June 17

John Ward threw the second perfect game in Major League Baseball history on June 17, 1880. The first came just five days before. The next National League perfect game didn't come until 80 years later when Jim Bunning dropped a perfecto on the Los Angeles Dodgers.

Maybe you remember June 17 it as the day O.J. was chased along the L.A. freeway. Or if you're tight with Dave Concepcion, you'll remember to send him birthday wishes. On that day mid-summer, Bostonians are thinking about Kevin Garnett's "anything is possible" celebration after winning the NBA Finals. If you like the Nets, Spurs, Pacers or Nuggets, your teams also deserve a "Happy Birthday" as they were brought into the league on that date in 1976.

You get the picture. A lot of crap happened in sports on June 17. I look at the calender to remember important dates like my family's birthdays, my anniversary with my girlfriend and when bills I can't pay were due. I don't think about dates in sports very often. The one that sticks out the most is July 18. I wrote down the date on a blue note card immediately after watching David Cone toss a perfect game against the Expos. But, July 18 could go by 20 years in a row without it coming to mind.

However, when June 17 comes this year, I will remember that date forever after. No, I'm not getting married. But in a sense, I'm beginning a relationship I hope to last forever. Me and baseball. Broadcaster and game. June 17 is my first game doing play-by-play for the Batavia Muckdogs, single-A affiliate of the St. Louis Cardinals.

Calling any sporting event is exciting. There's a natural energy that you don't always pick up on as a fan. The 3...2...1 in your headphones. The nervousness about pronouncing a name correctly or interjecting the right anecdote or fact at the right time. The anticipation leading up to the first drop of the puck or swing of a kicker's leg. You never know what can happen. The first pitch will have a different feel, though.

Don't get me wrong, hockey and football are fine sports to announce. You practice all day how you're going to say "he scoreeeeees!" or "intercepted!" But, June 17 will be more than an exciting exercise. It will be reconnecting the with the game I've lost touch with since ending my college baseball career in 2005.

Sure, I've attended hundreds of baseball games since. I've studied thousands of statistics and written a bunch of articles for Biz of Baseball and VenuesToday magazine about America's game. What I've been missing, really, is being a part of the game.

From the booth, I'll still miss being on the mound. Every time I watch Felix Hernandez or Roy Halladay pitch, I feel the two-seemer in my finger tips. When a batter swings through, I do a little fist pump - you know, the one as a pitcher you learn to do inside your head so as not to show up any one. It won't be anything like doing that from the mound. It will - at least - be doing it as part of the team.

When I ended my college baseball career - if you can even call it that - I didn't think I'd miss my teammates.  Maybe I don't miss those guys, but I've missed having teammates. Learning their stories, coming in contact with so many different personalities and simply standing in the sun talking about baseball. And, baseball players - maybe only second to golfers in all of sports - have great stories. In baseball, you don't just have 25 teammates, you have 25 teammates who have stories about their last 25 teammates.

There's another aspect to this special day: June 17 will be the day many of the players remember as their first professional at-bat. The first "plate appearance" that puts them in baseball's books forever. June 17, the day they were paid to be in a box score. The first step in a staircase that could lead to a door with a $25 million contract behind it.

Ryan Howard played for the Batavia Muckdogs. So did Chase Utley. Maybe June 17 I can be up in the box pumping the fist in my imagination to strikeouts of the next great Major League Baseball player. How could anyone forget that day?

Greatness

If he wasn't 6-foot-7... if he didn't have a grin wider than a ruler.... and if he wasn't so damn good at basketball, Juan Paulino might have blended in at Finger Lakes Community College. Probably not though. A gigantic, Latino, Jay-Z lookalike from the Bronx, Juan stood out in the Big Apple. Imagine him at an Upstate college most known for its Woodsman's team and Natural Resource Conservation program.

Most of the white population seemed to be intrigued with Juan. Some of them would timidly say "good game," but most just stared as he walked by. Not to say he was the only minority - there were always a few black kids from the suburbs around the school, but few with similar backgrounds. Not many, though, with a tilt to their stride. The one letting you know they've been through things you don't understand.

On the basketball court, he wasn't graceful like Jordan, tough like Rodman or disciplined like Pippen. He wasn't fast like Rondo, fierce like Garnett or sharp like Pierce. He was a dash of all six. He was so audaciously better than anyone in junior college, you couldn't help but invoke the famous Billy Joel line: "Man, what are you doing here?"

