Around The Horn With The '61 Yankees: 3B

Yes, as tradition (and position numbering) dictates, I'm skipping SS to go to 3B first. The Yanks third sacker in that magical year of 1961 may have the most memorable name to Yankees fans (or at least to this one). Clete Boyer wasn't your modern third baseman, where the bat can so often outweigh the glove--general managers tend to look for guys to play the hot corner as if they're looking for a mirror-image third baseman, with perhaps a little less pop and a little more glove. Look at Ryan Braun, one of my fave players, and one of the best sluggers in the game. If he hadn't been hitting the commish's name off the ball last year, he'd have been sent down to the minors for his stone glove. Instead, he was voted Rookie of the Year.

Boyer would have scoffed at such poor defense at the hot corner. Along with Red Rolfe and Graig Nettles, Clete is among the best of Yankees third-sackers. Some would even say the best. Part of his problem was playing in the shadow of Brooks Robinson, the Hall of Famer, who won Gold Gloves even in years (like 1962) when Boyer led the league in assists. Then as now, Gold Gloves went to the better-known players, which means they go more often to those who can hit as well as field.

Boyer, unfortunately, couldn't hit like Robinson, although he wasn't without talent with the stick. Part of his problem was playing in Yankee Stadium, whose cavernous dimensions (457 to left center, 461 to straightaway center) swallowed up his warning-track drives. The other part of his problem was hitting in the mighty Yankee lineup, where world-class power hitters like Maris, Mantle, Howard, and Berra meant he often hit eighth, in front of the pitcher, where he didn't see many good pitches.

So his lifetime average was only .242/.299/.372, figures boosted by his later years in Atlanta's Fulton County Stadium, a hitter's park extraordinaire (and further proof that Yankee Stadium took away many a longball from Boyer). But Boyer could pick 'em at third, and--as with his other unsung infield heroes--he turned both bat and glove up a notch in the postseason. In 1961, he hit .267/.421/.400, while in 1962, he went .318/.333/.500, with a dinger in the seventh inning of Game 1 that put the Yankees ahead. With the glove, he distinguished himself twice in the 1961 Series, throwing two runners out from his knees, one of them after a backhanded pickup. Boyer set a record with 65 World Series assists, a mark that would last until Nettles broke i.

Boyer would leave the Yankees in 1964 for Atlanta, and would play until 1971, but his contributions didn't stop there. As a coach for the Oakland Athletics, he helped Carney Lansford learn to to play third. Later, as a Yankees bench coach in the early 1990s, he helped revitalize Wade Boggs' career, and shaped the future of a spindly shorstop who'd committed 54 errors in the minors: Derek Jeter.

So when you watch the Yankee captain pick one from deep in the hole and make a long throw to first, think of Clete Boyer, third baseman for the 1961 Yankees and one of the steadiest Yankee glovemen ever at that position.