Latest in legendary legacy of tandems
MUCH of the historic precedent surrounding the Yankees’ trade for Giancarlo Stanton involves the 2004 deal with the Rangers for Alex Rodriguez. That was a transaction that yielded both good (a title in 2009 and two MVPs) and bad (a year’s PED suspension and an exhausting amount of conversation about whether he’d ever be “true” Yankee).
(To say nothing of the eerie fact that two of the principal players in the drama of 2004 were Aaron Boone, whose absence — via a catastrophic knee injury — prompted the A-Rod trade, and Derek Jeter, whose presence necessitated an historic position shift for Rodriguez, are players in this spectacle for the Yanks and Fish.)
But there is another benchmark out of Yankee yesterdays that rings true today, and it’s one slice of history the Yankees would far prefer to see repeat itself across the next few years.
On Dec. 11, 1959, the Yankees traded away two of their most popular players — Hank Bauer and Don Larsen — as well as a failed former prospect (Norm Siebern) and a future staple of Mets slapstick (Marv Throneberry) for three players of whom the centerpiece, Roger Maris, was an intriguing but enigmatic young star in the making.
This was a deal done with their most regular trade partner of the time, the Kansas City Athletics, the 15th deal involving 59 players the teams had engaged in since the A’s moved from Philadelphia to K.C. after the 1954 season.
The snickers across baseball were immediate and loud and overwhelming; Kansas City had long been a Yankees affiliate and this smacked of preferential dealsmanship — not unlike some of the outcry (fairly or unfairly) accompanying Jeter gifting his old team the reigning National League MVP.
“I know we’ll take a lot of ribbing for this,” George Weiss, the Yankees GM, said, at a time when social media was limited to audience-participation shows like “American Bandstand.”
“And I hate to see as fine a competitor as Hank Bauer go, and we’ll always be grateful to Larsen for his perfect game [in the 1956 World Series against the Dodgers]. However, in Maris we have a young outfielder who should develop into a fine player at the Stadium.”
You might say that worked out well for Weiss, in what proved to be his last huge deal before being put out to pasture alongside Casey Stengel a year later. In 1960, Maris, at age 25, won the American League MVP with a .283 average, 39 homers and 112 RBIs while also playing the finest right field in the league. That, of course, was mere prelude for 1961: 61 homers, the last coming on the last day of the season to break (in most reasonable people’s eyes) the 34-year-old record Babe Ruth had cherished above all others. In all, the Yankees would play in five World Series and win two in Maris’ seven-plus years in pinstripes. But his presence also inspired a relatively unique dynamic in Yankees’ lore: the Golden Tandem. The spine of the Yankees’ legend until then had been mostly team-centered (18 titles and 24 pennants in the 39 years connecting 1921 and 1959) or individual (Ruth’s various longball records, Lou Gehrig’s streak of 2,130 consecutive games played, Joe DiMaggio’s 56-game hitting streak, Mickey Mantle’s 1956 Triple Crown dreamscape).
Now, because the Yankees were the sport’s dominant team, they also had its most dangerous 1-2 punch. In 1927, Gehrig and Ruth engaged in a season-long battle to eclipse Ruth’s existing single-season record of 59; Gehrig cooled off in September but between them their 107 homers would, by the time Maris joined forces with Mickey Mantle, be a two-man record that seemed every bit as unapproachable as Ruth’s individual mark.
The M&M boys first earned their nickname by combining for 79 homers in 1960. They were launched into baseball mythology in ’61, when Mantle clobbered 54 to go along with Maris’ 61, and that tandem total of 115 remains the twoman record some 56 years later (Barry Bonds’ 73 and Rich Aurilia’s 37 snuck in between the two Yankees tandems in 2001; feel free to fully asterisk at your leisure).
You have to believe that Stanton and Judge will take regular aim at that unassailable record. Last year Stanton’s 59 and Judge’s 52 would’ve put them four behind (a total you have to believe they would have shattered if Stanton had as many opportunities to beat up Orioles pitchers as Judge did).
And let’s be extra honest here: Either (or both) of these guys could find an equally agreeable dance partner in Greg Bird, whose September and October hints of spectacular days ahead, especially at Yankee Stadium (and if Gary Sanchez ever switches positions ... as a wise old philosopher might have put it: “Holy cow”).
Those are some fine summer thoughts to ponder on the first day of snow. Winter doesn’t seem quite so unbearable anymore, at least if you happen to reside on the Yankees’ side of the street.