The Yankees and Rangers made a major trade on November 10, 1978. The Bombers sent Sparky Lyle, catcher Mike Heath, infielder Domingo Ramos, and pitchers Larry McCall and Dave Rajsich south and in return received pitchers Dave Righetti, Mike Griffin, and Paul Mirabella along with outfielders Juan Beniquez and Greg Jamison. In Sparky and Rags, the Yanks spent a former Cy Young Award winner for a future Rookie of the Year (which Righetti would cop in 1981).
The DiMaggio brothers showed how dangerous they could be playing on the same side yet again on November 10, 1951. On that day in front of 50,000 in a game pitting an American all-star team against a home-standing Japanese Central League all-star team, Joe DiMaggio hit a 400-foot, eighth-inning home run to tie the game at one. Then Dom DiMaggio smacked an rbi triple in the ninth and scored and the visitors came away with a 3-2 victory. The American record on that trip advanced to 12 wins and a tie.
On November 10, 2023, the Yankees activated righthanders Michael King, Stephen Ridings, and Luis Gil from the 60-day injured list; while 2022 left fielder Tim Locastro elected free agency. The Yankees then activated righthander Jimmy Cordero, and selected his contract from the AAA Scranton/Wilkes-Barre RailRiders. The team also selected the contracts of lefthander Matt Krook and righthander Jhony Brito from Scranton/Wilkes-Barre.
Although the Yankees re-signed free agent lefthander Joely Rodriguez on November 10, 2021, he would not spend the 2022 season with the team.
On November 10, 2018, the Yankees signed free agent catcher Chace Numata to a minor league contract and invited him to spring training.
There were big hopes in Yankee camp that the November 10, 2006 trade that sent slugging veteran outfielder Gary Sheffield to the Tigers for righthanded pitchers Humberto Sanchez, Kevin Whelan, and Anthony Claggett will start paying big dividends in the Bronx soon. But time’s running out on the chances we’ll get anything from the principal target, Mr. Sanchez, and Claggett has moved on after a brutal intro to the big leagues in early 2009.
A 1988 team of mlb All Stars continued to battle the Japanese, as they took Game Five, 3-1 on November 10. They would finally prevail in a tour much tighter than the one in which the DiMaggio boys excelled, three games to two, with two ties.
On November 10, 2009, third baseman/outfielder Jerry Hairston Jr.‘s stint with the Yankees ended when he filed for free agency.
On the strength of 24 home runs, 137 rbi’s, and a .363 batting average, St. Louis Cardinal Joe Torre won the 1971 NL Most Valuable Player Award, besting Willie Stargell in the vote, on November 10. The eventual 12-year Yankee manager would not win a ring for yet another 25 years. Mr. Torre took the L.A. Dodgers to the NLDS in 2008 and 2009, but no further.
On the same day (November 10, 1971), the AL prize went to Oakland A’s hurler Vida Blue, who outpointed battery-mate Sal Bando. Willie Mays beat Sandy Koufax for the NL Award on this day in 1965; and Texas Ranger Juan Gonzalez rode his 157 rbi’s, the most in the AL in 49 years, to the AL honor on November 10, 1998.
Roger Clemens won his first of back-to-back AL Cy Young Awards during his two years in Toronto on November 10, 1997. In the 1987 NL Cy Young vote, Steve Bedrosian edged past Rick Sutcliffe, 57-55, for the closest vote of the century. But a year later on November 10, 1988, L.A. Dodger Orel Hershiser copped the NL Cy Young in a unanimous vote, after a 23-8 campaign.
Clark Griffith, the first New York Highlanders manager, who piloted the team its first six years, moved onto Cincinnati the next year. But in 1912, he took the helm of the Washington Senators. Then on November 10, 1919, he bought controlling interest in the club, going into hock to do so.
Players Who Have Died This Day
Although the one Yankee player of two to have died on November 10 with the more accomplished career is outfielder Ben Paschal (1974), fellow outfielder Jack Reed (2022) will be more happily recalled by Yankee fans of a certain (advanced) age. Referred to as “Mantle’s legs” for all the times he closed out games for The Mick, Jack hit one memorable home run with six rbi’s in 222 games from 1961-1963 Yankees, his only major-league service. And he won a 22-inning game with his long ball on June 24, 1962, 9-7, in Fenway, with Jim Bouton :happy to collect the win. Paschal, on the other hand, played 346 games for the club from 1924 to 1929. He hit 24 home runs and drove in 133 runs while collecting 232 hits in 738 at bats. Short stints with the 1915 Indians and the 1920 Red Sox increased Ben’s rbi total to 138.