The funny thing about Juan was how easily you could see his potential to be really great. The ease in which he dominated. The fundamentals that could be improved. Intangible passion for the game. But, being really great is quite different than being great. Great is local. Great is secure. Great is natural. Really great is transcending, risky and takes a hell of a lot of work.

A baseball player from the 30's Buck Rodgers may have best described greatness as "commitment to excellence and rejection of mediocrity." Not just to be, but refusing to not be. Most of us never reach really great at anything. Juan had it in his view and mid-way through his second year at FLCC, Division I schools were taking notice.

Coaches would come to a town built for tourists around a pleasant little lake to see Juan play in front of a couple hundred fans in a smelly gym with plastic bleachers. They'd watch as he brilliantly read his opponents' head fakes, pouncing at the right time to slap the ball into the half-empty stands. They'd see his balance and quickness on the dirty floor.  They'd leave in awe of the powerful forward scoring 30 points and ripping down 30 rebounds while getting slapped and hacked for 30 minutes.

While the competition in junior college isn't anywhere near D-I, other teams had guys who were his height. They had guys who - unlike Juan - played years and years of organized basketball. They had size, talent and experience. They didn't have anything close to Juan. Especially by the end of his sophomore season. I'd watched him go from clumsy to smooth, from pudgy to jacked, from a great D-III player to one with D-I talent. But, I noticed that something was going on with Finger Lakes star.

One night after leading a blowout win - who knows how many points and rebounds Juan had - 25/25 is a safe bet - I pulled up behind him at a stoplight. We knew each other slightly beyond a head nod. So, when he turned a little white Honda which probably wasn't his into McDonalds, I figured I'd stop in to congratulate him. But, when he realized I was following him, Juan paused in the lot long enough for me to park then slammed on the gas and high tailed it out of there.

It didn't make sense. I thought about the way he looked talking to people he didn't know well.  He looked  at them like a poker player trying to make a read. He spoke with caution. Not that he wasn't friendly, even at times gregarious, but the book was always half closed.  It wasn't long after the season ended and Juan had an offer to play with the best college basketball players on Earth, that I found out why he sped away.

He thought I was a cop.

Turned out Juan had failed to reject mediocrity. He was arrested for selling cocaine and eventually sentenced to one year in prison.

Go ahead and say it. Typical minority basketball player from the Bronx: good enough to play D-I but blows it by getting arrested. Sure, we could spend years debating whether a little 99-percent-white town could ever be a jury of Juan's peers. We could talk about why he felt he had to sell cocaine in the first place. We could talk about the hypocrisy of the legal system punishing petty drug dealers with much harsher penalties than those who drink and drive. But none of that matters. The fact is, Juan knew the consequences and shredded his D-I chances.

I thought he'd spent the rest of his life regretting not being really great. While I'm not the betting type, my chips were down on his story playing out as so many others' do: go in, meet up with more drug dealers, deal more drugs, get arrested again.

Isn't it great to be wrong sometimes?

After Juan was released from prison, Wells College men's basketball coach Joe Wojtylko came calling. After several hundred days living in a box, Juan wanted only to turn things around. "Something just woke me up," Paulino told AuburnPub.com in 2010. "It really helped that I went. It really helped that I went before it was too late. I learned a lot and decided to come back to school."

He wanted only to get his degree. The 6-foot-7 didn't want to be known as a baller. He wanted to be known as a good man and good father to his new daughter. But, Wojtylko's call lit the fire and passion that made Juan so great the previous one year before.

The Jay-Z lookalike with the one-foot grin spent 2009 and 2010 dominating. By the end of his second season, Juan was right back to 20/20 games.

A few camps and NBA teams sniffed around, but there were no takers. Juan ended up signing with an ABA team in Seattle and was eventually traded to New Jersey. It's clear he won't ever play with the likes of Rondo, Garnett or Pierce. He won't ever be really great on the basketball court. But, these days, Juan does reject mediocrity.

"I have a daughter now," Juan said in 2010. "I want her to see that I worked hard and I want her to do the same thing when she gets older. I want her to see that I have a diploma, that I wasn't a bum.”

Nope, he'll never be anything more than just great on the court. But don't try and convince me Juan Paulino didn't become really great.

