October 6, 1978: Thurman Munson, the Damaged Man

October 6, 1978: Game 3 of the ALCS at Yankee Stadium. The winner will take a 2-1 lead in the series. George Brett of the Kansas City Royals hits 3 home runs off Jim "Catfish" Hunter of the New York Yankees, including when leading off the game.

Reggie Jackson, "Mr. October," as he had off Al Hrabosky, "the Mad Hungarian," to clinch Game 1 of the series, hit a home run in the 2nd inning. But Brett homered again in the 3rd, to make it 2-1 Royals. With 1 out in the bottom of the 4th, Thurman Munson doubled. Reggie singled him home to tie it. Lou Piniella grounded to short, and Freddie Patek threw it away, allowing Reggie to score and Piniella to make it to 3rd. It was 3-2 Yankees.

Graig Nettles then flew to left. Clint Hurdle caught it, Piniella tagged up to try to score, and Hurdle made a perfect throw to nail him at the plate. Ron Luciano, the most demonstrative umpire of all time, pumped his fist to call Piniella "Out! Out! Out!" The inning was over.

"Sweet Lou" had a fit, with what a pro-Yankee writer called a "Wild Man of Borneo" act. I was 8 years old at the time, and already a huge Yankee fan, and I was sure the Yankees were robbed. Seeing the play again many years later, I saw that Lou was out by a mile.

And then Brett led off the top of the 5th with his 3rd home run of the game. Catfish, who had overcome a shoulder injury to be vital for the Yankees down the stretch, pitched 6 innings. Other than Brett's homers, he had allowed no runs on 4 hits, so it wasn't like he was pitching badly. He just got beat 3 times.

Reggie had hit 3 in Game 6 of the previous year's World Series, and Babe Ruth had hit 3 homers in a World Series game twice. This was only the 4th time anybody had hit 3 in any postseason game, and nobody had ever done 4. (Through the 2021 season, that's still true.) Yankee fans were worried that this would be it.

Reggie drove Roy White home with a sacrifice fly in the bottom of the 6th, to retake the lead, 4-3. Manager Bob Lemon, himself a Hall of Fame pitcher, brought Rich "Goose" Gossage in to relieve Catfish in the 7th. In the top of the 8th, he gave up a double to Amos Otis, gave up an RBI single to Darrell Porter, struck Pete LaCock out, gave up a single to Hurdle, and gave up an RBI groundout to Al Cowens, before getting Patek to ground out to end it, but it was 5-4 Royals.

With 1 out in the bottom of the 8th, White singled. Munson stepped up against Royals reliever Doug Bird. Munson was, and remains, the only Yankee to win the American League's Rookie of the Year award and its Most Valuable Player award, in 1970 and 1976 respectively. He was named the Yankees' Captain in 1976. From 1975 to 1977, he had 3 straights seasons of at least a .300 batting average and 100 runs batted in. But he had battled injuries, to his shoulders and his knees. Statistically, 1978 was a down year for him.

(Babe Ruth, Lou Gehrig and Joe DiMaggio all debuted before the Rookie of the Year award did, in 1947. Mickey Mantle did not have an exceptional rookie season. Derek Jeter won the Rookie of the Year in 1996, but was cheated out of at least 2 and possibly 3 MVP awards.) (UPDATE: Aaron Judge was named ROY in 2017 and MVP in 2022, '24 and '25.) 

Munson crushed a pitch, 470 feet to left-center field. Appropriately, it went into Monument Park. On ABC, broadcasting along with Keith Jackson and the still-active pitcher Tom Seaver, Howard Cosell, who admired Munson, laughed: "Ho-ho! The damaged man!" The Goose finished it off in the 9th, and the Yankees won, 6-5.

This is what I love most about Munson: At the moment when the Yankees most needed him to hit a home run, the banged-up Captain hit the longest home run of his career.

At this point, the only players honored in Monument Park were the big 4: Ruth, Gehrig, DiMaggio and Mantle – along with owner Jacob Ruppert, general manager Ed Barrow, managers Miller Huggins, Joe McCarthy and Casey Stengel, and the plaque honoring the Mass delivered by Pope Paul VI.

The next Plaque to be dedicated would be the one for the Mass delivered by Pope John Paul II, but the next one for a Yankee would be, sadly, for Munson himself.

