1977 Yankees

The 1977 New York Yankees won 100 games, two pennants' worth of fistfights, and a World Series -- all while their owner, manager, and biggest star tried to destroy each other on national television. It was the most chaotic championship season in baseball history, and honestly, it wasn't even close.

A hundred wins. A Cy Young from the bullpen. Three home runs in the clincher -- on three consecutive swings that still don't seem real. And somewhere in the middle of all of it, Billy Martin and Reggie Jackson nearly came to blows in the Fenway Park dugout while Yogi Berra played bouncer. This was the Bronx Zoo, and every animal in it could play.

The Zoo

The whole mess started before a single pitch was thrown. George Steinbrenner signed Jackson as a free agent on November 29, 1976 -- five years, reportedly close to $3 million, a deal that put him among the highest-paid players in the game -- without consulting Martin. Billy wanted pitching. George wanted a star. Reggie wanted everything. The triangle was set.

Then the Sport magazine article hit newsstands in May. Jackson, talking to writer Robert Ward, called himself "the straw that stirs the drink" and said Thurman Munson "doesn't enter into it." Munson -- the reigning AL MVP, the first Yankees captain since Lou Gehrig, a guy who played like he was angry at the ball -- found out from teammates. The clubhouse split into factions overnight. Martin sided with Munson. (Of course he did.)

The explosion everyone saw coming arrived on June 18 at Fenway Park. National TV. ABC Game of the Week. Jim Rice hit a blooper to right, Jackson jogged after it, and Martin yanked him mid-inning. The dugout screaming match -- Billy charging at Reggie, coaches Berra and Elston Howard physically stepping between them -- played out on every television in America. Steinbrenner watched from home and aimed his fury at Martin, not Jackson. Billy kept his job, but the fuse was lit.

When I was a little boy, I wanted to be a baseball player and join the circus. With the Yankees, I have done both.

The Season

Here's the thing nobody remembers about this team: they were freakin' dominant. A hundred wins and sixty-two losses. Best record in the American League East. The drama made great TV, but the talent made a championship.

Mickey Rivers hit .326 at the top of the lineup and ran like he stole something. Nettles hit a career-high 37 homers -- second in the American League only to Jim Rice -- and played third base like he had a magnet in his glove. Munson hit .308 with 100 RBI while catching every day and holding together a pitching staff that could've used a therapist. Chris Chambliss and Willie Randolph were the steadying presence up the middle. And Jackson -- for all the noise -- hit 32 home runs and drove in 110 runs, saving his best work for when it mattered most.

The pitching staff ran deeper than the headlines suggested. Ron Guidry went 16-7 with a 2.82 ERA in what turned out to be a warm-up act for his legendary '78. Ed Figueroa posted 16 wins. Don Gullett went 14-4 before his arm gave out. Mike Torrez won 14 and came up huge in October. And Sparky Lyle -- throwing that wicked slider 72 times out of the bullpen -- won the AL Cy Young Award with a 2.17 ERA and 26 saves. First reliever to win it in the American League. (He pitched 137 innings in relief. In 2024, that number would get a closer hospitalized.)

October

The ALCS was a rematch with Kansas City -- the same Royals team that had pushed the Yankees to five games the year before. It went five again. Sparky Lyle was brilliant in relief throughout the series, and the Yankees survived on the road to clinch the pennant. Hard-fought, tense, the kind of series Martin managed better than anyone alive. Nobody remembers it. What happened next swallowed everything.

Game 6 of the World Series. October 18, 1977. Yankee Stadium, 56,407 in the building, the Yankees leading the Dodgers three games to two. Jackson had homered in his last at-bat of Game 5 off Don Sutton. He stepped into Game 6 already locked in.

Fourth inning -- Burt Hooton's first pitch. Gone. Right field. Fifth inning -- Elias Sosa's first pitch. Gone. Right field again. The Stadium was shaking. Eighth inning -- Charlie Hough, a knuckleball that didn't knuckle. Jackson turned on it and launched it deep into the center field bleachers. Three home runs. Three different pitchers. Four straight if you count the Sutton blast from Game 5. Only Babe Ruth (1926, 1928) had done it before. Nobody's done it since.

Reggie Jackson! Oh, what a blow! What a way to top it off! Forget about who the most valuable player is -- Reggie Jackson is just the most valuable player the world has ever seen!

Yankees 8, Dodgers 4. First championship since 1962. Fifteen years of wandering, over. Mr. October was born, and the Bronx Zoo had its crown.

(Munson hit .320 in that Series, by the way. Eight hits in six games, steady and solid behind the plate while the whole world watched Reggie. Nobody noticed. That particular wound didn't heal.)

Key Moments

Frequently Asked Questions

What was the 1977 Yankees' final record?

100-62, good for first place in the AL East. They beat Kansas City 3-2 in the ALCS and the Los Angeles Dodgers 4-2 in the World Series for their first championship since 1962.

What happened in Game 6 of the 1977 World Series?

Reggie Jackson hit three home runs off three different Dodgers pitchers -- Burt Hooton in the 4th, Elias Sosa in the 5th, and Charlie Hough in the 8th. The Yankees won 8-4 to clinch the title. Jackson was named World Series MVP after batting .450 with 5 homers in the six-game series.

Who won the 1977 AL Cy Young Award?

Sparky Lyle, the Yankees' closer, went 13-5 with a 2.17 ERA and 26 saves across 72 appearances (137 innings). He was the first relief pitcher to win the Cy Young in American League history.

What was the Billy Martin and Reggie Jackson fight about?

On June 18, 1977, at Fenway Park during an ABC national broadcast, Martin pulled Jackson from right field mid-inning for not hustling on a Jim Rice blooper. The dugout confrontation -- caught on live television with coaches Yogi Berra and Elston Howard physically intervening -- was the most visible eruption in a season-long feud rooted in Martin's resentment of Steinbrenner's interference and Jackson's star power.

Three home runs. Three swings that changed everything. A hundred wins and a clubhouse that should've burned itself down. The 1977 Yankees weren't just a championship team -- they were the championship team that proved you don't need to like each other. You just need to show up and compete. Every freakin' day.