Why Sports Coverage Often Defies Human Logic

Jon Gruden insists on Monday Night Football that "this Ben Roethlisberger kid will be OK."  Josh Hamilton is called a "hero." Michael Vick is the "feel good story" of the year. 
In our efforts to be good sports journalists in an ever increasingly competitive environment, to find stories that are compelling, informative and at the end of the day to find stories that sell, we often flirt with crossing the line between telling a story and making an athlete a hero. In doing so, we glorify the wrong types of athletes.  Often one's have done wrong are glorified for their atonement.
The case of Gruden, ESPN and Roethlisberger defies human logic.We've been told that Roethlisberger is a changed man.  That's he's on the road to redemption.  That, as Gruden said, Big Ben will "be OK."  Last summer, Roethlisberger was accused of sexually assaulting a girl in the bathroom of a club.  Despite not being convicted, Roethlisberger was suspended for four games by the NFL (reduced from six).  Before his first game back, the Steelers' quarterback was interviewed by ESPN's Merril Hodge, who is Roethlisberger's self-proclaimed mentor.  During the interview, Big Ben denies assaulting the girl, but says he's a changed man and that the person from the night in question "just wasn't him."  Of course, he also found religion again.  Which begs the question: if he didn't do anything wrong, why such a need for change, comeback and redemption?  There again, that's human logic, not sports logic.
Keep in mind that Hodge doesn't question Roethlisberger, in fact, the interview seemed so contrived, Roethlisberger was almost answering the questions before Hodge asked them, all the while the former Steeler Hodge is nodding his head in agreement.
In this mixed up bout with reality and logic, somehow Roethlisberger ends up the victim.  Somehow he's painted as someone who's overcoming.  He's the comeback story, he's the underdog who we're being told to celebrate and cheer for.  All the while, there's an actual victim: the girl Roethlisberger was accused of assaulting.  Unfortunately, she can't throw a football 50 yards or break a tackle.
Back on Earth, humans would normally choose to cheer for someone who hasn't been twice accused of sexual assault and, from what we learned, been an arrogant jerk to fans, media and teammates. Not on Planet Sports, though.
The story of Josh Hamilton is another example of twisted, blurred logic and a "feel good" gone wrong.  Hamilton had the world in his palm.  An incredibly talented, No. 1 overall Major League Baseball draft pick who was, at 6-foot-4, 235 lbs considered a can't miss.  He tossed it down the drain, or rather into his lungs, nose, veins and throat, with drugs abuse and alcoholism.  Now, before I go on, I'll first say that it's fantastic that Hamilton is no longer suffering with addiction and was able to win the AL MVP.  But, Hamilton is not an underdog or a hero.  Yet, those words are tossed about each time a soft feature package about the Rangers' outfielder is made.
These are the features which act as opinion leaders in telling us who we should cheer for and emulate.  Maybe I'm being naive, but I'd tell my children to learn from players I've mentioned before on this blog such as David Eckstein and Jim Abbott.  Players who persevered despite disadvantages which were out of their control, such as Eckstein's size (5'5, 140) and Abbott being born without a right hand.  Hamilton had the world, gave it away, then got it back with a nice smile and a swift swing. We glorify him for not doing drugs, which, as far as I know, there are hundreds of excellent role model athletes who never did drugs, presumably Eckstein and Abbott.
Again, Hamilton's success is good.  I'd never root for a player to not succeed because he was once a drug addict, but the message becomes clear: as long as you perform, you are free of responsibility for your past and are, in fact, a hero.
(Though I would like to add that when commentators say "he's never been arrested" about black or mulatto players like Terrell Owens or Derek Jeter, that's despicable and racist.  Someone not being arrested should be the norm. Plus, I've never heard that said about Tim Tebow)
Now, about Mike Vick.  The Eagles' quarterback, who was imprisoned for cruelty to animals, is now a hero.  Vick made his comeback last year, and spoke for the Humane Society last year and spoke to schools last year and was humble last year and was a good teammate last year, but last year, very few were making him into a hero.  Very few were begging for his forgiveness as ESPN columnist Rick Reilly did this week.  Reilly said, "The man reinvented himself into a wonder, both in his uniform and out. He has seen how wrong he was. He's sorry. He's making amends."  Notice the mention of his on-field success.
I feel good that Vick has brought himself back from a very dark place, but a man who spends two years in prison for feeling invincible, who then can have the sports world beg fans to forgive him based on humility (which should have been there in the first place) and 11 touchdowns, is not someone I'd label a hero.  But Reilly almost does.  He said that because new laws have been passed since Vick's imprisonment, that the Eagles' quarterback's murder of dogs was in a way, good.  That is ABSURD.  That defies every ounce of logic we humans on this planet have been instilled with. 
Am I glad that Martin Luther King Jr. was thrown in jail because the Birmingham letters came out of it?  Am I glad Ghandi nearly died during his Salt March?  Should I cheer for the school who would not allow Homer Plessy to go to school with white kids because it eventually was overturned?  OK, then I will go ahead and think that companies who abused their workers in the early 1900s were good because their abuse led to anti-trust laws and unions.
Again, I have nothing against Vick and am glad things have turned around and he isn't killing dogs anymore.  But my goodness, Ravens' lineman Matt Birk works tirelessly to assist former NFL players in need, even encouraging players to donate game checks, and he isn't given anywhere near the praise Vick is.  Where it goes wrong, as you can see in Reilly's column, isn't the praise of Vick's on-field play but Vick himself as a "feel good" story.  I don't feel good about a man not killing dogs.
But, as we've seen from the Derek Jeter contract situation, the mainstream media seems to make up its mind and dissenters get ripped or are ignored.  I understand they want what sells, but when you cross the line of a "good story" and begin disingenuously attempting to force viewers/readers to believe certain athletes are heroes or are deserving of praise for overcoming their self-inflicted wounds, that's when you enter Planet Sports, where rhetoric rules over human logic.