Since Brett, 3 homers in an LCS game has been done in the American League by Adam Kennedy, of the team then known as the Anaheim Angels, against the Minnesota Twins, in Game 5 in 2002; and in the National League by Kiké Hernández, of the Los Angeles Dodgers, against the Chicago Cubs, in Game 5 in 2017.

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October 6, 1978 was a Friday. Football was in midweek. It was a little early for the NBA, NHL and World Hockey Association seasons to start. So the only other score on this historic day was in Game 3 of the National League Championship Series.

The Philadelphia Phillies beat the Los Angeles Dodgers, 9-4 at Dodger Stadium in Los Angeles. Steve Carlton not only outpitched Don Sutton -- a fellow member of the Hall of Fame and the 300 Win and 3,000 Strikeout Clubs -- but hit a home run in his own cause. Greg Luzinski also homered for the Phils, Steve Garvey for the Dodgers. But this would be the only game the Phils would win in this series, as the Dodgers clinched the next day. The Yankees beat the Dodgers in the World Series.

Also on this day, on CBS, the Wonder Woman TV series airs the episode "The Deadly Sting." Agent Diana Prince (Lynda Carter) investigates the manipulation of college football players into throwing their games. Footage of Notre Dame games against Texas and USC was used. Among the guest stars are former Los Angeles Rams stars Roman Gabriel and Deacon Jones, former TV Tarzan Ron Ely, and, as a player before he became a Coach, Craig T. Nelson.

September 7, 1978: The Boston Massacre, Game 1

September 7, 1978: The New York Yankees go into Fenway Park on this Thursday night for a 4-game series against the Boston Red Sox, who lead them by 4 games in the American League Eastern Division -- having led them by 14 games on July 20. This 1st game was a makeup of the rainout of July 4.

It is generally agreed at the time that, to really make it a race, the Yankees will have to win 3 out of 4. Sox fans are confident their boys can take 3 out of 4 and finish the hated Yankees off.

But, just as the Yankees had been riddled with injuries in June and July, their bench barely keeping their heads above water, now, it was Boston's turn to see if they could overcome injuries. Carlton Fisk was catching with bad ribs. Butch Hobson was playing 3rd base with bone chips in his elbow, leading the former rocket-armed University of Alabama quarterback to made an alarming 43 errors before he finally got benched.

1st baseman George Scott, known as Boomer for his usual heavy hitting, was playing with a bad finger. 2nd baseman Jerry Remy, a particular pain in the neck in games with the Yankees earlier in the season, was out with a hand injury.

And right fielder Dwight Evans had been beaned, and was having what we would now call post-concussion syndrome. This forced the moving of the Sox' Most Valuable Player candidate, Jim Rice from left field to right field, and the team's greatest legend among active players, Carl Yastrzemski, away from the 1st base-designated hitter platoon he'd been in with Scott, and back to his former position of left field. And he was wearing a back brace.

The Yankees' biggest star at the time, Reggie Jackson, said:

It's hard to explain, but, somehow, we all seemed to believe we would win up there. Sure, we had our work cut out for us, and we knew it wouldn't be easy. But there was something in the air which made everyone even more confident.

On the 2nd play of the game, Hobson made a throwing error. This led to the Yankees scoring 2 runs in the 1st inning, 3 in the 2nd, 2 in the 3rd, and 5 in the 4th, knocking out Mike Torrez, who'd signed with the Sox in the off-season, after being one of the Yankees' own heroes in the previous year's World Championship season.

Yankee catcher Thurman Munson collected 3 singles and an RBI, and 2nd baseman Willie Randolph reached base 3 times, all before Hobson, the 9th and last man in the Sox batting order, even came to bat for the 1st time.

In spite of a 12-0 lead going into the bottom of the 4th, manager Bob Lemon, himself a Hall of Fame pitcher, took Catfish Hunter out, due to a pulled groin muscle. Ken Clay relieved, and got the win despite giving up a home run to Fisk. Yankees 15, Red Sox 3. The Yankees are now 3 games back.

Reggie had an RBI single in the 1st. Yaz hit a triple off Catfish.

