SARASOTA – Soon he will be like Yogi, Guidry, Reggie and Mattingly, one of the Yankee greats who comes to spring training so all the young prospects can touch and feel another legend in pinstripes.
Though Mariano Rivera is still a few years from retiring – three more at least after signing a contract extension worth potentially $30 million yesterday – he can see the end. That’s why he desperately wanted to stay with the Yankees and one day enter the Hall of Fame wearing a cap with an interlocking NY.
“I could have gone and tested the [free-agent] market,” a beaming Rivera said yesterday after his Yankee future became official. “But that wasn’t my thing. My goal was to remain with the Yankees. Putting on that uniform day in and day out is priceless. Now I might get into the Hall of Fame with the pinstripes.”
Yes, Rivera, 34, has thought about his chances of being enshrined in Cooperstown. How could he not, amid a brilliant career that took flight in 1996, when he was the setup man for John Wetteland on a World Series winner and then took over as the closer role in 1997?
Since then he has been one of the game’s most dominant pitchers.
His exploding fastball has helped him compile 283 saves with a 2.49 earned-run average. But it has been in the postseason where he has particularly excelled.
He owns a record 30 postseason saves, 15 more than Hall of Fame inductee Dennis Eckersley, who is second. Rivera’s career ERA in the World Series, 1.16, is impressive enough, but consider his career ERA of 0.27 in 21 Division Series games and 0.85 in 20 ALCS games. It’s those numbers that will get him into the Hall.
“He’s the best reliever, in my opinion, in the history of baseball,” said GM Brian Cashman, who negotiated a deal that will earn Rivera $10.5 million in 2005 and 2006 and another $10.5 in the option year.
“There are a lot of names you could throw out there. But that’s how this organization sees him.”
With potentially three more years as a Yankee, Rivera figures he’ll add to his already impressive statistics to the point where Cooperstown is his destiny. There are only three relievers in the Hall: Hoyt Wilhelm, who was a starter for much of his career; Rollie Fingers, who had 341 career saves, and Eckersley, elected this year with 390 career saves.
“I think about it more and more at this point in my career,” Rivera said of the Hall. “Being a Yankee has been the most pleasant thing in my life, knowing that I’m playing with the greatest team in all of sports, the same team as Babe Ruth and Mickey Mantle. It’s tremendous and it means a lot to me and my family.”
“He’s the best I’ve ever been around,” manager Joe Torre said. “Not only because of the ability to pitch and perform under the pressure, but the calm with which he does his job when there’s so much pressure around him, not only being a Yankee, but a Yankee in October.”
Rivera said this will likely be his last contract, and that he won’t stick around just to pad his Hall of Fame credentials.
“Everyone else can have the numbers. I’ll take the rings,” he said.
—
‘My goal was to remain with the Yankees. Putting on that uniform day in and day out is priceless. Now I might get into the Hall of Fame with the pinstripes.’ -Mariano Rivera