Chumps to Champs

February 18, 2019
New York Times sportswriter Pennington (Billy Martin; The Heisman) draws on his decades of reporting to offer a fast-paced, insider history of the 1990s New York Yankees. Pennington charts the steady resurgence of the Yankees from a “cloak of doom” in the 1980s to a powerhouse that dominated the sport in the decade following. Pennington shows how manager Buck Showalter built the new team by strengthening the farm system, and explains how the famously mercurial owner George Steinbrenner recovered from a 1990 ban he received from commissioner Fay Vincent (for paying someone to smear right fielder Dave Winfield), returning to the organization in 1993 calmer and more willing to let others, like GM Gene Michael, run the team. Along the way Pennington introduces the rookies who rose up from the Yankees minor league system: shortstop Derek Jeter, pitcher Andy Pettitte, catcher Jorge Posada, and reliever Mariano Rivera (“we didn’t know what we had with Mariano,” recalls Showalter). Excitement builds as Pennington takes the narrative through the 1995 season, to the moment when veteran first baseman Don Mattingly shed tears after clinching a wild card playoff berth—the team’s first since 1981. Pennington’s work is a must for Yankees fans, but also an exciting history for any baseball aficionados.

Christian Baskous narrates this compelling slice of recent baseball history. Many listeners will already know the ending. By 1995, the New York Yankees had become a terrific team led by a cadre of homegrown stars and would go on to a legendary run of first-place seasons and World Series wins. Even so, baseball fans will revel in the details of how the team rose to such success after hitting rock bottom between 1989 and 1992. Though this account is a potentially unwieldy combination of interviews, history, and play-by-play action, it sounds entirely seamless as read by Baskous. He turns the work into a well-articulated, easy-to-follow story. Baskous also skillfully captures the personalities of the players, coaches, and front-office executives listeners meet along the way. A.T.N. � AudioFile 2019, Portland, Maine