December 9 is another problematic day in Yankee history, but the 12-year contract they signed on that day in 1988 with the MSG Network turned things decidedly in their favor. The $500,000,000 would pay the contract of many a player in those years during which they went from AL East basement (well, fifth place) to penthouse.
The Yankees pulled off their second pretty big trade in two days (after having acquired Starlin Castro on 12/8) on December 9, 2015, when they shipped lefty reliever Justin Wilson to Detroit for righties Chad Green and Luis Cessa. Both young hurlers showed some promise in 2016, and Green became a bullpen stud in ’17.
On December 9, 2022, the Yankees signed three free agents — lefthander Nick Ramirez, righthander James Norwood, and DH Jake Bauers — to minor league contracts.
In a bitter pill to swallow, at least as it affected the 2021 season, on December 9, 2020, the Red Sox claimed righthander Garrett Whitlock off waivers from the Yankees, claiming him from AA Trenton Thunder. He would solidify the Boston pen for much of the season. In a similar vein, Cleveland claimed righthander Trevor Stephan off waivers from Trenton. He would also post a decent 2021 season. In other December 9 transactions, Matt Krook was assigned to Yankees; and the club invited nonroster righty Reggie McClain to Spring Training.
On December 9, 2011, the Yankees signed free agent righthander Freddy Garcia to a major league contract following a good season in pinstripes. His 2012 campaign would not be as good. The team also designated outfielder Colin Curtis for assignment.
The Yankees signed free agent lefthander Andy Pettitte on December 9, 2009. It was touch and go for a while as Pettitte agonized over retiring or returning to pitch another year.
The Yankees delved into the rule-5 draft twice on December 9, 2010, and both guys had decent Spring Trainings with the club before not quite making the team. They claimed righty reliever Daniel Turpen off waivers from the Portland Sea Dogs, and then claimed lefthander Robert Fish off waivers from the Arkansas Travelers.
Yankee fans like myself expected big offensive numbers once the team signed former Tigers slugger Steve Kemp to a free-agent contract on December 9, 1982, but the 19 homers and 90 rbi’s over the next two seasons fell far short of the mark. Do you know anyone who wants to buy a Kemp Yankee shirt?
The biggest drawback to the trade of outfielder Dave Collins and pitcher Mike Morgan on that same day (12/9/82) for reliever Dale Murray of the Blue Jays was neither Murray’s mediocre performance over the following three seasons nor the loss of the two Yanks. Collins’s departure was no problem: He had been a bust in New York. And Morgan would tour both leagues and set records for all those stops. Murray would surrender 147 hits while striking out only 58 in 120 innings, post a 3-6 record, and garner only one save. But the worst part of this trade was the inclusion of a not well-known minor-league (at the time) first baseman Fred McGriff in the package sent to Toronto, which in itself made it one of the Blue Jays’ best trades ever.
On December 9, 1981, one day after announcing that Yankee skipper Bob Lemon would return for the 1982 season, the Bombers added that former manager Gene Michael would be taking the helm over the 1983 team. But Stick would replace Bob earlier than that.
It was a slight on a dark day that would not be avenged for another 3.5 years. Greg Maddux used the Yankees’ offer of $34 million to drive up the amount the Braves would bid for his services, and then took $6 million less from the Atlanta-based NL team than the Bombers had offered when he signed with Atlanta on December 9, 1992. The Yanks and their fans would be avenged in October 1996 when they copped the World Championship in Game Six over Maddux and the Braves.
St. Louis Cardinals player/manager Rogers Hornsby was named the 1925 National League Most Valuable Player on December 9 of that year.
On December 9, 1992, Reds owner Marge Schott apologized to her fellow owners for insensitive remarks. But she was removed from the limelight of the owners’ meetings when Florida Marlins President Carl Barger, also the former president of the Pittsburgh Pirates, died of a heart attack on that same day. Barger receives mention below in the December 9 deaths.
In other December 9 general major league baseball news, owners voted to allow night baseball for the St. Louis Browns in 1936, and in 1931, the National League continued their ban on uniform numbers, and both leagues voted to discontinue the MVP Award, expressing concern over the financial aspect of the game during the Great Depression. In 1902, the American League got the attention of the rival National League when they announced plans to build a Stadium in New York.
