Let’s remember Casey Stengel, who retired on this day in 1965.
Along the way, he managed the Brooklyn Dodgers (1934-1936), Boston Braves (1938-1943) and took over the New York Yankees in 1949 when he replaced the retiring Joe McCarthy.
It was his time with the Yankees that reminds me of my late father and his generation sitting around watching the TV or catching the sports pages about those great teams of the 1950’s. Casey won 1, 149 games (696 losses) over 12 seasons with the Yankees, including 10 AL pennants and seven World Series rings. Back then, my father would tell me that you were either a Yankee fan or cheer for whoever they were playing in “La Serie”.
He was quite a character as well as an amazing manager. Stengel’s critics say that he was a “button pusher” because of great teams. In fact, he was the first manager to use the platoon system (lefty batter vs right handed pitcher) and was a great judge of talent.
As my father said, Casey managed great teams but he was also a great manager. He was also the author of a lot of wonderful lines that transcend baseball such as this: “There comes a time in every man’s life, and I’ve had plenty of them.”.
So we remember Casey today and baseball conversations that I had with my late father over the years.