May 30 in Yankee History

  • All good things come to an end. On May 30, 1967, the Chairman of the Board, Whitey Ford, called it a career.
  • In the same vein, Babe Ruth made his final game appearance, as he played just the first inning of the Braves’ 11-6 loss to the Phillies in the first of two on May 30, 1935.
  • Rbi’s by Giancarlo Stanton, Gary Sanchez, Didi Gregorius, and Aaron Hicks carried the Yanks to a 5-3 victory over visiting Houston on May 30, 2018, but the star of this one was starter Luis Severino, who struck out 11 while allowing just two hits and no walks over seven dominant innings.
  • In its own way it was the most frustrating of the four straight losses the Yanks suffered to the Mets when they fell 3-1 in Yankee Stadium on May 30, 2013. Marlon Byrd reached Yankee southpaw Vidal Nuno for a two-run home run in the top of the second, but fans breathed a sigh of relief when Robinson Cano halved the margin with his own blast in the third. But middling Mets starter Dillon Gee had his best professional start, befuddling the Yankee lineup on four hits with no walks and 12 strike outs pitching into the eighth inning. Relievers Scott Rice and Bobby Parnell each added a strike out, as the Yanks went down quietly.
  • The Yanks persevered behind A.J. Burnett through eight innings on May 30, 2010 and, courtesy of a five-run home eighth-frame rally punctuated by Mark Teixeira‘s three-run bomb, prevailed against Justin Masterson and the Cleveland Indians by a 7-3 score. Not only was the fence clearer Tex’s 250th of his career, a two-run single earlier in the inning by Derek Jeter tied him with Don Mattingly for ninth in rbi’s on the all-time Yankee list.
  • To look at Yankee history for this day, you need to know two things about Memorial Day: Until 1971, it fell on May 30 every year, and it used to almost always involve baseball doubleheaders. The Yanks swept a pair, 4-3 and 12-5, from the Senators on May 30, 1956. In addition, estimates of more than 600 feet are reliably attributed to Mickey Mantle‘s mammoth blast off Washington’s Camilo Pascual that came within 18 inches of clearing the Yankee Stadium facade in the second game.
  • The Yanks split two with the Senators on the same day in 1960, winning the nightcap 3-2 on a two-run Yogi Berra eighth-inning tater after falling 2-1 in the first game. Mickey Mantle was accosted by fans loose on the Stadium field after he caught the last out of the latter game, and he was punched as he made for the dugout.
  • In the first of many more May 30 doubleheaders we’ll list roughly in chronological order, Roger Bresnahan connected for two inside-the-park dingers in a sweep over the Indians on May 30, 1902, when the Yankee franchise was still in Baltimore as the Orioles, one year before they would make the trip north. They won over Cleveland by 12-4 and 10-7 scores.
  • It was a doubleheader shutout over the A’s in 1917. Nick Cullop won the first 6-0; the 2-0 second-game victory went to Slim Love.
  • The sweep over Washington in 1923 was keyed by Babe Ruth‘s first-inning homer in Game One, a 6-4 win for Herb Pennock; the Bombers won the second game 9-5.
  • A plaque honoring former Yankee Manager Miller Huggins became the first monument ever dedicated in Yankee Stadium on this day in 1932. Then the Yanks took two from the Red Sox, 7-5 and 13-3.
  • The Yanks managed a split by winning the second game over Washington 5-4 in 1934 in 11 innings behind four innings in relief by Burleigh Grimes. Earl Whitehill tossed a one-hitter (Ben Chapman‘s single in the ninth) in besting Lefty Gomez 1-0 in the first game.
  • One year later, the Yanks swept two from the Senators 4-0 and 9-3 with Vito Tamulis notching his second straight shutout in the opener, on May 30, 1935.
  • The Red Sox were the double-barreled victim on May 30, 1938, in front of the biggest Stadium crowd ever, 83,000-plus. Red Ruffing snapped Lefty Grove‘s eight-game winning streak with his 10-0 victory in the first game. Yankee outfielder Jake Powell and Boston player-manager Joe Cronin fought for several minutes once Archie McKain hit Powell with a pitch during the 5-4 Yankee win later on.
  • The next year the same two teams split two in Boston, 8-4 Red Sox, then 17-9 Yanks, on May 30, 1939.
  • Joe DiMaggio got hits in both games against Boston in 1941, extending “The Streak,” with the Yanks edging the Sox 4-3 before being blasted 13-0. Ted Williams had six hits on the day.