Transactions involving former and future Yankee players on December 9 include two moves involving Jose Canseco, with the Devil Rays signing the slugger in 1998 and the Red Sox sending Otis Nixon and Luis Ortiz to Texas for him four years earlier. Also on this day, the Orioles inked catcher Matt Nokes in 1994; and the Mariners traded outfielder Dave Collins to the Reds for pitcher Shane Rawley in 1977. Also on December 9, 1997, the Devil Rays grabbed third baseman Wade Boggs.
Players Who Have Died This Day
Hall of Fame Manager and baseball executive Branch Rickey passed away on December 9, 1965. A lefty-hitting catcher, Rickey played 52 games for the Highlanders back in 1907, with no long balls but 15 rbi’s on 25-for-137 hitting. Three intermittent years of play with the Browns gave him career numbers of three home runs with 39 rbi’s, but he made the Hall based on his work behind the bench. Former Yankee Manager Wild Bill Donovan was killed in a train wreck on December 9, 1923, while traveling to the major-league meetings. New Yankee owners Colonel Jacob Ruppert and Cap Huston had tabbed Bill to pilot the Yanks in 1915 once they couldn’t coax Hugh Jennings out of his spot in Detroit. A player/manager, Donovan went 0-3 pitching in 10 games for the Bombers while skippering the club, and the fourth-place 80-74 record they earned in 1916 was the only plus-.500 mark they attained in his three-year stint as field boss. Donovan, who also managed the 1921 Phillies, posted 186 wins, 139 losses, and eight saves pitching from 1898-1918, most of it with Detroit. In addition, two Yankee outfielders, an infielder, and a righthanded pitcher have died on December 9. Wes Ferrell, who threw to a 198-128-13 record from 1927-1941, mostly with the Indians and the Red Sox, won three games, lost four, and saved none in eight appearances (seven starts) with the 1938-1939 Yankees. Lefty-hitting outfielder Curt Walker (1955) cleared no fences and drove in no runs playing his first big-league game with the 1919 Yankees on 0-for-1 hitting. He homered 64 times good for 688 rbi’s for the Giants, the Phillies, and the Reds from 1920-1930; and outfielder/first baseman Dutch Sterrett (1965) played for the 1912 Highlanders and the 1913 Yankees only, with one home run, 35 rbi’s, and 67 hits in 265 at bats playing in 87 games. The most recent addition to the list is infielder Phil Linz (2020), who debuted in New York and hit 10 home runs with 67 rbi’s in the Bronx from 1962-1965. Phil is also a storied name in Yankee lore over his harmonica incident with at the time manager Yogi Berra. After completing his career with the 1966-1967 Phillies and the 1967-1968 Mets, Linz retired with overall numbers of 11 and 96.
Hall of Fame Negro Leagues Executive Rube Foster died on this day in 1930. Foster, a player, manager, and executive, founded the Negro National League. The list of other noteworthy nonYankee players who have died on December 9 includes a righthanded pitcher, a left-handed first baseman, a third baseman, two lefty-hitting outfielders, and catcher Don Padgett (1980), another portsided batter who played some outfield too. He hit 37 home runs and drove in 338 runs mostly for the Cardinals and the Phillies from 1937-1948. Walt Dickson (1918) posted a 26-50-2 mark pitching mostly with the Giants, the Braves, and the Rebels from 1910-1915; first baseman Dick Siebert (1978) hit 32 home runs and drove in 482 runs from 1932-1945 with the Dodgers, the Cardinals, but mostly the A’s; and third sacker Whitey Kurowski (1999) cleared 106 fences good for 529 rbi’s with the Cardinals from 1941-1949. The outfielders are George Browne (1920) and Jeff Heath (1975). Browne hit 18 long balls and knocked in 303 runs with the Giants, the Phillies, and the Senators from 1901-1912; and Heath delivered 194 roundtrippers and drove in 887 runs from 1936-1949, mostly with the Indians. Finally, Florida Marlins President Carl Barger, also the former president of the Pittsburgh Pirates, died of a heart attack on this same day at baseball’s winter meetings in 1992. A huge fan of Yankee Clipper Joe DiMaggio, Barger was posthumously honored by the Marlins when they retired the number 5 before they ever played a regular season game.
