In this post we are going to take a look at Derek Jeter, to see where he ranks among the greatest Yankees of all time. Jeter is a Yankee lifer, so lets take a look at how he ranks among the best of one of the most esteemed franchises in sports history. There are also a ton of Jeter haters out there, who definitely don’t want to read another article like this. But I think the haters even like him a little bit.
Now I realize that we are talking about a franchise with players in it’s history like Mickey Mantle, Babe Ruth, Lou Gehrig, Yogi Berra, and Joe DiMaggio. Statistically speaking, Jeter may not even be considered a greater Yankee than Mariano Rivera or Andy Pettite. But to me comparing a short stop to pitchers is apples and oranges. I don’t think that a definitive rank can be made among these baseball legends. It is difficult to compare people from different eras, especially when thinking about facts like African Americans couldn’t play during Babe Ruth’s time, and the juice scandals of the modern baseball era. We can however look at some of the categories Jeter has excelled in.
Jeter’s career started off with a bang. In 1996 he was the Yankees opening day short stop, the first rookie to open at short stop since Tom Tresh in 1962. In his first game he hit his first major league home run. During Jeter’s rookie season he had a .314 average, 10 home runs, 78 RBIs, and 14 steals according to derekjeter.com. He was named the AL rookie of the year, and batted .361 in the postseason, an intricate part of leading the Yankees to their first World Series win since 1978.
That World Series ring in his rookie year would set a tone of winning as the Captain has five to date.
Jeter puts up consistent numbers. He has 3,225 hits, and was the fourth youngest member of the 3,000 hit club, a group of only 23 people. He is a 12 time all star, with five gold gloves but the Captain really shines where it counts, in the post season.
In post season play Jeter holds the MLB records for hits, games played, extra base hits, and runs scored.(derekjeter.com)
These are just areas where he is statistically superior. The intangibles are an area that must be considered when discussing Derek Jeter.
According to mlb.com in the Derek Jeter biography section, commissioner Bud Selig wrote Jeter a letter in 2009 which he said “[You are] Major League Baseball’s foremost champion and ambassador. You embody all the best of Major League Baseball. … You have represented the sport magnificently throughout your Hall of Fame career. On and off the field, you are a man of great integrity, and you have my admiration.”
It’s easy to see why people outside of the Yankee’s world hate Derek Jeter. You have to make up rumors about a guy who consistently wins, stays out of the tabloids (despite being single in New York City), never seems to say the wrong thing or make a mistake in front of the camera, and receives gushing praise from the Commissioner himself. My favorite of the Jeter rumors is the most recent. Hackers got into official Yankee Twitter accounts and tweeted that Jeter would be benched for the rest of the season because he is having a sex change.
I’m sure the Captain can take comfort knowing he is doing something right when the only rumors the haters can make up about him are fake sex change articles. In the media frenzied world we live in, its not hard to dig up dirt on someone, unless there apparently is no dirt to dig.