What the heck, it's only one game, right? In the words of Nathan Salant, in a book he wrote after the season, put it, imagining what a Sox fan would think, "After all, 15-3 losses were made to be laughed at. It couldn't happen again... "

The series ended up being given the name given to the shooting of 5 locals by British troops in downtown Boston on March 5, 1770: "The Boston Massacre."

*

September 7, 1978 was a Thursday. This was also the day Keith Moon, the drummer for The Who, died of a mix of drugs and booze. And Canadian actor Devon Sawa was born.

These other games were played in Major League Baseball that day:

* The New York Mets beat the Montreal Expos, 9-4 at the Olympic Stadium in Montreal. Joel Youngblood and Willie Montañez hit home runs, in support of Nino Espinosa. Montañez had 4 RBIs. Gary Carter, with the Expos at the time, went 0-for-3.

* The Atlanta Braves beat the San Francisco Giants, 6-5 at Atlanta-Fulton County Stadium.

* The Toronto Blue Jays beat the Milwaukee Brewers, 5-4 at Exhibition Stadium in Toronto. Robin Yount went 2-for-5 for the Brewers.

* The Cincinnati Reds beat the San Diego Padres, 6-2 at Riverfront Stadium in Cincinnati. Pete Rose, Johnny Bench and Ken Griffey Sr. all hit home runs for the Reds. For the Padres, Dave Winfield went 1-for-3 with a walk.

* The Philadelphia Phillies beat the Chicago Cubs, 5-3 at Wrigley Field in Chicago. Mike Schmidt went 1-for-3 with 2 walks.

* The Seattle Mariners beat the Chicago White Sox, 5-3 at Comiskey Park in Chicago. Yes, both Chicago teams were at home on the same day, and both lost.

* The St. Louis Cardinals beat the Pittsburgh Pirates, 5-4 at Busch Memorial Stadium in St. Louis. Neither the Cardinals' Lou Brock nor the Pirates' Willie Stargell played in this game.

* The Los Angeles Dodgers beat the Houston Astros, 3-2 at the Astrodome.

* The California Angels beat the Texas Rangers, 7-6 at Anaheim Stadium (now Angel Stadium of Anaheim).

* Not scheduled to play that day: The Baltimore Orioles, the Cleveland Indians, the Detroit Tigers, the Kansas City Royals, the Minnesota Twins, the Oakland Athletics.

August 9, 1969: The Manson Family Murders

Sharon Tate

August 9, 1969: A pair of horrific multiple murders in Los Angeles shocks the country. They will be known as the Tate-La Bianca Murders, the Benedict Canyon Murders, the Helter Skelter Murders, and the Manson Family Murders.

Film director Roman Polanski -- a few years before his own shocking crime led him to flee to his native France -- and his wife, actress Sharon Tate, who was near full term of a pregnancy, had rented a house belonging to Terry Melcher, hit music producer, and son of actress Doris Day.

Polanski was in Europe, filming The Day of the Dolphin. With Tate, 26, that night were Jay Sebring, 35, a popular hairstylist and her former boyfriend; Abigail Folger, 21, a social worker and an heir to the Folger's coffee fortune; Wojciech Frykowski, 32, a Polish actor who had worked with Polanski; and Steven Parent, 18, who was staying at the house as a guest of its caretaker, William Garretson, who was not there that night.

Parent heard a car pull up to the house, went to see who it was, and was shot. The other four occupants -- five, if you count Tate's unborn child -- were stabbed to death. Someone else wrote the word "PIG" on the wall, with blood later determined to be Tate’s.

This was just after midnight on August 8 into 9. The following night, elsewhere on the West Side of Los Angeles, supermarket executive Leno LaBianca, 43, and his wife, dress shop owner Rosemary LaBianca, 39, were murdered in their home.

Again, words were smeared on the walls in victims' blood: "WAR," "RISE," "DEATH TO PIGS," and "HEALTER SKELTER." (A misspelling of "helter skelter.") So the police realized that the killers at the LaBianca home were also the killers of Tate and her friends.

On October 24, police raided the Spahn Ranch, in the Los Angeles suburb of Chatsworth, and arrested Charles Manson and several others, whom he called his "Family," but acted more like a cult. He was soon linked to other murders with similar modii operandi.

