History

Brit Annie Spares is not fond of many New York Yankees.

She has said on more than one occasion that she didn't like Joe DiMaggio, but she followed that up by telling anyone who would listen that she admired him more than any player she had ever seen.

Brit Annie recalls some anecdotes her mother told her about DiMaggio's great hitting streak in 1941.

Let's get it straight. I didn't like Joe DiMaggio. He was stand-offish, prideful, and, to use a modern term, too full of himself.

Believe it or not, it has been 43 years since a major league baseball player captured the Triple Crown. The jewels in this elusive crown are batting average, home runs, and runs batted in.

Only a blessed few are in this elite class. Sixteen men, yes only sixteen men in the history of major league baseball have achieved such an incredible individual feat.

Chants of "We're No. 2" are sure to be heard echoing through the air around Landsdowne Street when the Red Sox take the field for the upcoming 2010 baseball season.

The anticipated chatter will not be a predication of the Red Sox impending finish in the American League East, however, as much as acknowledgement of left fielder Jacoby Ellsbury's entry into an "exclusive club" of players who wore the number two on the back of their Red Sox uniform.

Jo Bydin was a young baseball fan when the Yankees 18-game winning streak was broken by the St. Louis Browns on June 16, 1953.

Jo rooted for the New York Giants, and any day that the Yankees lost was a good day for Jo Bydin.

The St. Louis Browns

The New York Yankees had high hopes of becoming contenders in 1966 after their disastrous sixth place finish the previous season.

Jo Stac recalls that after the disastrous 1965 season, the New York Yankees were finally considered "just another team."

She read many articles about how the "pride of the Yankees" belonged to the past. Jo was pleased.

I have rooted for the Cleveland Indians since 1951. Today's fans don't know that the Indians, not the Boston Red Sox, were the New York Yankees' main competition during the early and mid-1950s.

By any measure, the Pirates' Jason Bay was a superstar in 2006. But he injured his knee in 2007, and was never quite the same again.

In that year, his batting went downhill to "league average," and his crippled fielding pulled his overall usefulness down to that of a replacement player. Bay has since regained his star batting ability, but his continued weak fielding makes him worth perhaps $5 million less than he might have commanded were he a free agent in 2006.

Victor Mohn, despite being a Boston Red Sox fan, admired Mickey Mantle, but he felt that injuries were part of the game.

Victor wasn't surprised to learn that New York Yankees' general manager Ralph Houk talked Mickey out of retiring after the disastrous 1965 season.

Mickey Mantle revealed the truth. At the age of 34, the second greatest center fielder in New York Yankees' history no longer could run or throw well, and was no longer an effective hitter from the left side of the plate.

Mary Lynne Munroe roots against the New York Yankees as much as the next woman, but even she felt sorry for Tony Kubek when he was hit in the throat by a ground ball that took a bad hop in the 1960 World Series.

Kubek suffered a neck injury that might have led to his early retirement.

Bill Virdon's Ground Ball

Now don't get me wrong.

Bryan Kashmen passed by Yankee Stadium in early October, 1965. The ball park that would be destroyed following the 2008 season was eerily silent.

For the first time since 1959, there would be no World Series games at Yankee Stadium. Bryan felt so good.

Tired of the Yankees in the World Series

I couldn't root for the New York Yankees for many reasons that I will not discuss in detail. Let's just say that they had great advantages over their opponents with respect to money.

Bryan Kashmen thinks that the only reason the New York Yankees rehired manager Johnny Keane three weeks before the end of the 1965 season was to avoid embarrassment.

Yankees' management knew that that the team had deteriorated with time, and that firing Keane would result in too much bad publicity since he could hardly be blamed for what happened.