He had a terrific major league baseball career spanning 17 seasons. He was a nine-time all-star, and the MVP of the 1971 season. Beyond his playing career, he was a broadcaster, and a manager of five different teams. Among those teams, his managing career will be most remembered for his time with the New York Yankees.
For this TBT, we shine the spotlight on former Yankees’ manager Joe Torre.
When Torre was hired to be the Yankees’ skipper following the 1995 season, it came with mixed reaction from fans and media alike due to the fact that he had never found success in his previous managerial positions, and had never been to the postseason as a player or as a manager. However, in his 12 seasons as the Yankees’ manager, Torre guided the team to the postseason every year, and compiled a record of 1173-767. Only one other Yankees manger (Joe McCarthy) managed more games as Yankees’ manager than Torre.
Torre took over a team poised to make a run in the late nineties, following Buck Showalter’s departure after the 1995 season. The Yankees had been eliminated by the Seattle Mariners in the ’95 American League Division Series that went all five games. They had acquired RHP David Cone before the trade deadline to help them in the playoff run, and Cone pitched the dramatic fifth game in Seattle coming away with a no-decision in the Yankee’s exit from the postseason. Then came the retirement of Don Mattingly and other changes, along with the hiring of Torre as the new manager.
In his first year as skipper of the Bombers, Torre lead the Yankees to their first World Series title since 1978, and he would steer the team to four World Series titles in five seasons between 1996 and 2000. Overall, he guided the Yankees to six World Series appearances in eight seasons between 1996 and 2003, only missing out in 1997 and 2002. No team in modern sports, in any sport, has had such dominance in that time frame.
No doubt, Torre’s greatest season with the Yankees came in 1998 when after a 1-4 start that actually had the media and fans calling for his dismissal, he lead the team to a then all-time American League best regular season record of 114-48, topping the previous record of 111 games set by the 1954 Cleveland Indians. The ’98 Yankees are considered by baseball historians and experts to be one of the greatest teams of all-time, another testament to Torre’s distinguished career as Yankees manager.
Torre was the epitome of class, which especially shined through at the beginning of the 2005 season when the Yankees had to travel to Fenway Park in Boston for the Red Sox home opener. The Yankees had just suffered their most devastating defeat in club history the previous October at the hands of the Red Sox when they blew a 3-0 series lead and the Sox “reversed the curse” in the ALCS sending them to the Fall Classic where they would defeat the St. Louis Cardinals.
For the opener at Fenway, the Red Sox were presented with their championship rings, and Torre instructed the Yankees players to be present in the dugout as their bitter rivals received their hardware as a gesture of sportsmanship. In his book “The Yankee Years”, Torre indicated that there were players who did not want to be on the field for the ceremony, but under his leadership and urging, the team complied and was in the dugout. It was moments like these that marked Joe Torre’s career, as a great manager, a gentleman and a Yankee icon that has become a beloved figure in the Bronx.
Upon his departure from the Yankees after the 2007 season, Torre spent three seasons as the manager of the Los Angeles Dodgers before retiring as manager and then moving to the front offices of MLB where he still serves today.
Joe Torre’s number 6 was retired by the Yankees on August 23, 2014 in a ceremony in which he received a plaque in famed Monument Park in Yankees Stadium.
