Bernie Williams Honors The Babe in The Most Appropriate Way

Today, I’m taking you back to 1998 and the day the Yankees marked the 50th anniversary of Babe Ruth’s death and Bernie Williams delivered a Ruthian moment with an upper deck walk-off homer to beat the Rangers. Lets get to it.

NEW YORK (Aug. 16, 1998) - On a day when the New York Yankees commemorated the 50th anniversary of Babe Ruth’s death, there was really only one way the festivities could have concluded in The House That Ruth Built.

“It’s a nice tribute to Babe Ruth’s memory to win a game with a home run,” said center fielder Bernie Williams, who did just that, setting ablaze a crowd of more than 50,000 with a dramatic walk-off blast in the bottom of the ninth inning, giving the Yankees a 6-5 victory over the Texas Rangers. “That’s the way he used to hit them, I guess. It’s what baseball is all about.”

It was exactly the way the Babe used to hit them, a titanic left-handed shot that carried into Yankee Stadium’s upper deck in right field. No doubt the Babe would have been proud.

“He brought the home run into the game,” Yankees manager Joe Torre said of Ruth, whose memory was honored during a pre-game ceremony. “To have it end with a home run, that’s what you talk about when you think of Babe Ruth. That’s who everyone is talking about when you talk about the home run race (between Mark McGwire and Sammy Sosa). They still talk about Ruth instead of Roger (Maris). Babe set the standards.”

Ruth’s standards have obviously been dwarfed, for a variety of reasons including a livelier ball, smaller ballparks, and of course, steroids. Not only was his career mark of 714 home runs surpassed in 1974 by Hank Aaron and later by Barry Bonds, but his single-season record of 60 in 1927 was eclipsed in 1961 by Maris. And while only Ruth and Maris had ever reached the 60-homer plateau before 1998, since then Bonds, McGwire (twice), Sosa (three) and Aaron Judge have all hit that majestic mark.

Still, when you talk about home runs, as Torre said, you talk about the Babe, the man who virtually invented the home run.

“I was an 8-year-old,” Torre said, recalling the day Ruth passed away in 1948. “I remember them having announced it on television. They interrupted a show to announce that he passed away. When you’re talking about that 50 years after his death, much less after he played here, then he obviously left an impact.”

The day began with a moment of silence to remember Ruth, and PA announcer Bob Sheppard reading a prepared tribute as still shots of Ruth’s career were shown on the video board. And then the focus shifted to the pitchers’ mound as David Wells, whose admiration for Ruth was legendary, prepared to start the game.

“This was a special day for me,” Wells said. “It’s been building up ever since I found out I’d be pitching on the anniversary. It’s a special day for baseball, period, and it’s kind of sad because you don’t like to bring back old memories. But when it comes to something like this, I think it’s special.”

Considered by many to be the reincarnation of the Babe, Wells wrote Ruth’s No. 3 on his cap before he took the mound, and clearly pumped up, not to mention honored that he was pitching on such a big day in Yankee history, Wells was hoping to do his hero proud.

Unfortunately for Wells, the day did not go well as he was strafed by the Rangers for 10 hits and five runs in six innings.

“The curse of the Bambino, I suppose,” Wells said with that devilish smile of his. “You just try to do the best you can. But it seems like every time I threw a pitch, it was a home run. He was haunting us, he was haunting me. This is the second time I’ve done something because of the Babe and it didn’t turn out too good. I wore the cap last year and got my butt kicked. Today, he took it a little easier on me. I got the no-decision.”

The year before, Wells had purchased an authentic game-worn cap of Ruth’s and wore it for an inning in one of his starts, defying Torre’s order not to do so, by the way That day he got knocked around, too.

However, Williams spared Wells the indignity of a loss, and in the process enabled the Yankees to improve their record to 90-30. Only the 1944 St. Louis Cardinals had ever won 90 times in the first 120 games of a season.

“Yes, it does stagger me when you think of 90 wins by the middle of August,” said Torre, whose club increased its lead in the AL East over second-place Boston to 19.5 games, the Yankees largest league or division lead since Sept. 12, 1941, when they also were 19.5 games ahead of the Red Sox.

The Yankees jumped to a 3-0 lead, appropriately enough on a pair of home runs - a two-run drive by Derek Jeter in the second inning and a solo shot by Darryl Strawberry in the third. “I hit that one pretty good,” Jeter said of his upper deck rocket, a rarity for a right-handed batter at Yankee Stadium. “Babe Ruth was up there blowing it out.”

But Wells couldn’t hold the lead as he gave up two home runs to ex-Yankee Roberto Kelly and one to Royce Clayton which helped Texas grab a 5-4 lead in the fifth. Tino Martinez’s double play grounder scored the tying run in the bottom of the fifth for New York, and then the bullpens took over and the scoreboard remained unchanged until the ninth.

After Mariano Rivera retired Texas’ Will Clark on a bases-loaded grounder to end the top of the ninth, Williams produced his fourth hit of the day, and stood there admiring it as it soared into the seats.

“I hit it and I was like, ‘Yes!”’ Williams said. “We didn’t plan it that way, but it turned out great. I don’t think it was spooky, I just think it was a good way to end a game. It was very exciting and very coincidental that it came on that date.”

⚾ Aug. 12, 1953: The Yankees crushed the Senators 22-1 at Griffith Stadium, and if not for Washington scoring a run in the eighth inning, the Yankees would have set the MLB record for the largest shutout victory in history. Their 28 hits also fell just short of the AL single-game hits record, and only one of those hits left the yard, a three-run homer by Yogi Berra in the first inning. How well did the Yankees hit in this game? Starting pitcher Whitey Ford, in his first full season with the club after spending 1951 and 1952 in the service, tossed seven shutout innings but also went 4-for-5 at the plate and scored one run while driving in two. That raised his season average to .281 and his on-base percentage to .349.

⚾ Aug. 13, 1939: The MLB and Yankees’ team record for largest shutout victory that the 1953 team nearly broke? It occurred on this day 14 years earlier, a 21-0 rout of the A’s at Shibe Park. Joe DiMaggio and Babe Dahlgren each hit two home runs, including one inside-the-park home run apiece which was quite a thing. They had 23 hits in all with DiMaggio going 4-for-5 with five RBI, Dahlgren going 2-for-4 with four RBI, Bill Dickey going 4-for-6, and winning pitcher Red Ruffing going 4-for-6 with three RBI. This Yankees team reached double digits in runs scored 31 times including three where they topped 20 runs.