  • Philadelphia’s Eddie Joost scored the only run in the 1-0 opener and two in the A’s 4-0 win in the nightcap as Philly blanked the Yanks in two in 1947. Dick Fowler beat Spud Chandler; then Joe Coleman won Game Two over Bill Bevens.
  • The Red Sox took both halves of a twofer in 1951, and Casey Stengel replaced Mickey Mantle with Cliff Mapes after The Mick struck out five times. The Red Sox rallied and tied both games on Ted Williams at bats, Vern Stephens‘s 15th-inning homer off Spec Shea decided Game One 11-10, and Stephens drove Williams home with the winner in the 9-4 nightcap too.
  • Philadelphia swept the Yanks in 1952 too. Bobby Shantz struck out 11 in winning the first game 2-1 in 14 despite a Mickey Mantle homer in the third and his double in the last frame. Bob Hooper lost his shutout in the second game in the ninth, but held on to win 4-2.
  • Mickey Mantle had his first 5-for-5 game since 1956 as the Yanks took the first game vs. Washington in 1968, 13-4, behind The Mick’s two homers and five rbi’s. Mantle sat out Game Two and the Senators came back with a 6-2 win.
  • Very Bomber-like was the 12-3 spanking the Yanks administered to the Sox at Fenway on this day in 1961, as they tied the record for number of teammates hitting multiple homers in a game. Roger Maris, Mickey Mantle, and Moose Skowron hit two apiece. Maris’s two were the 10th and 11th of the 61 he was to blast that year.
  • As a young fan, I was furious with the Yankee trade for Ron Kittle (along with Wayne Tolleson and Joel Skinner) from the White Sox on May 30, 1986. I was simply not a fan of Kittle’s often futile uppercut swing; my distress had nothing to do with the players we gave up.
  • The Yanks’ 5-4 win over Boston on May 30, 1977, was keyed by Reggie Jackson and Graig Nettles homers in the second frame.
  • Foremost among the Flushing headlines before the 2005 Yankee/Mets battle was the fact that Mets starter Victor Zambrano had defeated the Yanks four times in 2004 as a member of the Tampa Bay Devil Rays. In one of those on May 30, the Rays jumped on Jon Lieber for a 6-0 lead, but because the visiting Yankees rallied for four in the eighth and two in the ninth, the game-winning hit was actually catcher Brook Fordyce‘s eighth-inning homer off Tanyon Sturtze in the 7-6 Tampa win.
  • On May 30, 2021, the Yankees optioned righthanders Albert Abreu and Deivi Garcia to the AAA Scranton/Wilkes-Barre RailRiders; and then placed center fielder Aaron Hicks on the 60-day injured list, with a left wrist injury. The team also selected the contract of lefthander Nestor Cortes from the AAA Scranton/Wilkes-Barre RailRiders; and recalled righty Nick Nelson from the same location.
  • The Yankees placed outfielder Dustin Ackley on the 15-day disabled list, with a right shoulder dislocation, on May 30, 2016. The team also activated righthander Luis Severino from the 15-day disabled list, and optioned him to the AAA Scranton/Wilkes-Barre RailRiders. Finally, the Yanks recalled Rob Refsnyder from Scranton/Wilkes-Barre.
  • The Yankees sent righty Chris Martin on a rehab assignment to the AAA Scranton/Wilkes-Barre RailRiders on May 30, 2015; and recalled outfielder Ramon Flores from Scranton/Wilkes-Barre.
  • On May 30, 1982, Cal Ripken started his consecutive-games-played streak in a 6-0 Baltimore loss to Toronto.
  • The Yanks traded Waite Hoyt and Mark Koenig, stalwarts of the ’27 team, to the Tigers for Ownie Carroll and Harry Rice on May 30, 1930.
  • Yesterday we celebrated the anniversary of a 2000 unassisted triple play by former Yank Randy Velarde; Cubs shortstop Jimmy Cooney turned one on this day in 1927.
  • Precedent for the broken scoreboard clock scene in The Natural took place in Ebbets Field, on May 30, 1946. Braves player Bama Rowell smashed that scoreboard clock at 4:25, and the clock stopped one hour later.
  • Senators pitcher Mickey McDermott beat the Yankees with his bat on May 30, 1955, as he singled in the winner as a pinch hitter in a 3-2, 10-inning Washington win.
  • The Yanks beat the White Sox 3-2 in Chicago on this day in 1965, as Mickey Mantle delivered the Yanks’ first run off Gary Peters with a fourth-inning bomb.
