New York Yankees

The New York Yankees are a professional baseball team based in the borough of the Bronx, in New York City, New York. The Yankees are a member of the Eastern Division of Major League Baseball's American League. One of the American League's eight charter franchises, the club was founded in Baltimore, Maryland in 1901 as the Baltimore Orioles, moved to New York City in 1903, then becoming known as the New York Highlanders, and became solely known as the "Yankees" in 1913. From 1923 to the present, the Yankees permanent home has been Yankee Stadium. In 2009, they will move into a new stadium, also to be called "Yankee Stadium"
The Yankees have been Major League Baseball's most successful franchise with 26 World Series championships and 39 American League Pennants. They are also the most successful franchise in North American professional sports history, passing the Montreal Canadiens' 24 titles in 1999.

Franchise history

Origins: the Baltimore Era (1901-1902)
At the end of 1900, Western League president Ban Johnson reorganized the league, adding teams in three Eastern cities, forming the American League. Plans to put a team in New York City were blocked by the National League's New York Giants, who had enough political power to keep the AL out. Instead, a team was put in Baltimore, Maryland, a city which had been abandoned when the NL contracted from 12 to 8 teams in 1900.
The team, known as the Baltimore Orioles, began playing in 1901. In the middle of the 1902 season, the Giants gained controlling interest of the team and began raiding it for players, until the AL stepped in and took control of the team. In January 1903, a "peace conference" was held between the two leagues to settle disputes and try to coexist. One of the results of the conference was that the NL agreed to let the "junior circuit" establish a franchise in New York. The Orioles' new owners, Frank J. Farrell and William S. Devery, found a ballpark location not blocked by the Giants, and Baltimore's team moved to New York.

Move to New York: the Highlanders Era (1903-1912)
The new ballpark was constructed in northern Manhattan, at one of the island's highest points, between 165th and 168th Streets. Hilltop Park, (formally known as "American League Park") was much smaller than the Polo Grounds, the Giants' home just a few blocks away. The team came to be known as the New York Highlanders for two reasons: a reference to the team's elevated location and to the noted British military unit The Gordon Highlanders, which made sense, as the team's president from 1903 to 1906 was Joseph Gordon.
The most success the Highlanders had was finishing second in 1904, 1906 and 1910; 1904 was the closest they would come to winning the AL pennant. That year, they would lose the deciding game on the last day of the season to the Boston Americans, who would later become the Boston Red Sox. This had much historical significance, as the Highlanders' role in the pennant race caused the Giants to announce that they would not play the World Series against the AL pennant winner. 1904 was the last year no World Series was played until 90 years later in the strike-truncated 1994 season. It would also be the last time Boston would beat New York in a pennant-deciding game for a full century (2004).

New owners, a new home, and a new name: the Polo Grounds Era (1913-1922)
The Polo Grounds burned down in 1911 and the Highlanders allowed the Giants to play in Hilltop Park during reconstruction. Relations between the two teams warmed, and the Highlanders would move into the newly rebuilt Polo Grounds in 1913. Now playing on the Harlem River, a far cry from their high-altitude home, the name "Highlanders" no longer applied, and fell into disuse among the press. The media had also called the team the "Yankees" (a synonym for "Americans", the team being an American League franchise) for a number of years, so in 1913 the team became known exclusively as the New York Yankees.
By the mid 1910s, owners Farrell and Devery had become estranged and were both in dire need of money. At the start of 1915, they sold the team to Colonel Jacob Ruppert and Captain Tillinghast L'Hommedieu Huston. Ruppert inherited a brewery fortune, providing the Yankees with an owner who possessed deep pockets and a willingness to dig into them to produce a winning team. This would lead the team to more success and prestige than Ruppert could ever have envisioned.