My Favorite Baseball Player Pt. 2

Since I was motivated by a Retweet of my "My Favorite Player" post by an editor of a respected baseball publication, I decided to give it another go.  In fact, I may give it several go's because, well, there's only so many posts I can write complaining about sac bunting or naming awful players who won big games.  So, my second favorite baseball player of all-time is Jim Abbott.  Here's why:
Several moments in my sports watching/casting/writing life have made me think, "if there was ever a moment to cry with tears of joy like a father at his daughter's wedding, now would be it."  One of those moments involved then New York Yankees pitcher Jim Abbott. 
Before I get there, it must be pointed out that Abbott has one arm. He was like sharp shooter who has one eye or a long jumper with half a foot. It seemed a physical enigma.  How can he field?  Why don't they just bunt?  Simple (sort of): he put the glove on his nub then quickly slipped his hand in post-delivery.  Incredible as it is to even field the ball, Abbott was an above average fielder.  During his career, his range factor per nine innings was higher than the league average, as was his fielding percentage.  In 254 starts and 381 total chances, he made nine errors and turned 16 double plays.
Abbott even managed two hits in 21 at-bats during his one season with Milwaukee. He also drove in three runs.*
Of Abbott's accomplishments, which include being elected into the College Baseball Hall of Fame and finishing third in the Cy Young Award voting in 1991, his most notable came on Sept. 4, 1993 against the Cleveland Indians. Abbott threw a no-hitter.
I'm not old enough to say I remember every pitch.  I'm not old enough to remember anything about Cleveland's starting right fielder that day Candy Maldonado, but I do remember being in absolute awe of Jim Abbott.  There's nothing like the tension of the last pitch of a no-hitter, but No. 119 of the day for Abbott was a little different.  It seemed like there was more on the line.  That everything Jim had ever come up against was about to be knocked down with one pitch. I don't know that I've cheered as hard to someone to succeed since pitch No. 119 or that I ever will cheer harder than I did for Jim Abbott. I don't recall the celebration, probably because I was too busy celebrating myself.  Celebrating for a man that didn't allow his disadvantage to be one, and celebrating the idea that anything is possible.*

