BOISE, Idaho — THIS DAY IN SPORTS…August 2, 1979:
Thurman Munson, at that time the heart and soul of the New York Yankees, dies in a private plane crash at the age of 32. Munson was the Yankees’ catcher and captain when they won the World Series in 1977 and 1978. The Yanks would not win another until 1996. Munson hit .292 in his career and is still the only Yankee to win both the American League Rookie of the Year and Most Valuable Player awards. Club owner George Steinbrenner immediately retired Munson’s No. 15 upon his death.
This is the 45th anniversary of Munson’s death. A Yahoo! Sports column by Jay Busbee marking the 40th anniversary of the tragedy painted this picture of him: “Munson was the embodiment of every image Yankees fans hold dear. An undersized, oddly shaped catcher — his teammates used to call him “Squatty Body” — he sported a sloppy mustache and a mess of hair, and his uniform always looked like he’d slept in it for three days before the game. He wasn’t slick in his dress or his speech, and he wasn’t a friendly on-camera presence.
“What he was, was the lead dog on the most alpha-laden team in the most alpha-obsessed city in the country. The first Yankees captain since Lou Gehrig, Munson was — like Odysseus before him — a reluctant leader, but a natural and a brilliant one.” When Busbee puts it that way, you wonder what effect a similar shock would have had on Yankees fans (and baseball fans in general) had a beloved captain in later years named Derek Jeter met a similar fate.
Munson was in his 11th major league season when he passed away. His career batting average was .292, and he hit 113 career home runs. The seven-time All-Star was AL Rookie of the Year in 1970 and AL MVP in 1976, leading the Yankees to their first World Series since 1964. But Munson always longed to go back home to Ohio, and he actually requested a trade in 1977. Ohio is where he died while practicing takeoffs and landings at Akron-Canton Regional Airport. Munson’s locker in the Yankees clubhouse remains empty to this day.
(Tom Scott hosts the Scott Slant segment during the football season on KTVB’s Sunday Sports Extra. He also anchors four sports segments each weekday on 95.3 FM KTIK and one on News/Talk KBOI. His Scott Slant column runs every Wednesday.)
