DANIEL STYLER
<Staff Writer>
In 1996, following a loss to the New York Yankees, the long-time manager of the middling Minnesota Twins, Tom Kelly, said this about Yankees’ reliever Mariano Rivera: “We don’t need to face him anymore. He needs to pitch in a higher league, if there is one. Ban him from baseball. He should be illegal.”
The most alarming thing about the above quote is that it was said a year before Rivera acquired his most deadly weapon – the cutter. In 1995 and 1996, first as a starting pitcher and then as a set-up man for John Wetteland, Rivera threw a straight fastball. In 1997, so the story goes, Mariano – in his first year as the Yankees closer – lost his ability to throw his mid-90s fastball straight.
He hadn’t changed anything – not the grip, nor the release – and yet suddenly the ball broke with such fervour towards his glove side as it approached home plate that his catcher in the bullpen, Mike Borzello, was nervous. He was nervous, you see, because the bullpen in Detroit’s old ballpark, Tiger Stadium, was on the field and not behind the outfield wall as it is now in most parks, and he didn’t feel confident that he could catch whatever it was that Rivera was throwing: “… if you missed the ball, they would have to stop the game. And there’s nothing more embarrassing than that.”
For a month or so, Rivera worked with Borzello and his pitching coach, Mel Stottlemyre, to eliminate the cutting action. Then, they gave up. It was the right decision.
Mariano has amassed 652 saves (and counting) in his brilliant career – over 50 more than Trevor Hoffman, who is second on the list with 601 – and has the highest ERA+ in baseball history at 205. ERA+ is a metric designed to adjust a pitcher’s ERA (earned run average) according to the park in which they pitch and the ERA of the pitcher’s league. Pedro Martinez is a distant second with an ERA+ of 154. By any measure, Mariano Rivera – or Mo, as he is better known – is one of the greatest pitchers of all time.
What makes Mariano’s alarming success so inconceivable is that – aside from the occasional “straight” fastball – he exclusively throws his now patented cutter. Baseball, at its most fundamental level, is about outsmarting the competition. Pitchers bring a deep arsenal to their intellectual battle with hitters, armed with a variety of pitches and a variety of locations that these pitches can be thrown to. Mariano, on the other hand, brings none of this. He throws a cutter. And another. And another still. And yet major league hitters can very rarely make solid contact with a pitch that they know is coming.
Enter Sandman, Metallica’s 1991 single, plays whenever Mariano Rivera enters a game at Yankee Stadium. The lyrics are appropriate: “Exit light/Enter night/Take my hand/We’re off to never never-land.” For years, Rivera has put his competition to sleep, ending games without much in the way of adversity.
Mariano’s regular season accomplishments are dwarfed only by his postseason achievements. The New York Yankees’ success as a team during his career has translated into many postseason opportunities: he has pitched in the playoffs in all but three seasons (including this one, as the Yankees are almost assured of missing the playoffs for only the second time since 1995). He has almost always risen to the occasion; in 141 innings, Rivera has amassed a hard-to-fathom 0.70 ERA, far lower than his career regular season ERA of 2.39. It would be disingenuous to avoid mentioning his two particularly high-profile playoff failures – the 2001 World Series and the 2004 ALCS. Rivera has responded to these failures, though, with a measure of grace and dignity not often demonstrated in the sporting world.
I would be remiss to define Rivera solely in terms of his sporting achievements. If he is a great baseball player, he is by all accounts a better person. The Mariano Rivera Foundation, founded in 1998 by Mariano and his wife, provides scholarships to underprivileged youths and sponsors youth centres and churches that implement educational programs that serve to benefit underprivileged families in their communities in both Rivera’s native Panama and the United States. In 2012, the Giving Back Fund, a non-profit organization that tracks philanthropic giving worldwide, listed Rivera as 25th most generous celebrity, having donated over $600 000 of his own money in 2010.
Sometime between the time I write this article and September 29th, Mariano Rivera will throw his last major league pitch, having decided to retire following this season. The 2013 season has been a farewell tour of sorts for Rivera, with organizations across baseball holding ceremonies and showering him with gifts and donations to his charity. The gifts have ranged from the brilliant (a chair made of broken bats – Mariano’s trademark cutter often moves in such a way so as to induce a broken bat – given to him by the Minnesota Twins) to the absurd (a sandcastle with his likeness etched in sand given to him by the Tampa Bay Rays). The affection across baseball has been genuine; despite being a dominant and feared competitor, he is universally revered and respected across the sport.
Since 1997, the Yankees have had a privilege that no other team has had. They have known that the 9th inning, a source of anguish and despair for so many other teams across baseball, has been occupied and accounted for by the greatest relief pitcher to ever play baseball. Next year, everything will change. As a Yankees fan, rather than feel a sense of despair, I am thankful that the “higher league” Tom Kelly spoke about doesn’t exist and that Mariano Rivera has been – and will always be – a New York Yankee.