*Jim Abbott bunted three times
**I don't care if that was cliche, it's true

My Favorite Baseball Player

Yesterday, I discussed on Twitter how we (journalists/fans) determine our favorite baseball players and athletes.  We're talking about the players who make us love baseball; the types of players who make us light up with more cliches than Monday Night Football.  Every time I went on the hunt for criteria for my favorite players, I found myself in a soupy mess of "plays with heart" and "overcame the odds."  I tip-toed around the word "hustle" and nearly nuzzled up to "gives 100 percent."  Channeling Johnny Cash, I asked myself "what have I become?"
So, I set out on a quest (a quest can take less than 20 minutes, can't it?) to find my favorite baseball player of all-time without citing a single cliche. 
My favorite baseball player is David Eckstein. (I know what you are thinking:  Impossible!  No freekin' way on this planet you can say David Eckstein is your favorite player without saying "heart," "hustle," or "overcome adversity."  You can't avoid "he's a winner" and "leader in the clubhouse.")  Nevertheless, here's my explanation: 
Eckstein was done.  Career over.  Minor Leaguer for life or real estate salesman.  He was 25-years old and was waived by the Boston Red Sox after never appearing in a major league game.  At the time he was let go, Eckstein was hitting .246  with an OPS under .700 in 119 games with Pawtucket.  He was picked up by the Angels, where in 15 games in triple-A where he put up three home runs, eight doubles and an OPS that would make Albert Pujols blush. Eckstein made the roster in 2001 and went on to win the World Series in '02 and '06, where he won the series MVP.
Before you say "small sample size," in those 15 games that determined his successful career, hear me out.  There was a time where I felt it was time to quit.  My college coach said I had great stuff and control, but couldn't throw hard enough to get hitters out (low 80s on a good day) and he refused to put me in.  Of course, it was more complicated than that, but the bottom line was that after my freshman season, I walked away from baseball. 
While I don't regret moving on and working tirelessly on my career in sports writing and broadcasting, I understand Eckteins position.  Where I walked away, Eckstein excelled in his final shot at ever being a Major League Baseball player. While I'm sure there are 10,000 statisticians who would argue (and logically prove) that Eckstein's fork-in-the-road 15 games and his World Series numbers are nothing more than a fleeting hot streak, I can't help but believe Eckstein found/finds a place that those less determined and committed can not.
*please feel free to point out that David Eckstein is well-known for sacrifice bunting

Sir, May I Ask Why You Are Bunting?

First and second base occupied, nobody out in the third inning, top of the order coming up and the pitcher's on the ropes.  Nobody's scored yet; this could be the inning where the whole thing blows up.  Presumably your top on-base guys are coming up.  What now?  Be afraid.  Though the pitcher is actually the one who is scared out of his mind, you, the hitting team's manager are actually the one scared out of his mind.  How do I know?  You freekin' bunt.  You give up a chance at a putting up crooked numbers in order to stay out of a double play and give your team a chance to score one run on a sacrifice fly or two on a hit.
If your pitcher was at the plate, by all means, do your thing.  But, we'll so often find good hitters, even Hall of Fame level hitters asked to bunt in the most bizarre situations just to stay out of the double play. 
 Poor souls like Honus Wagner, who once laid down 27 sac bunts in a year in which he had a .909 OPS.  With that we look at one of the better young hitters who has been victimized by their manager's fear, Asdrubal Cabrera:
 At the ripe old age of 24, Cabrera has already sacrificed 37 times.  During his early career, he's hit into 38 double plays.  More importantly, the Indians' infielder has hit 87 doubles, more than twice the number of double plays he's hit into.  He's also walked 132 times.  The breakdown comes out something like this:  Cabrera hits into a double play once every 44 times he comes to the plate, walked once every 12 and hit a double once every 19 times he stepped up.  Yet, he's called upon to lay down a bunt once every 44 times or around 10 games, because he could hit into a double play once every 10 games.
The numbers that illustrate the insanity of having Cabrera bunt reside in his averages with runners on base:
Men on base - .831 OPS, 49 doubles.  Man on first base - .900 OPS, 90 hits, 24 GIDP.  Men on first and second - .836 OPS, 31 hits, six GIDP.
To add insult to stupidity, Cabrera has the same OPS against ground ball pitchers as he does fly ball pitchers, so nobody can say, "well, (insert Derek Lowe or who the heck ever) gets a lot of double plays.)
Most of Cabrera's DPs have been on the first pitch.  My suggestion:  miss on purpose, then hit a double.

