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According to Baseball Almanac, five Yankee first basemen wore number 23. Oddly, two of them did so in the same season, 1949, when the Yankees won the final two games of the season against the Red Sox to become the American League Champions. The team then beat the Dodgers in five games to win the World Series.
One of the two, Dick Kryhoski, split time with Tommy Henrich, who is usually credited as the first baseman for the '49 squad. The other player, Fenton Mole, started just eight games at first but also wore number 23 in what would be his sole year in major league baseball. Two players who were primarily catchers, Billy Bryan (1966) and John Ellis (1970-1972), also made starts at first with "23" on the back of their jerseys.
Of course, the license plate doesn't pay homage to Kryhoski or Fenton or the catchers. It is certainly a tribute, to graphically quote graffiti Melvin and I saw in 2016, to—
In more polite circles, we would of course be speaking of Don Mattingly, nicknamed "The Hit Man" and "Donnie Baseball." Mattingly was the 1985 MVP and a six-time all-star, 1984-1989. He won nine Gold Glove awards and six Silver Sluggers. His six grand slams in 1987 is the major league record for a single season and strangely, the only ones he ever hit. He is considered the greatest Yankee to never play in a World Series.
On September 20, the Florida Marlins (then 53-99) extended Mattingly's contract as manager for two years, with a mutual option for 2022. His first year managing in Florida was 2016, after a five excellent years at the helm of the Los Angeles Dodgers. His record in LA was 446-363 and he is the only manager in franchise history to make the post-season three years in a row, 2013-2015.
A great player, an accomplished manager, but almost certainly not the driver behind the wheel of the Japanese sedan on Livingston Street in Brooklyn. What would make a car owner declare their love for Don Mattingly (or any player for that matter) with a license plate? Can't you just buy a jersey like everyone else? Or write a blog post?
* Full disclosure: I saw the car in 2017 and according to How's My Driving NY, no vehicle with that plate is currently on the road. I found an unpublished draft on Blogger, cleaned it up and dated it for the day after the contract extension. If all this does is drive traffic (no pun intended) to "Are you ... Tony Campana?", one of my all-time favorite posts, it was worth the time.
Of course, the license plate doesn't pay homage to Kryhoski or Fenton or the catchers. It is certainly a tribute, to graphically quote graffiti Melvin and I saw in 2016, to—
In more polite circles, we would of course be speaking of Don Mattingly, nicknamed "The Hit Man" and "Donnie Baseball." Mattingly was the 1985 MVP and a six-time all-star, 1984-1989. He won nine Gold Glove awards and six Silver Sluggers. His six grand slams in 1987 is the major league record for a single season and strangely, the only ones he ever hit. He is considered the greatest Yankee to never play in a World Series.
On September 20, the Florida Marlins (then 53-99) extended Mattingly's contract as manager for two years, with a mutual option for 2022. His first year managing in Florida was 2016, after a five excellent years at the helm of the Los Angeles Dodgers. His record in LA was 446-363 and he is the only manager in franchise history to make the post-season three years in a row, 2013-2015.
A great player, an accomplished manager, but almost certainly not the driver behind the wheel of the Japanese sedan on Livingston Street in Brooklyn. What would make a car owner declare their love for Don Mattingly (or any player for that matter) with a license plate? Can't you just buy a jersey like everyone else? Or write a blog post?
* Full disclosure: I saw the car in 2017 and according to How's My Driving NY, no vehicle with that plate is currently on the road. I found an unpublished draft on Blogger, cleaned it up and dated it for the day after the contract extension. If all this does is drive traffic (no pun intended) to "Are you ... Tony Campana?", one of my all-time favorite posts, it was worth the time.
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