Their trial began on July 24, 1970, and became a sensation. Witnesses, including "Family" members, testified that Manson knew that a "race war" was coming, and he wanted to make it happen sooner. Hence, the use of the term "pigs," which black activists had used to describe the police and had entered white people's lexicon as well.

Manson, like so many others, most of them not as crazy as he was, was fascinated by The Beatles. He wasn't the first person to misinterpret their songs, and he certainly wasn't the last. Making a hideously wrong guess, he thought "Piggies" and "Helter Skelter," 2 songs off of their 1968 self-titled album (a.k.a. The White Album), were about the coming race war. His use of Nazi imagery and claim of being Jesus (about as far from being true as you could imagine) terrified people who saw the proceedings on television. 

I was born at the end of 1969, so my mother and Tate were pregnant for a few of the same months. Mom said the thing that really worried her was that Manson might pass his insanity down to his children, and he'd admitted that he didn't know how many children he had.

As far as is publicly known, there were 3:

* Charles Manson Jr. was born to Manson and his 1st wife, Rosalie Jean Willis, in 1956. When his mother remarried, he took his stepfather's name, and became Jay White. But he struggled with this connection, and committed suicide in 1993. He had a son, who goes by the name Jason Freeman.

* Charles Luther Manson was born to Manson and his 2nd wife, Candy Steven, in 1959. He changed his name to Jay Warner, is believed to have had a daughter, and died in 2007. It is interesting that both of these sons named Charles Manson changed their name to a "Jay W."

* And Valentine Michael Manson was born to Manson and Mary Brunner, whom he never officially married, in 1968. Named for the lead character in Manson's favorite novel, Robert A. Heinlein's Stranger in a Strange Land, he was sent to live with Mary's parents, changed his name to Michael Brunner, has a son, and says he feels no connection to Manson. None of Manson's descendants are known to have a criminal record.

Manson and the other defendants were convicted on January 25, 1971. Manson was sentenced to death, but, a year later, the U.S. Supreme Court ruled that the death penalty was unconstitutional, and Manson's sentence then became life. A later Supreme Court ruling reversed the earlier decision, but, ex post facto, Manson's sentence had to remain life.

He occasionally granted interviews, sometimes (but not always) in a straitjacket, living mostly at Folsom State Prison, outside Sacramento, California (the famous Johnny Cash concert there having taken place before these murders), until his death from colon cancer on November 19, 2017. He was cremated, and there is no final resting place.

At that point, Sharon Tate would have been 74 years old; her child, 48.

As for the other defendants: 

* Susan Atkins died in prison in 2009, age 61.

* Charles "Tex" Watson is 76, and imprisoned outside San Diego.

* Patricia Krenwinkel is 74, and imprisoned outside Los Angeles.

* Linda Kasabian is 73, and never served time, the result of a deal to be the prosecution's chief witness.

* Leslie Van Houten is about to turn 73, and is in the same prison as Krenwinkel.

* Steve "Clem" Grogan is 71, and was paroled in 1985.

All of them eventually renounced Manson, and expressed remorse for what they did.

In 2019, on the 50th Anniversary of the murders, director Quentin Tarantino released the film Once Upon a Time in Hollywood, a fictionalized version of the events leading up to the murders, resulting in an "alternate history": A declining actor, Rick Dalton (played by Leonardo DiCaprio) and his best friend and stuntman, Cliff Booth (Brad Pitt) prevent the murders at the Polanski-Tate house, and all victims survive, including Tate (Margot Robbie). Damon Herriman played Manson for the 2nd time in his acting career.

Tarantino has not explained what happened to the characters in years since, including the fictional version of Tate.

UPDATE: Linda Kasabian died in 2023. The same year, Tarantino posted an obituary for Rick Dalton on his Instagram page, but still hasn't said whether his version of Tate, or her child, is still alive -- or whether Tate stayed with Polanski, who is still alive.

*

August 9, 1969 was a Saturday. It was the offseason for the NFL, the NFL, the NBA, the ABA and the NHL. But there was a full slate of Major League Baseball games was played:

* The New York Yankees beat the Oakland Athletics, 2-1 at the old Yankee Stadium. The day before, Thurman Munson had made his major league debut, going 2-for-3. He did not play in this game, as Jake Gibbs was the catcher. But Joe Pepitone hit a home run off Chuck Dobson, to make a winning pitcher out of Mel Stottlemyre.

