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Zimmer
takes another subway ride
NEW YORK (Bloomberg)
—
The last time two New York teams played in a World
Series, Don Zimmer was 25 years old and three
months removed from sipping his dinner through a
straw.
In the summer of 1956, Zimmer was playing
second base for Brooklyn when he suffered a
fractured cheekbone on a pitch from Cincinnati's
Hal Jeffcoat. He watched from the dugout as Don
Larsen pitched a perfect game and the New York
Yankees beat the Dodgers in the World Series.
''I guess I would call myself a professional
cheerleader --just like I am today,'' Zimmer said.
With the Mets and Yankees set to play the first
all-New York World Series in 44 years starting
Saturday, Zimmer also qualifies as New York's
resident baseball historian, tour guide and
cherub-faced link to the days of Ebbets Field and
the Polo Grounds.
Zimmer, now 69 and in his fifth year as bench
coach for Yankees manager Joe Torre, was around
when Mickey Mantle, Willie Mays and Duke Snider
played center field for the city's three teams,
and fans of the Yankees, Dodgers and Giants took
their allegiances as seriously as life itself.
He was the starting second baseman when
Brooklyn's Johnny Podres beat the Yankees 2-0 in
the deciding game of the 1955 World Series -- the
second most recent Subway Series.
Original Met
Zimmer even has ties to New York's other World
Series participant. He was selected by the Mets in
the expansion draft in 1961, and started at third
base for manager Casey Stengel on opening day of
1962.
After Zimmer hit .077 in 14 games, the Mets
traded him to Cincinnati for Cliff Cook and Robert
G. Miller. He missed most of the Mets' inaugural
40-120 season.
''That first year was so tough, I'd have bet it
might be 1,000 years before the Mets got to a
World Series,'' Zimmer said. ''People always ask
me, 'How does it feel to be on a team that loses
120 games? I tell them, 'I don't know. Just blame
me for the first three weeks. I got traded.'''
Memories
Before the Yankees played Seattle in Game 6 of
the American League Championship Series on
Tuesday, Zimmer took a seat in the home dugout for
an interview with a Yankees radio broadcaster. He
was barely finished when a wave of print reporters
and cameramen approached him in search of
memories.
Zimmer recalled his first visit to Yankee
Stadium for the 1947 World Series between New York
and Brooklyn. He was a member of the American
Legion national championship team from Cincinnati,
which received Series tickets as a reward for its
accomplishment.
A rookie named Jackie Robinson played first
base for Brooklyn in the Series, and Joe DiMaggio
hit .231 in seven games for the Yankees.
''Every day I walk on this field, I think of
that top row in the upper deck where 16 of us kids
were sitting,'' Zimmer said. ''We thought we were
in hog heaven.''
Zimmer reminisced about Gil Hodges, Pee Wee
Reese, Carl Erskine and other former Brooklyn
teammates, who used to car-pool to Yankee Stadium
together for World Series games. The 1956 Subway
Series was the 13th in history, and baseball fans
in New York had reason to think their good fortune
might last forever.
It didn't, of course. Dodgers owner Walter
O'Malley moved the team from Brooklyn to Los
Angeles in 1958, and Zimmer went along for the
ride.
Now he's part of history revisited, and he can
feel the excitement building in the city.
''I can only go by '55 and '56,'' Zimmer said.
''It was bedlam. How can anybody describe how
it'll be this time? It hasn't happened in 44
years.''
One aspect of an All-New York World Series
hasn't changed, Zimmer said. In the next week to
10 days, he expects to receive phone calls from a
lot of people he hasn't talked to in a while.
''It'll be absolutely wild, unbelievable,''
Zimmer said. ''Just try to get five tickets. If
you can, come and give them to me, please.''
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