  • Milwaukee’s Skip Lockwood threw his first of three 1972 one-hitters in a 3-1 win over the Yanks on May 30.
  • While scoring the second of three runs in the winning 11th-inning Yankee rally in Milwaukee on May 30, 1979, Cliff Johnson knocked home plate ump Lou DiMuro unconscious in a collision. The Yanks took the game 5-2.
  • Scott Sanderson became the ninth pitcher to beat all (at the time) 26 teams when he pitched the Yanks to an 8-1 win over the Brewers on this day in 1992.
  • Boston’s Mo Vaughn included three homers in his 4-for-4 as the Red Sox beat the Yanks 10-4 on May 30, 1997.
  • Yankee hurler recently relegated to the retirement ranks Mike Mussina, then with the Orioles, mowed down the first 25 Cleveland Indians on this day in 1997, surrendered a single to Sandy Alomar, and then struck out the last two in a 3-0 win.
  • The Senators purchased veteran outfielder John Anderson from the Highlanders on May 30, 1905.
  • The pitching-hungry 1980’s Yankees probably already had their eyes on San Diego when Ed Whitson stretched his record to 10-0 with a 5-4 win over the Expos on May 30, 1985. New York expected big things when they signed Whitson to a free agent deal three years later in a partnership that did not work out.
  • Dennis Eckersley was years removed from his as yet to come dominant years as a closer when he topped the Angels 1-0 on a no-hitter for the Indians on May 30, 1977.
  • A couple of May 30 items involving one-time Yankee players starts withh the 14 K’s Doc Gooden notched in a 2-1 Mets victory over the Giants on this day in 1985. The other “high”light is one eventual Yank Frank Chance would hardly look back on fondly. He was hit by four pitches in a Cincinnati/Chicago NL doubleheader on May 30, 1904.
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    Players Who Have Died This Day

  • The only Yankee player to have died on May 30 is lefthander Jim Magnuson (1991), who ended his career pitching eight games (no starts) for the 1973 Yankees to an 0-1 record with no saves. He pitched for the White Sox in 1970-1971, with an overall mark of 2-7 with no saves.
  • We have just two noteworthy nonYankee player to have died this day, first outfielder Max Carey (1976), who hit 70 home runs with 800 rbi’s from 1910-1929, playing for the Pirates and the Dodgers. And lefthanded first baseman Costen Shockley (2022) hit three long balls with 19 rbi’s playing 51 games with the 1964 Phillies and the 1965 Angels.
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    Players Born This Day

  • Rube Oldring (1884), a rookie with the Yanks in 1905, was born May 30, as was Al Mamaux (1894), who posted a 1-1 win-loss record for the Yanks in 1924, the last of his 12 years in the bigs. Oldring hit one homer with six rbi’s in his first Yankee stop, then returned in 1916 after 10 years in Philly with the A’s, adding another home run and 12 runs driven in to his New York total.
  • Also, righty Lou McEvoy (1902) posted a 1-3 mark with four saves with the 1930-1931 Yankees in his only major league service. And lefthanded outfielder Mike Donlin (1878) hit most of his 51 homers with 543 rbi’s with the Giants from 1899-1914, but he makes the list because five of the home runs and 67 of the runs delivered came with the 1901 Baltimore Orioles. This franchise would be moved to New York as the Highlanders in 1903, and the rest is glorious history. Therefore, he is technically a Yankee birthday as well. Donlin jumped from the St. Louis Cardinals to the Orioles in 1901, and to the Cincinnati Reds to start the 1902 season.
  • Other birthdays: Hall of Fame hurler Amos Rusie (1871), who was traded to the Reds by the Giants even-up for the legendary Christy Mathewson in 1900, and who won 245 and lost 174 from 1889 to 1901; righty Turk Lown (1924), who posted a 55-61 mark in Chicago with the Cubs and then the White Sox from 1951-1962; Mike LaCoss (1956); Mike Oquist (1968); Manny Ramirez (1972); Scott Eyre (1972); Reggie Willits (1981); Jae Kuk Ryu (1983); Jairo Asencio (1983); Frank Herrmann (1984); Fernando Salas (1985); Tony Watson (1985); Tony Campana (1986); Zack Wheeler (1990); Eury Perez (1990); John Brebbia (1990); Collin Wiles (1994); Brett Phillips (1994); Sterling Sharp (1995); Christian Arroyo (1995); and Alan Trejo (1996).