* The New York Mets beat the Atlanta Braves, 5-3 at Atlanta Stadium (later renamed Atlanta-Fulton County Stadium.) This would turn out to be an unexpected preview of the National League Championship Series.

* The Baltimore Orioles beat the Minnesota Twins, 5 to 1 at Memorial Stadium in Baltimore. This would turn out to be a very expected preview of the American League Championship Series. As with the NLCS, the team that won this game would also win the Pennant.

* The Seattle Pilots beat the Washington Senators, 8-6 at Robert F. Kennedy Stadium in Washington. The Senators jumped out to a 5-0 in the 1st inning, knocking John Gelnar out of the box, and also scoring a run off Jim Bouton in the 2nd. I guess Gelnar didn't smoke 'em inside, and was Bouton's Super Knuck working? Yeah, surrre!

The Senators still led 6-3 after 5 innings. But the Pilots scored 2 runs in the 6th, 1 in the 7th to tie it, and 2 in the 8th to win it. The Pilots zitzed 'em, and then probably went and pounded some Budweiser. (If you don't get the references, read Ball Four, Bouton's diary of the season.)

* The Boston Red Sox beat the California Angels, 9-4 at Fenway Park in Boston.

* The Kansas City Royals beat the Cleveland Indians, 10-0 at Cleveland Municipal Stadium. Bill Butler pitched a 1-hit shutout, but this would be the highlight of his career.

* The Cincinnati Reds beat the Philadelphia Phillies, 4-2 at Crosley field in Cincinnati. The Phils took a 2-1 lead into the bottom of the 9th, but Lee May hit a home run to tie the game, and Pete Rose hit a home run in the 12th to win it.

* The Detroit Tigers beat the Chicago White Sox, 8-4 at Comiskey Park in Chicago.

* The Houston Astros beat the Montreal Expos, 5-3 at the Astrodome in Houston. Joe Morgan won it with a home run in the 11th.

* The Chicago Cubs beat the Los Angeles Dodgers, 4-0 at Dodger Stadium in Los Angeles. Bill Hands pitched a 6-hit shutout.

* And the St. Louis Cardinals beat the San Francisco Giants, 8-6 at Candlestick Park in San Francisco.

August 6, 1979: The Munson Memorial Game

Bobby Murcer, hugged by Ron Guidry (left) and Lou Piniella

August 6, 1979: The New York Yankees return from Canton, Ohio, where they attended the funeral of Thurman Munson, their catcher and team Captain, who had been killed in a plane crash there 4 days earlier.

There was a question of whether they would get back in time to play that night’s nationally televised game against the Baltimore Orioles. Team owner George Steinbrenner, a man who liked to say, "To me, winning is second to breathing," said going to the funeral was more important: "If we don't make it back, we'll forfeit."

They got back in time. On ABC Monday Night Baseball, Howard Cosell, a man so often seemingly like he was born without tact, remembered that he was a professional journalist, and handled the situation superbly. He spoke well of Munson, and broadcast an interview he had done with Munson on a recent broadcast, in which Munson spoke of possibly retiring to spend more time with his family. Instead, at the age of 32, he had no future.

Keith Jackson, better known for college football, was the play-by-play announcer. Ron Guidry started for New York, Dennis Martinez for Baltimore. Munson's death had left the Yankees with only 1 catcher on their major league roster: Jerry Narron, who had played exactly 29 major league games, batting .188. The Yankees activated their bullpen catcher, Brad Gulden, who had played in 3, all the previous season, with the Los Angeles Dodgers.

The Orioles led 4-0 at the 7th Inning Stretch, including home runs by Lee May and Ken Singleton, who later became a Yankee broadcaster. But with 2 outs in the bottom of the 7th, Bucky Dent drew a walk, and Willie Randolph doubled. Bobby Murcer, a Yankee star who had been traded away and recently reacquired, Munson's best friend and, along with Lou Piniella, one of the eulogists at Munson's funeral, hit a home run to bring the Yankees to within 4-3.

Murcer and Munson in 1973.

Note the Yankee Stadium 50th Anniversary sleeve patches.

