Carl Yastrzemski
Carl Michael Yastrzemski Sr. (/jəˈstrɛmski/ yə-STREM-skee; born August 22, 1939), nicknamed "Yaz",[1] is an American former professional baseball player who played his entire career with the Boston Red Sox of Major League Baseball (MLB). He started his career primarily as a left fielder, but also played 33 games as a third baseman.[2] Later in his career, he was mainly a first baseman and designated hitter.[2]
For other people with the same surname, see Yastrzemski (surname).Carl Yastrzemski
Yastrzemski is an 18-time All-Star, the possessor of seven Gold Gloves, a member of the 3,000 hit club, and the first American League player in that club to also accumulate over 400 home runs.[3] He is second on the all-time list for games played, and third for total at-bats. He is the Red Sox's all-time leader in career RBIs, runs, hits, singles, doubles, total bases, and games played, and is third on the team list for home runs, behind Ted Williams and David Ortiz.[3] He was elected to the Baseball Hall of Fame in 1989.[4]
In 1967 Yastrzemski achieved a peak in his career, leading the Red Sox to the American League pennant for the first time in over two decades and being voted the 1967 American League MVP. Yastrzemski also won the Triple Crown that year, something not accomplished again in the Major Leagues until Miguel Cabrera did so in 2012.[2][5][6]
Early life[edit]
Yastrzemski was born in Southampton, New York, to Karol Yastrzemski (anglicized to Carl) and Hattie Skonieczny.[2] Both his parents were of a Polish background, and young Carl was bilingual from an early age. Raised on his father's potato farm, Carl played on sandlot baseball teams with his father, who, he maintains, was a better athlete than he was. He graduated in 1957 from Bridgehampton School. Yastrzemski also played Little League Baseball, and became the first Little League player to be inducted into the Baseball Hall of Fame.[7][8][9] He attended Notre Dame on a basketball scholarship (his career Long Island high school scoring mark at Bridgehampton broke one previously held by Jim Brown) briefly before embarking on his baseball career.
Yastrzemski signed with the Red Sox organization, which sent him to the minor-league Raleigh Capitals in 1959, where he led the league with a .377 batting average.[1][10] The organization moved him to the Minneapolis Millers for that post-season and the 1960 season.[11] Yastrzemski, who had studied business at Notre Dame, fulfilled a promise to his parents by finishing his degree at Merrimack College in North Andover, Massachusetts, in 1966.[12]
Major League career[edit]
Early career[edit]
Yastrzemski began his major-league career in 1961[2] and hit his first home run off of former Red Sox pitcher Jerry Casale.[13] From the beginning, there was tremendous pressure on him to perform as he succeeded to the position of the great Red Sox legend Ted Williams.[3] He proved to be a worthy successor at the plate and a far superior defensive player with a strong arm, expert in playing off the Green Monster, Fenway Park's left-field wall. In 12 years as a left fielder, Yastrzemski won seven Gold Gloves and led the team in assists seven times.[14][15]
While his first two years were viewed as solid but unspectacular, he emerged as a rising star in 1963, winning the American League batting championship with a batting average of .321, and also leading the league in doubles and walks, finishing sixth in the Most Valuable Player voting.[16][17]
1967[edit]
Yastrzemski enjoyed his best season in 1967, when he won the American League Triple Crown with a .326 batting average, 44 home runs (tied with Harmon Killebrew), and 121 RBIs.[5] Yastrzemski's Triple Crown win in 1967 was the last time a major league hitter won the Batting Triple Crown until Miguel Cabrera in the 2012 season (conversely, six different pitchers have since won the pitchers' version). He was voted Most Valuable Player almost unanimously (one voter chose César Tovar of the Twins).[6] His 12.4 WAR was the highest since Babe Ruth's 1927 season.[18]
1967 was the season of the "Impossible Dream" for the Red Sox (referring to the hit song from the musical Man of La Mancha), who rebounded from a ninth-place finish a year before to win the American League pennant (their first since 1946) on the last day of the season.[19] With the Red Sox battling as part of a four-team pennant race, Yastrzemski hit .513 (23 hits in 44 at-bats) with five home runs and 16 runs batted in over the last two weeks of the season, and finished a mere one game ahead of the Detroit Tigers and Minnesota Twins.[19][20] The Red Sox went into the final two games of the season trailing the Twins by one game and leading the Tigers by one-half game. Their final two games were against Minnesota with the pennant and home run title (hence, the triple crown) on the line. In the Saturday game, Yastrzemski went 3 for 4 with a home run and 4 RBI. Killebrew also homered, but the Red Sox won, 6–4. Thus the teams went into the final game tied for first place, and Yastrzemski and Killebrew were tied with 44 home runs apiece. In the final game, neither player homered, but Yastrzemski went 4 for 4 with 2 RBI in a 5-3 Red Sox win. In the two games with the pennant on the line, Yastrzemski was 7 for 8 with six RBIs.
The Red Sox lost the World Series four games to three to the St. Louis Cardinals, losing three times to Bob Gibson.[21] Yastrzemski batted .400 with 3 home runs and 5 RBI in the series. That season, he also won the Hickok Belt as top professional athlete of the year and Sports Illustrated magazine's "Sportsman of the Year" Award.
In an article he co-wrote for the November 1967 issue of SPORT magazine, Yastrzemski credited Boston's remarkable season to manager Dick Williams and an infusion of youth, including Rico Petrocelli and Tony Conigliaro. Of Williams, Yastrzemski wrote: "He got rid of all the individuality, made us into a team, gave us an incentive, and made us want to win."[22]
Family[edit]
His son Carl Michael Yastrzemski Jr., known as Mike, played college baseball for the Florida State Seminoles and was drafted by the Atlanta Braves in the third round in 1984. He started his professional career with the Durham Bulls and eventually played for two Chicago White Sox affiliated teams in the Triple-A Pacific Coast League, first with the Hawaii Islanders in 1987 and then ending his playing career with the Vancouver Canadians in 1988.[46] He died in 2004 at age 43 from a blood clot after having hip surgery.[47]
Carl's grandson Mike Yastrzemski, Carl Jr.'s son, was drafted by the Red Sox in 2009 and the Seattle Mariners in 2012. However, he did not sign with either team, as he played college baseball for the Vanderbilt Commodores. He signed with the Baltimore Orioles after being selected in the 2013 MLB draft. He rose through Baltimore's farm system, reaching Triple-A with the Norfolk Tides by 2016. In March 2019, he was traded to the San Francisco Giants organization, and he made his MLB debut with the Giants on May 25, 2019.[48] On September 17, as a member of the Giants, in his first game played at Fenway Park, Mike went 2-for-7 with a home run and a double.[49] In the next game of the series on September 18, Carl threw out the ceremonial first pitch to Mike.[50]