The Worst New York Yankees Players to Win the World Series

The New York Yankees were presumably favorites to win the 2010 World Series.  Their fans remind us daily that the team has won 27 titles.  We've had the names of legends blasted into our brains, Ruth, DiMaggio, Mantle, Jeter...the list goes on, but, here at Stop Sac Bunting, we want to focus on the forgotten and replaceable.  In honor of the playoffs, we'll name the most replaceable Yankees players to win the series. 
I'll begin by making this distinction:  When discussing the worst player to win a World Series, there are some criteria that our awful victor must fulfill.  First, we're not going back to 1867 with this, we're talking modern era, say 1947 forward, the game is so different from the 1920s, it's near impossible to study statistics in the same manor as it is today....and, a disclaimer, while I utilize and enjoy statistics, I'm no Bill James.  But, since I mildly understand sample size, the players must also have over 400 plate appearances in the season in which the Yankees won.
The statistical outlines will be mixed between on-base plus slugging percentage as well as range factor and total zone runs and WAR for defensive purposes. 
Here's the five worst of the best:

1951 - New York Yankees 2B Jerry Coleman -
Part of several New York Yankees winning teams, Coleman managed just a .630 OPS good for an OPS+ of 73.  It should come as no surprise that 1951 was Coleman's last year as a full-time player.  His total line looked like this:  .249 average / .315 on-base percentage / .315 slugging / three home runs / 11 doubles / six stolen bases.  Coleman's range factor of 5.03 was well below league average of 5. 69.  Not to mention he made 17 errors in 102 games at second base.  Yes, second base, the same position some players routinely make between zero and five errors at every season.  Coleman's Wins Above Replacement according to Baseball-Reference was 1.1 or basically an average replacement player.  Yet, Coleman was celebrating on the same field as Joe DiMaggio and Yogi Berra.

1956 - New York Yankees 3B Andy Carey -
Here's Carey's total line from '56, you may want to shield your eyes:  .237 / .310 / .339 / .649 (OPS+ 74) / seven home runs / nine stolen bases.  Even with slightly above average fielding, Carey's WAR was 0.2 for '56.  We can say this to Carey's credit, he hit very well (.311 average) with two outs and runners in scoring position, but overall with runners in scoring position he hit just .269.

1961 - New York Yankees 2B Bobby Richardson -
Before we get stared on Richardson's awful 1961 season, we'll say this:  If you think the media sucks up to the Yankees like Forest Gump to that hippi tramp Jenny now, in 1961, some writers voted Bobby Richardson for MVP.  That's like voting that Elliot Spitzer for president.  Richardson had a 67 OPS+ and .610 OPS.  And, though his fielding wasn't terrible in '61, during the rest of his career every stat points to his futility at the position.  If we ever talk about overrated players, Richardson will be right up there, he was only above average for his position once during his 12-year career.  But, let's get back to '61:
It was almost like Richardson refused to make an impact on his team.  He stole nine bases and was caught seven times.  He only walked 30 times and scored only 80 runs while playing all 162 games on one of the best offensive ballclubs of all-time.
Richardson had nine hits in the World Series, but eight were singles and he only score two runs.

1996 Yankees DH Ruben Sierra - 
The Yankees ran, or I suppose you could say sat, a bunch of designated hitters in '96 including Daryl Strawberry and Cecil Fielder.  Even Tim Raines DH'ed twice.  It was like the 1991 All-Star team, only beleaguered by cocaine and cheeseburgers.  But Sierra was a black belt in being a wash up.  He stepped up 407 times for the Yankees in '96, hit .258 / .327 / .403 with 11 home runs and 52 RBI.  While the numbers would be outstanding for a second baseman in 1961, Sierra's numbers compared to other DH's in the AL paint the ugly picture.  In fact, compared to anyone his power numbers stunk.  The AL hit a home run once in ever 32 at-bats in 1996, Sierra hit one ever 37 for the Yankees.
To the Yankees' credit, Ruben didn't play for them by the time the World Series came along, but the guy did get eventually get a ring.

2000 Yankees 3B Scott Brosius
Plenty of Yankees fans would love to tell you that Scott Brosius was a great third baseman and that he's super clutch and the definition of all that is the Yankee aura and so on and so on.  But, in 2000, Scott Brosius was terrible.  Not just sub-par, not just an off year, but plain awful.  So bad that he didn't surpass a .300 on-base percentage and led the team in double plays.  Not double plays turned, but double plays hit into.  Speaking of which, the .230 hitter also played very average defense in 2000, managing a 0.4 defensive WAR.
Brosius did hit one home run in the World Series, but outside of that bomb, he hit under .230 for both the ALDS and ALCS.  In fact, myth spreading Yankee fans would hate to know the Scotty B's "clutch" reputation is one of near insanity.  His career playoff OPS is .696 in over 200 plate appearances.  Yes, he had a big home run in the 2001 World Series, but outside of that, he was mostly ghostly in the playoffs.