Felix "Tippy" Martinez replaced Dennis. (They were not related: Tippy was from Colorado and of Mexican descent, while Dennis was from Nicaragua.) The game remained 4-3 going into the bottom of the 9th. Dent led off with another walk. Randolph tried to bunt him over, but Eddie Murray, the Orioles' best all-around player, dropped the throw at 1st base, putting Dent on 3rd base and Randolph on 2nd. And Murcer hit a drive into the left-field corner, scoring Dent with the tying run, and Randolph with the winning run: Yankees 5, Orioles 4.

The Yankees mobbed Murcer, most of them in tears. A crowd of 36,314 was crying along with them. This game has been called the only time the home fans left Yankee Stadium crying after a win.

But losing Munson was the latest and worst in a series of events that had troubled the Yankees all season long. They never got going, and finished 4th, 13 1/2 games behind the Orioles, who went on to end the Yankees' 3-year run atop the American League Eastern Division, and then win the AL Pennant.

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August 6, 1979 was, as I said, a Monday. These other 5 games were played in Major League Baseball:

* The Kansas City Royals beat the Toronto Blue Jays, 16-12 at Exhibition Stadium in Toronto. Yes, that's a baseball game, not football. The Royals scored 11 runs in the 7th inning. George Brett went 2-for-4 with a walk and 4 RBIs. Pete LaCock went 4-for-6 with 2 RBIs. Freddie Patek went 3-for-4 with a walk and 5 RBIs. Despite all of that, they hit no home runs. For the Jays, former Royal John Mayberry and Rico Carty hit home runs, and Rick Cerone, who would become the Yankees' catcher the next season, went 3-for-4 with 5 RBIs.

* The Cincinnati Reds beat the Atlanta Braves, 3-1 at Riverfront Stadium in Cincinnati. Johnny Bench went 2-for-3 with a walk.

* The San Francisco Giants beat their arch-rivals, the Los Angeles Dodgers, 7-1 at Dodger Stadium in Los Angeles.

* The California Angels beat the Oakland Athletics, 5-2 at the Oakland Coliseum. Bobby Grich hit a home run. Rod Carew went 2-for-5. Rookie Rickey Henderson went 0-for-3 with a walk, but had an RBI on a groundout.

* And the Seattle Mariners beat the Minnesota Twins, 7-4 at the Kingdome in Seattle.

August 2, 1979: Thurman Munson Dies

 

August 2, 1979: Thurman Munson, catcher and team Captain for the New York Yankees, is killed in a plane crash at the airport outside his native Canton, Ohio. He was just 32 years old. 

The day before, the Yankees had wrapped up a series in Chicago against the White Sox. This was an off-day, so Thurman decided to spend it at home with his family. But he had also discovered a love of flying, and felt that being able to fly from New York to Canton would enable him to spend more time with his family.

Having been properly trained on a propeller-driven aircraft, he had just bought his first jet plane, a Cessna Citation I/SP, and decided to spend Thursday, August 2 practicing takeoffs and landings at Akron-Canton airport in Green, Ohio. Also aboard were his flight instructor, Dave Hall, and a friend and business partner, Jerry Anderson.

A Cessna Citation I/SP, similar to Munson's.

There appears to be no photograph of his plane before the crash.

Thurman made three takeoffs and landings, with no issues. He made a fourth takeoff, but one his approach to the landing, he forgot to lower the flaps, and came in too fast. He overshot the runway and crashed into a tree stump.

Hall and Anderson were injured, but were able to escape. Thurman was trapped in the wreckage. He was asphyxiated. His injuries were such that, had they been able to get him out, he would have ended up paralyzed like another legendary New York catcher, the Brooklyn Dodgers' Roy Campanella.

The crash happened at 4:02 PM. At 6:28, I was watching WOR-Channel 9 from my house in East Brunswick, New Jersey. That was the time each day that Sara Lee Kessler gave a newsbreak. The station now known as WWOR didn't have an early evening local news broadcast, only a late-night one at 10:00.

I heard the announcer introduce Sara Lee, and she looked very grim, and even at age 9, I could tell that something bad had happened. She said, "Good evening. Yankee catcher Thurman Munson was killed today... " I don't remember the rest of what she said. I do remember, literally, falling out of my seat. And I remember that they already had film footage of the smoking wreck.

