The Year the Yankees Bottomed Out

By ROB PATTERSON

Baseball may no longer be our national pastime, but for a sport with its moments of near-Zen calm, it can still be wildly entertaining. Both on the field and off, as shown in the lively new documentary, “Bronx Zoo ’90: Crime, Chaos, and Baseball.”

The three-episode series streaming on Peacock might be sadder if it weren’t so damn entertaining. After all, 1990 was a horrifyingly bad year for the most distinguished franchise in baseball if not all of professional American sports: The New York Yankees, a.k.a. The Bronx Bombers.

I’m a casual Yanks fan in many ways – for instance, I practice Yankees heresy by rather liking their arch-enemies the Boston Red Sox, being disposed towards underdogs – yet my affection for the club is nonetheless lifelong and nearly unbreakable.

My hometown had a Triple A Yankees farm team, The Binghamton Triplets. The small ballpark with its dark green fences in the middle of a residential neighborhood was a field of dreams in my youth.

Yankee Stadium was the first place I saw a Major League Baseball game. The 1961 race between Mickey Mantle and Roger Maris to break Babe Ruth’s season record of 60 home runs dominated the news for much of that year, when I was 7-years old, as they jockeyed the lead back and forth. As a New Yorker from 1975 to late 1989, heading up to the stadium in the Bronx for a game was a top NYC treat. I loved how ex-Yankees were frequent ad pitchmen on late-night TV. The team was interwoven into the fabric of the Big Apple.

But I missed the drama and zaniness that reigned within and around the 1990 Yankees, having just moved to Texas. Plus the sorrow of the most-successful team in the sport spending much of the season in the basement.

“Bronx Zoo ’90” relates the team’s annus horribilis with zing over its three segments. And what an awful year it was. On Christmas, 1989, the death of veteran Yankees player and manager Billy Martin – who had been fired from the latter job five times by team owner George Steinbrenner, but was rumored to be rehired – died in a auto accident; an omen of what was to come.

It wasn’t just the lousy playing on the field that made 1990 a disaster for the team, such as when pitcher Andy Hawkins threw a no-hitter yet the team lost the game. Its hires and trades were a chaotic mess. Player Mel Hall was dating an underaged teen girl, and for some reason brought two cougars into the clubhouse one day; he was later convicted and jailed as a sex offender. Overpaid free agent pitcher Pascual Pérez failed to show for spring training and had to be tracked down at his home in the Dominican Republic. That’s just some of the chaos

And owner George Steinbrenner was banned from baseball after hiring a convicted gambler to dig up dirt on star player Dave Winfield, who Steinbrenner was feuding with. When his ban was announced at the stadium, the crowd cheered.

While watching the doc, I twigged to how much Steinbrenner’s obnoxiousness reminded me of another man New Yorkers loved to hate: Donald Trump. Sure enough, the series documents the future president sucking up to, and taking cues on being obnoxious from the Yankees owner.

My only issue with this lively account is how it claims the worst year ever led to building the team into a genuine dynasty. I beg to differ: the Yanks were already a dynasty. But the final part of the series detailing how the club rebounded to greatness makes a sweet ending to a doc that should be of interest to viewers beyond baseball fans.

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Rob Patterson is a music and entertainment writer in Austin, Texas. Email robpatterson054@gmail.com.

From The Progressive Populist, September 1, 2024

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