Kerry Dineen is someone most people have probably forgotten. He played a total of 16 major league games, with two runs batted in. He played for the Yankees in 1976 and got one of the big hits of that baseball season. I know, because I saw it.
It was the Bronx Bombers against the Red Sox, a most hated rival in those days (see Fisk vs Piniella). In 1975 the Bostonians battered and embarrased the Yanks. But 1976 was a different story.
May 21 featured the first of three games in the series. It was a Friday night game at Yankee Stadium. And the Sox got off to an early lead. I distinctly remember the Yankees tying the score in the bottom of the ninth.
Then ensued tense, scoreless baseball until the bottom of the twelfth. I don't know who was on base or how many were out. All I recall is that Kerry Dineen stroked a single for the winning run. I can still hear Phil Rizzuto's, "Holy Cow" after the winner. My dad (a lifelong Yankee rooter) and I watched the exciting battle on WPIX in New York.
The victory propelled the Yankees to an excellent campaign, while the Sox floundered for most of the season.
The only reason I write about Kerry Dineen is because he was in left field for the Yankees last Saturday -- as an old-timer at Old-Timer's Day at the Stadium and it brought back fond memories.
Isn't it amazing how relative unknowns can make such a big difference sometimes? Kerry Dineen certainly did on that spring evening 26 years ago.
» Domenic Durante. My first game was on July 4, 1961 at Yankee Stadium. It was the Yanks vs. Detroit. One interesting footnote to that season was that Roger Maris' 61st homer was caught by -- you got it -- Sal Durante, alas, no relation to me.
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Copyright © 2002 by Domenic Durante. Posted July 11, 2002.
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