Players Born This Day
The 49-40 record mark Doc Medich (1948) posted with the 1972-1975 Yankees is enough to merit him top-of-the-list consideration of the seven Yankee players born on December 9 in itself. His trade to Pittsburgh for recent Yankee third base coach and bench coach, and former captain and second baseman Willie Randolph, the recently deceased Ken Brett, and pitcher Dock Ellis on December 11, 1975, solidifies those credentials. Medich, drafted by the Yankees in 1970, really became a doctor.
Lefthanded outfielder Tony Tarasco‘s (1970) place in Yankee lore, despite his three rbi’s and one stolen base playing 14 games for the 1999 club, will always be more rooted in his being the Orioles right fielder Jeffrey Maier robbed of Derek Jeter‘s fly ball that became a home run in the 1996 ALCS vs. Baltimore. Tony signed with the Bombers as a free agent in March 1999, and was released that October.
Reliever Joe Ausanio (1965) pitched only for the Yanks, notching a 4-1 mark with one save for the 1994-1995 teams; he suffered the loss to the Blue Jays in the last game of the strike-shortened 1994 season on August 12 of that year when he surrendered a home run to Ed Sprague. The Yanks snatched Joe from the roster of the Expos in the 1993 minor-league draft, and released him after the ’95 season.
Outfielder Rick Bladt (1946) had a homer, 11 rbi’s, and six stolen bases for the 1975 Yanks; his only other major league service was with the 1969 White Sox. Rick arrived in New York with minor-leaguer Terry Bongiovanni via a January 1970 trade from the Cubs for Jimmie Hall. Seven years later, Bladt was sent to the Baltimore Orioles with Elliott Maddox for Paul Blair.
And shortstop Joe DeMaestri (1928) recorded four rbi’s in 79 games in the Bronx in 1960 and 1961 after one season with the White Sox, one with the Browns, two with the Philly A’s and five with the same club once they had moved to Kansas City. Joe was included by the Athletics in the December 1959 Yankees trade for Kent Hadley and Roger Maris that cost the Yankees Don Larsen, Hank Bauer, Norm Siebern, and Marv Throneberry.
The final two Yankee birthdayers actually played not with the Yanks per se, but with the Baltimore Orioles team that would relocate to New York as the Highlanders in 1903. Hall of Fame outfielder Joe Kelley (1871), who hit 65 home runs with 1,194 rbi’s from 1891-1906, collected one of those long balls and drove in 34 runs with the 1902 Orioles in 60 games. In an unsettled time in early baseball history, Joe jumped from the Brooklyn Superbas to Baltimore before the 1902 season, and from the Orioles to the Cincinnati Reds a year later. And Cy Seymour (1872), who played 10 years (in two five-year stints) of his 1896-1913 career with the Giants, accumulating 52 long balls and 799 rbi’s, had four and 118, respectively, with the 1901-1902 Orioles in 206 games. Seymour arrived in Baltimore by jumping there from the Giants before the 1901 season; he jumped to the Reds when Kelley did.
Other birthdays: Lefthander Darold Knowles (1941), who was the first pitcher to ever appear in all seven games of a World Series; Jim Merritt (1943); Del Unser (1944); Ed Romero (1957); Juan Samuel (1960); Mike Fyhrie (1969); Ramon Garcia (1969); Todd Van Poppel (1971); Chris Truby (1973); Tony Batista (1973); Chris Booker (1976); Jeff Duncan (1978); Eric Stults (1979); Fred Lewis (1980); Buddy Baumann (1987); Blake Smith (1987); Adam Wilk (1987); Pedro Villarreal (1987); Mat Latos (1987); Bruce Rondon (1990); Adam Engel (1991); Geoff Hartlieb (1993); Hunter Harvey (1994); and Louie Varland (1997).
