Yogi by Jon Pessah

Author:Jon Pessah [Pessah, Jon]
Language: eng
Format: epub
Publisher: Little, Brown and Company
Published: 2020-04-14T00:00:00+00:00

The Casey Stengel Era officially comes to an end on October 18 at the Savoy Hilton Hotel. Almost 150 members of the print and electronic media jam into the hotel’s Le Salon Bleu and listen as Topping explains the Yankees’ new mandatory retirement age, which they’ve set at 65, making Casey—whose final résumé in New York includes seven world championships and 10 pennants in 12 seasons—five years past due.

“I wish Casey was 50 years old,” Topping tells the disbelieving press corps.

Several reporters ask if Stengel was fired. Topping simply ignores the question. Then it’s Casey’s turn to address the room.

“Mr. Topping and Mr. Webb have paid me up in full and told me that my services no longer were desired,” says Stengel, who insists he’s leaving the Yankees on good terms even if it’s earlier than he planned. But the grim look on Stengel’s face tells a different story. Reporters keep pressuring Stengel to tell them if he was dismissed, and before long someone tells Casey that the Associated Press is reporting he was fired.

Stengel finally goes off script. “Quit. Fired. Write whatever you please, I don’t care,” Stengel says. “I’ll never make the mistake of being 70 again.”

Two days later the Yankees hold another press conference at the same hotel for an announcement almost everyone expects: 41-year-old Ralph Houk is the new Yankee manager. Elston Howard is the lone player present at Houk’s press conference. A few weeks later, GM George Weiss, who is 65, is pushed upstairs to make way for his assistant Roy Hamey.

Out in Montclair, New Jersey Yogi Berra is struggling to make sense of firing a man who came within two innings of winning an eighth World Series title, the one manager who insisted Yogi could be a terrific catcher when everyone else thought Berra belonged in the outfield. In Casey’s place is a man who spent eight seasons riding the Yankee bench, blocked from ever showing if he had big league talent because he played the same position as Berra.

Yogi never believed the whispers that Houk resented his success. But Stengel is gone, Berra does not understand why, and Yogi recently asked to be considered for the manager opening in Detroit. He had a productive 1960 season, but he knows the game is a business and has never forgotten the way the Yankees cut his best friend Phil Rizzuto less than four years ago.

No one can blame Yogi, soon to be 36, if he’s wondering exactly what his future holds.

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