The Yankees will retire Joe Torre’s #6 on August 23rd. Then, when Derek Jeter retires and his # 2 joins the wall, the Yankees will have retired all of their single digit numbers.
By the time # 2 Derek Jeter retires, the New York Yankees will have retired all of their single digit numbers for players and the string will look like this:
Retired Yankees single Digit Uniform Numbers
1) Billy Martin
2) Derek Jeter
3) Babe Ruth
4) Lou Gehrig
5) Joe DiMaggio
6) Joe Torre
7) Mickey Mantle
8) Yogi Berra/Bill Dickey
9) Roger Maris
Want to see the rest of the 1st Ten?
10) Phil Rizzuto
How about the rest of the Yankee retired numbers?
15) Thurman Munson
16) Whitey Ford
23) Don Mattingly
32) Elston Howard
37) Casey Stengel
42) Jackie Robinson
44) Reggie Jackson
49) Ron Guidry
The question is …. Where is all of this happy permanent celebrating finally leading the game? Granted, the storied Yankees have more of a winning history to celebrate than all others, but where do we end up if most teams have retired all their single digit uniform numbers? The possibilities are sometimes amusing:
a) Baseball teams with an identification system that bears a closer resemblance to football’s two-digit celebration of tenacious linebackers and larger beefy linemen.
b) Three digit numbers in which all players named Mendoza get to fight over the right to use “200”.
c) Elite Number One closers who never give up a run choosing the binary favorites of either “1” for their status (unless they happen to be Yankees) or “0” for what they give up.
d) “000” should satisfy the pitcher with the best ERA record.
e) “911” for the effective reliever who works both often and on short notice.
f) “666” for the player who is a hell of a lot better than all the rest.
g) “359” for guys who are fast enough to break the four-minute mile.
h) “003” for all the batters who time just a tad faster than Mickey Mantle running from home to first.
i) “007” for the managers who will do anything to foil the sinister plots of others to defeat their teams.
j) or we could just shift over to the use of Roman numerals as the NFL’s Super Bowl has done. Issue # III to the next Babe Ruth prospect. The bubble will pop, but the kid, at least, will get to have some short-time fun.
Maybe the retirement-happy clubs could follow the Astros example and re-direct the honors focus to stars and names on a “Walk of Fame” around the various ball parks. I like what the Astros are doing in this regard, but I still think they should retire # 36 for Joe Niekro and # 50 for J.R. Richard before they close the door on uniform numbers retirements. Those two guys really deserve that honor. Then they can go back to the process of avoiding a retirement of all their Astros single digit numbers too – without ever winning a single World Series.
The Pecan Park Eagle 
June 29, 2014 at 7:13 pm |
Next to Torre’s # 6 they also can add Mantle’s name, since he wore number 6 his rookie year.
They can recycle back to # 1 by adding letters, e.g. 1a, 2a, 3a 4a, 5a, etc. When all those are retired, they can go to the next letter, b.
Agreed on Niekro and J.R. Richard.