Thurman was a 7-time All-Star, and a 3-time Gold Glove. He was named the American League's Rookie of the Year in 1970, and its Most Valuable Player in 1976. Through the 2020 season, he remains the only player to win both awards as a Yankee.

He helped the Yankees win the AL Pennant in 1976, and go further to win the World Series in 1977 and 1978. By that point, he was battling injuries that might have made a lesser man quit. In 1979, he was playing games at 1st base and as the designated hitter. He might not have played much longer, anyway.

He left behind a wife, Diana; two daughters, Tracy and Kelly; and a son, Michael, who played for a time in the farm systems of the Yankees and the San Francisco Giants, and wore his father's Number 15 uniform as part of the closing ceremony at the original Yankee Stadium in 2008.

Yankee owner George Steinbrenner immediately retired Thurman's number. Before the team's August 3 game, a message that George wrote was put on the scoreboard, and would later be inscribed on Thurman's plaque in Yankee Stadium's Monument Park:

Our Captain and leader has not left us

Today, tomorrow, this year, next

Our endeavors will reflect our love and admiration for him.

On August 6, the Yankees flew -- which may not have been the best of ideas -- to Thurman's funeral in Canton. They flew back, to face the Baltimore Orioles, a game broadcast nationally on ABC Monday Night Baseball. They fell behind 4-0, but Bobby Murcer, perhaps Thurman's best friend on the team, hit a home run in the 7th inning to make it 4-3, and then hit a double in the bottom of the 9th to win it, 5-4. Someone called it the only time fans ever left Yankee Stadium in tears after a Yankee win.

*

As I said, August 2, 1979 was a Thursday, usually a travel day in baseball. The whole point of Thurman being able to take the day off was that the Yankees were not scheduled to play that day. Six games were played:

* The New York Mets split a doubleheader with the Philadelphia Phillies at Shea Stadium. The Phils won the opener 7-4, and the Mets won the nightcap 2-1.

Shea Stadium scoreboard making the announcement

* The Montreal Expos beat the Chicago Cubs, 6-4 at the Olympic Stadium in Montreal.

* The St. Louis Cardinals beat the Pittsburgh Pirates, 5-4 at Three Rivers Stadium in Pittsburgh. In spite of this loss, the Pirates went on to win that season's World Series.

* The Atlanta Braves beat the San Diego Padres, 7-4 at Atlanta-Fulton County Stadium.

* And the Boston Red Sox beat the Milwaukee Brewers, 10-1 at Milwaukee County Stadium.

April 15, 1976: The Renovated Yankee Stadium Opens

April 15, 1976: Yankee Stadium opens, after a renovation of two and a half years. Much of the original 1923 structure remains, but much of it is new. Some old-time Yankee Fans are relieved and thrilled. Others are appalled at the changes.

The support poles, and the obstructions they provided, were removed, while the upper deck was "cantilevered" and extended upward, so it no longer needed the poles' support. Seats and aisles were widened, dropping the Stadium's capacity from 65,010 (from a peak of 67,224) to 57,545.

The back wall of the Bleachers was raised to twice its height. No longer could a fan stand on the platform of the 161st Street Station of the Number 4 Train and watch the game for the price of a Subway token. And the "façade," actually a frieze, that wrapped around the roof of the Stadium was removed, as was the roof itself. A copy of the frieze was placed atop the Bleacher wall.

Robert Merrill sings the National Anthem. Bob Shawkey, the starting and winning pitcher from the 1st game there in 1923, throws out the ceremonial first ball. Among the guests with a connection to the Stadium's history are Babe's widow Claire Ruth, Lou's widow Eleanor Gehrig, Joe DiMaggio, Mickey Mantle, New York Giants legend Frank Gifford, and Joe Louis, who successfully defended the Heavyweight Championship of the World at Yankee Stadium 7 times.

A photograph of "the four great Yankee catchers" in uniform is taken: Bill Dickey as a special guest, Yogi Berra and Elston Howard as current Yankee coaches, and Thurman Munson as the current Yankee catcher, who has been named the team's 1st Captain since Lou Gehrig.

