yankees’ only consolation is that they became the first team in four games to produce an extra-base hit off the Braves’ staff when Wade Boggs hit a fifth-inning double.

“It was unbelievable,” Duncan said. “Every time we made a mistake, they made us pay for it. You can’t afford to make mistakes against that team. They’re too good.

“It’s just one loss, but, man, that was a big one.”

The man who accepted the brunt of the blame was Andy Pettitte. He’s the Yankee ace. He became the first Yankee pitcher since 1985 to win 20 games. He’s a shoo-in for the American League’s Cy Young Award.

And, oh, how he was clobbered.

Pettitte was pounded for six hits and seven runs in only 2 1/3 innings.

It equaled the most earned runs yielded by a starter in World Series history.

And the six runs he permitted in the third inning was the most by any American League starter in World Series history.

“What can I say,” Pettitte said, “I blew it. It’s beyond me what happened out there. I let it get out of hand so quick.

“I can’t explain what happened, but it’s very, very frustrating.”

Pettitte , who won 21 games this season, looked fine at the outset. He pitched a 1-2-3 first inning, struck out McGriff to lead off the second, but then ran into problems. Javier Lopez singled up the middle. Jermaine Dye flied out deep to left. Pettitte then fell behind to Andruw Jones, and on a 3-and-2 pitch, threw a fastball over the middle of the plate.

Jones sent it deep into the left-field seats, and the rout was underway. It was the largest margin of victory since the Kansas City Royals defeated the St. Louis Cardinals, 11-0, in Game 7 of the 1985 World Series. It also was the biggest rout in Game 1 of a World Series since 1959 when the Chicago White Sox beat the Dodgers, 11-0.

It’s one thing to lose a World Series game. It’s quite another to be blown out in the first game knowing that tonight they’ll be facing four-time Cy Young winner Greg Maddux.

“That pitching staff is amazing, it’s just unbelievable,” Pettitte said. “Unfortunately, I made it too easy on them. When you give eight runs to John Smoltz, you don’t have a chance.

“I found out the hard way.”