MAN PEOPLE OF THE
Yogi legacy goes far beyond baseball diamond
IT’S EASY. You let everyone else do the work. All you’ve got to do is show up, say a few words at the dinner, pose holding a large Styrofoam replica of a check estimating the charity’s take for the event, then leave in the limo the organization sent to pick you up.
That’s it. And you’ve won the day and the night. You were the bigdraw celebrity, the one who made the difference between raising a few grand and a large bundle, the difference between mere friends and family support for the charity, and friends, family and corporate bignumber donations.
They’re Monday golf charity outings, often held at country clubs. If the charity can attach a big name and the minimal presence of that star — call it “the annual King Tut Celebrity Classic,” and have King Tut stop by to be photographed with the biggest givers — you’ve hit a home run. And a good on you and King Tut. I’ve played in and/or worked on hundreds of such golf outings, big, small, in between.
Yogi Berra allowed his name to be attached to such an annual event, at his club, Montclair, in New Jersey. It was to fund a Boy Scouts program for specialneeds kids, mostly poor kids and mostly with Down syndrome, including kids in adulthood.
And all he had to do was show up at the Yogi Berra Celebrity Golf Classic. That would have been plenty good enough.
Twenty or so years ago, the first time I was invited — I’d offer rebates to my playing partners as the celebrity they’d never heard of — I arrived a few minutes early. I was directed to a side parking lot for “celebrities.”
When I pulled into “my spot” — geez, there was a sign with my name under a Boy Scouts logo! — there were some folks hammering in the parking signs, unfolding chairs and tables, shuttling boxes and golf clubs.
“Good morning,” I said to the man affixing signs close to my car. He turned around. Yogi Berra. He then thanked me — and I mean, he sounded as if I were doing him a big, personal favor — for attending. Wow. I hadn’t left the parking lot and I already had won the tournament.
And my car was nearly as close to the entrance as the spot reserved for Mickey Mantle, though not as close as the one for Whitey Ford. Did Yogi choose to have the celebs park in alphabetical as opposed to celebrity order?
Throughout the day, Yogi, driving a golf cart, carried those impaired kids of all ages, all in their Scouts uniforms, around the course. He introduced them by name to the golfers. The kids had no idea who the man was who was driving them around, up and down. They only knew he was a nice man and they were having a ball.
And that was yet another of Yogi’s unassigned obligations and pleasures.
At night, during the dinner, Yogi worked the overflow room and the patios, stopping at every table, shaking every hand, posing for pictures, signing autographs — and with one or two of those Boy Scouts at his side in case anyone needed reminding that this wasn’t about Yogi Berra.
By the end of that day and at ensuing Yogi Berra Golf Classics and then at the Yogi Museum — even nearing 90, Yogi would make sure to attend every Museum event he possibly could, to be the Museum and Learning Center’s genuine host, not just the attached name of a celebrity — I had seen his light.
I never again would think of Yogi Berra in terms of a Yankees great from my kid years and a man who said accidentally funny things. I thought of him as a man who wore his fame as well as fame can be worn.
And that Learning Center, opened on the Montclair State campus in 1998, immediately met the terms of its title. It was, and remains, a genuine learning center.
Yogi taught there for years. He taught his guests to know Yogi Berra, baseball immortal and shy speaker of slightly fractured common sense, as a shrugging, nousefightingit, resigned-to-history victim of his caricature rather than his character. Because Yogi Berra, first, foremost and forever, was a gentleman.
It is understandable and a bit unfair that Yogi Berra always will be known as Yogi — the pintsized, extraordinaryachievements catcher with the amusing, mildly detached view of our world. He even allowed his museum to draw upon his beloved persona with the reminder, “We’re open ’til we’re closed.”
He easily and steadily was portrayed as someone who tried, but just missed, just didn’t get it. But he got it. He completely got it.
In 2001, Scott Horowitz, now an assistant principal at Jersey’s Lakewood High, then an English teacher at South Plainfield HS, brought his Sports Literature class — about 15 students — to the Yogi Museum.
“As we entered, who walks up? Yogi Berra,” Horowitz recalled. “He spent two hours with us explaining every artifact, cracking jokes and telling stories.
“When we left, he encouraged us to have lunch at the diner just down the hill. So we did. When we finished, the owner came over and said, ‘Yogi paid for this.’ A true gentleman.”
Odd, but in death his autograph on baseballs, baseball cards, bats and photos remain cherished keepsakes. Yet, as collectibles to be sold or resold for profit, his autograph, to those who know “the market,” is pretty close to flat.
I suspect that whether he knew there was a market for his autograph before such markets became markets, he flooded it. He signed so much so often — the only requirement was a polite request — it became a working reprise of his “No one goes there anymore, it’s too crowded” postulate.
I don’t know if that’s what he had in mind as a matter of fore sight or whether he signed everything for everyone because he was a gracious gentleman, but a few years ago while he signed autographs for those who had attended a Museum seminar on sports writing, I told him I would trade him two Yogi Berras for one Johnny Blanchard. He laughed. He got it, and, I think, got it beyond the joke.
One more: At the Yogi charity golf checkin, the celebs, all playing on the free, were given goodie bags with all sorts of neat stuff — shirts, a dozen balls, real Yankees caps. At the dinner the emcee would ask the celebs to stand to be recognized by name, then he would declare, “We couldn’t have done this without you,” followed by applause.
What was I supposed to do, wave? I’d quickly sit down. Later, I would walk over and tell Yogi he’s lucky to know me because he couldn’t have done this without me. Of course he would laugh. He got it.
Yogi Berra’s family shed tears on Thursday, even while regaling visitors with upbeat stories about the late Yankee legend and his indomitable spirit.
Even at his lowest points, they said, Berra — who died Tuesday at age 90 — still managed to put a smile on the faces of those around him.
Son Dale Berra played 11 seasons in the big leagues, including two with the Yankees. Yogi was the Bombers’ Opening Day manager in 1985, Dale’s first year with the team, but his dad was canned 16 games into the season.
Dale remembered how crushed he was, but Yogi told him to cheer up.
“I remember walking into the office and going, ‘Dad,’ and he goes, ‘What are you worried about? I’m going to play golf tomorrow,’ ” Dale, 58, told reporters at the Yogi Berra Museum & Learning Center in New Jersey.
The Yankees were in Chicago when Yogi was fired. But instead of taking a separate cab to the airport, Yogi rode on the team bus.
“The whole bus full of players stood up and clapped for him as he walked off the bus . . . and waved at the bus,” Dale Berra said.
“Talk about being humble and [having] humility.”
Sons Dale, Larry and Tim were joined by Larry’s daughter, Lindsay Berra, in saying they have nothing but pleasant memories of the Yankee icon.
They said Yogi was the ultimate role model.
“I wanted to be like him. I admired everything he did,” Tim Berra, 64, said. “Dad talked to the baker, the garbage man and the CEO in the same way. What you saw was what you got.”
Despite a lifetime in baseball. Yogi knew when to take off the catcher’s mask or put down the lineup card at home, loved ones said.
“He separated baseball from family life,” said Larry Berra, 65. “He took us to his games but we just went to work with dad. He was a family man. At home, baseball was on the back burner.”
Plans for Yogi’s funeral have not been set. There will be a public memorial at the museum on Oct. 1.
Berra played 18 seasons with the Yankees, which included 10 World Series championships — a major league record for any player.
City Hall paid tribute Thursday to Berra, who managed both the Yankees and Mets to the World Series, by placing four stadium seats — two from Shea Stadium and a pair from the original Yankee Stadium — at the building entrance, with a Yankee pinstripe jersey bearing his No. 8 hanging above.