And, yes, there was a game. The opponent was the Minnesota Twins. While Babe Ruth had hit the 1st home run in the Stadium, the 1st home run in the renovated Stadium was hit by the Twins' Dan Ford, off Yankee starter Rudy May. And the Twins led 4-0 going to the bottom of the 3rd inning.

A groundout by Roy White got the Yankees on the board in the 3rd. They put it together in the 4th: With 1 out, Graig Nettles drew a walk. (Cliché Alert: Walks can kill you.) Oscar Gamble tripled him home, and was singled home by Willie Randolph. Randolph stole 2nd, and was singled home by Lou Piniella to tie the game. A wild pitch by Vic Albury got Piniella to 2nd, and Otto Vélez singled him home, and the Yankees had the lead.

The Yankees scored 6 more runs in the 8th, thanks to walks by White, Piniella and Fred Stanley; singles by Nettles, Randolph, Mickey Rivers and Chris Chambliss; and a double by Gamble.

Yankees 11, Twins 4. Dick Tidrow, in relief, was the winning pitcher. Two days later, Munson would have the 1st Yankee homer in the "New Stadium."

The Yankees won the 1st of 3 straight American League Pennants that season. From the Stadium's reopening until its closing in 2008, they won 15 AL Eastern Division titles, 10 Pennants, and 6 World Championships -- more than most teams, to this day, have won in their entire history.

*

April 15, 1976 was a Thursday. There were 6 other MLB games played that day:

* The New York Mets beat the Chicago Cubs, 10-8 at Wrigley Field in Chicago.

* The Montreal Expos beat the Philadelphia Phillies, 8-5 at Jarry Park in Montreal. For the Phillies, Mike Schmidt went 1-for-4, and Greg Luzinski hit a home run. Mike Jorgensen hit one for the Expos.

* The Chicago White Sox beat the Boston Red Sox, 8-4 at Fenway Park in Boston. For the Red Sox, Carl Yastrzemski went 0-for-2 with 2 walks.

* The Pittsburgh Pirates beat the St. Louis Cardinals, 9-3 at Three Rivers Stadium in Pittsburgh. Willie Stargell hit a home run for the Pirates, while Lou Brock did not play for the Cardinals.

* The Atlanta Braves beat the Cincinnati Reds, 10-5 at Atlanta-Fulton County Stadium. For the Reds, Pete Rose went 1-for-4, and Johnny Bench went 0-for-4.

* And the California Angels beat the Kansas City Royals, 5-1 at Royals Stadium in Kansas City. (It was renamed Kauffman Stadium in 1993.) Nolan Ryan went the distance for the win, striking out 9, a pedestrian performance by his standards.

There were 4 games played in the NBA that day:

* The Buffalo Braves beat the Philadelphia 76ers, 95-89 at The Spectrum. Bob McAdoo had 36 points and 21 rebounds.

* The Cleveland Cavaliers beat the Washington Bullets, 80-79 at the Capital Centre in the Washington suburb of Landover, Maryland.

* The Detroit Pistons beat the Milwaukee Bucks, 126-123 at Cobo Hall in Detroit. (It's now named Huntington Place.) Bob Lanier scored 35 points for the Pistons.

* And the Phoenix Suns beat the Seattle SuperSonics, 116-111 at the Seattle Center Coliseum. Fred Brown had 45 for the Sonics, but it wasn't enough.

And there was 1 game played in the American Basketball Association, entering its last few weeks of existence: The Denver Nuggets beat the Kentucky Colonels, 110-107 at the McNichols Arena in Denver.

In the NHL, the Stanley Cup Quarterfinals were underway, with all of these games being Game 3 of their respective series:

* The New York Islanders beat the Buffalo Sabres, 5-3 at the Nassau Coliseum.

* The Montreal Canadiens beat the Chicago Blackhawks, 2-1 at the Chicago Stadium. Guy Lafleur scored the winning goal with 13 seconds left in regulation.

* The Toronto Maple Leafs beat the Philadelphia Flyers, 3-2 at Maple Leaf Gardens in Toronto.

* And the Los Angeles Kings beat the Boston Bruins, 6-4 at The Forum outside Los Angeles in Inglewood, California.

And there was 1 game played in the World Hockey Association: The San Diego Mariners beat the Phoenix Roadrunners, 5-1 at the San Diego Sports Arena. (It's now named the Pechanga Arena.)