The list of noteworthy nonYankee players who have died on November 10 includes two lefthanded pitchers, a righty, a third baseman, a lefty-hitting second baseman, and a lefthanded first baseman. Righthander Mark Baldwin (1929) won 156, lost 165, and saved four games from 1887 through 1893 pitching mostly with the Pirates and the White Stockings; Hal Newhouser (1998) posted a 207-150-26 mark mostly for the Tigers from 1939-1953; and Ken Raffensberger (2002), throwing eight years for the Reds, five for the Phillies, and two for the Cubs from 1939-1954, went 119-154-16. Second sacker Heinie Reitz (1914) hit 11 home runs and drove in 462 runs from 1893-1899 mostly with the NL Orioles; portsided first baseman Chuck Connors (1992) of The Rifleman TV fame hit two roundtrippers and knocked in 18 runs for the Dodgers and the Cubs from 1949-1951; and third sacker George Pinkney (1926) cleared 21 fences good for 539 runs batted in from 1884-1893 with the Trolley Dodgers and the Bridegrooms.
Players Born This Day
There are a lot of good ballplayers born November 10, but only five of them played for the Yankees. Jorge DePaula (1978) flirted with a no-hitter and Perfect Game in his first start with the Yanks in 2003, but he went under the knife in early ’04 with an overall record of 0-1 in seven games; he pitched in three games in 2005. The Yanks got DePaula from the Rockies in 2001 in a minor-league deal that cost them Craig Dingman.
Kenny Rogers (1964) posted an 18-15 record with the 1996-1997 Yanks, but failed miserably in the postseason. Rogers was signed by New York as a free agent in December 1995, and was traded to Oakland for a player to be named that would become Scott Brosius in November 1997. Rogers has more than 200 career wins, and beat the Yankees in a decisive game in the 2006 ALDS.
Power hitter Jack Clark (1955) played 10 years with the Giants and three with the Cardinals before hitting 27 homers with 93 rbi’s for the 1988 Yanks. Clark was signed to a Yankee free agent contract in January 1988. He hit a tater in his first Yankee at bat in Spring Training, and then hurt himself rounding first in his home run trot. Clark was traded with Pat Clements to the Padres for Lance McCullers, Jimmy Jones, and Stan Jefferson in October 1988.
Second baseman/outfielder Chick Fewster (1895) debuted with the Yanks from 1917 to 1922 with two homers and 45 rbi’s, before playing two seasons each with Boston, Cleveland, and Brooklyn. Fewster was traded with Elmer Miller, Johnny Mitchell, Lefty O’Doul, and cash to the Red Sox in July 1922 for Joe Dugan and Elmer Smith.
And finally, although lefty-hitting outfielder Carmen Mauro (1926) never played for the Yanks, he did join the team with Loren Babe, Harry Byrd, Tom Hamilton, and Eddie Robinson in December 1953. They all arrived in a trade from the Philadelphia Athletics for Don Bollweg, Johnny Gray, Jim Robertson, Jim Finigan, Vic Power, and Bill Renna. Mauro hit two home runs with 33 rbi’s in scattered play for the Cubs, the Dodgers, the Senators, and the Phillies.
Another player with Yankee genes who has not played in New York is utility player Rob Segedin (1992), a third-round choice by the club in 2010, who was traded to the Dodgers for Tyler Olson and Ronald Torreyes in January 2016. Wasting no time, Rob played in 40 games with L.A. in 2016, and 13 more in 2017, with two home runs and 13 rbi’s.
Other birthdays: Manager Birdie Tebbetts (1912); fellow Managers Cal Ermer (1923) and Jimmy Dykes (1896); Tigers slugging first baseman Norm Cash (1934); Mike Vail (1951); Larry Parrish (1953); Larry Christensen (1953); Bob Stanley (1954); Junior Noboa (1964); Keith Lockhart (1964); Butch Huskey (1971); Shawn Green (1972); Micah Bowie (1974); Matt Pagnozzi (1982), nephew of veteran catcher Tom Pagnozzi, who spent a Spring Training with the Yanks near the end of his career; Brian Dinkelman (1983); Ryan Mattheus (1983); Kazuhisa Makita (1984); Eric Thames (1986); Aaron Crow (1986); Michael Choice (1989); Matt Magill (1989); JJ Bleday (1997); and Jordan Groshans (1999), who now has a Yankee connection, though an unimpressive one. The team selected Jordan off waivers in February 2024, then traded him with cash that June to Oakland for J.D. Davis, certainly a pickup that came with no magic.