Sluggers and the Stadium: the Ruth and Gehrig Era (1923-1935)
In the years around 1920, the Yankees, the Red Sox, and the Chicago White Sox had a detente. Their actions, which antagonized Ban Johnson garnered them the nickname the "Insurrectos". This detente paid off well for the Yankees as they enlarged the payroll. Most new players who would later contribute to the team's success came from the Red Sox, whose owner, Harry Frazee, was trading players to them for large sums of money. Other important newcomers in this period were manager Miller Huggins and general manager Ed Barrow. The hiring of Huggins by Ruppert would cause a break between the owners that eventually led to Ruppert buying Huston out in 1923. But pitcher-turned-outfielder Babe Ruth was the most talented of all the acquisitions from Boston. The outcome of the trade would haunt the Red Sox for the next 86 years. They would not win a World Series after 1918 until 2004, often finding themselves eliminated from the hunt as a result of the success of the Yankees. This phenomenon eventually became known as the Curse of the Bambino as the failure of the Red Sox and the success of the Yankees seemed almost supernatural, and all seemed to stem from that one trade.
Ruth's multitude of home runs proved so popular that the Yankees began drawing more people than their landlords, the Giants. In 1921, when the Yankees made their first World Serie appearance, which was against the Giants, the Yankees were told to move out of the Polo Grounds after the 1922 season. Giants manager John McGraw was said to have commented that the Yankees should "move to some out-of-the-way place, like Queens", but they instead broke ground for a new ballpark in the Bronx, right across the Harlem River from the Polo Grounds. In 1922, the Yankees returned to the World Series again, facing a second defeat at the hands of the Giants.
In 1923, the Yankees moved to their new home, Yankee Stadium. It was the first triple-deck venue in baseball and seated an astounding 58,000. In the first game at Yankee Stadium, Babe Ruth hit a home run, which was fitting as it was his home runs and drawing power that paid for the stadium, giving it its nickname "The House That Ruth Built". At the end of the year, the Yanks faced the Giants for the third straight year in the World Series, and finally triumphed for their first championship. Prior to that point, the Giants had been the city's iconic or dominant team. From 1923 onward, the Yankees would assume that role, and the Giants would eventually transfer out of the city.
The 1927 Yankees lineup was so potent that it become known as "Murderers' Row", and some consider the team to be the best in the history of baseball (though similar claims have been made for other Yankee squads, notably those of 1939, 1961 and 1998). The Yankees won an AL then-record 110 games with only 44 losses, and swept the Pittsburgh Pirates in the 1927 World Series. Ruth's home run total of 60 in 1927 set a single-season home run record that would stand for 34 years. Meanwhile, first baseman Lou Gehrig had his first big season, batting .373 with 47 round-trippers and 175 RBIs, beating Ruth's single-season RBI mark (171 in 1921). In the next three years, the Philadelphia Athletics would take the AL pennant and two world championships.
In 1931, Joe McCarthy came in as manager, and would bring the Yankees back to the top of the AL. They met the Chicago Cubs in the 1932 World Series, sweeping them and bringing the team's streak of consecutive World Series game wins to 12. This series was made famous by Babe Ruth's famous "Called Shot" in game three of the series at Wrigley Field. This would be a fitting "swan song" to his illustrious postseason career, as Ruth would leave the Yankees, going to the NL Boston Braves after 1934, and would never see the postseason again.

Joltin' Joe: the DiMaggio Era (1936-1951)
With Ruth retired, Gehrig finally had a chance to take center stage, but it was only one year before a new titan appeared: Joe DiMaggio. The team would win an unprecedented four World Series wins from 1936 to 1939. For most of 1939, however, they would have to do it without Gehrig, who was forced by amyotrophic lateral sclerosis to retire. The Yankees declared July 4, 1939 to be "Lou Gehrig Day", where they retired his number 4 (the first retired number in baseball), and which was made famous by Gehrig's speech, in which he declared himself "the luckiest man on the face of the earth".
Often described as the last year of the "Golden Era" before World War II and other realities intervened, 1941 was a thrilling year as America watched two major events unfold: Ted Williams of the Red Sox hunting for the elusive .400 batting average and Joe DiMaggio hitting in game, after game, after game. By the end of his hitting streak, DiMaggio had hit in 56 consecutive games, the current major league record.
Two months and one day after the Yankees beat the Brooklyn Dodgers in the 1941 World Series, the Pearl Harbor attacks occurred, and many of the best players, including DiMaggio himself, went off to serve in the military. The Yankees still managed to pull out a win against the St. Louis Cardinals in 1942. McCarthy was fired early in 1946, after a few slumping seasons, and after a few interim managers, Bucky Harris took the job, righting the ship and taking the Yankees to a hard fought series against the Dodgers.
Despite finishing only three games behind the first place Cleveland Indians in 1948, Harris was released in favor of Casey Stengel, who had a reputation of being a clown and managing bad teams. His tenure as Yankee field manager, however, was marked with success, and the "underdog" Yankees came from behind to catch and surprise the then powerful Red Sox on the last two days of the season, a face off that fueled the beginning of the modern Yankees-Red Sox rivalry. By this time, however, DiMaggio's career was winding down, and the "Yankee Clipper" retired after the 1951 season. This year also marked the arrival of the "Oklahoma Kid", Mickey Mantle, who was one of several new stars that would fill the gap.

Stengel's squad in the 1950s: the Stengel Era (1951-1959)
Bettering the clubs of the McCarthy era, the Yankees won the world series five consecutive times (1949-1953) under Stengel, which continues to be the major league record. Led by players like center fielder Mickey Mantle, pitcher Whitey Ford, and catcher Yogi Berra, Stengel's teams won 10 pennants and seven World Series titles in his twelve seasons as the Yankees manager. Casey Stengel was also a master at publicity for the team and for himself, even landing a cover story in Time magazine in 1955.
The team won over 100 games in 1954, but the Indians took the pennant with an AL record 111 wins. In 1955, the Dodgers finally beat the Yankees in the World Series, after five Series losses to the Yankees, but the Yankees came back strong the next year. On October 8 , 1956 in Game Five of the 1956 World Series against the Dodgers, pitcher Don Larsen threw the only perfect game in World Series history, which also remains the only no-hitter of any kind to be pitched in postseason play.
The Yankees lost the 1957 World Series to the Milwaukee Braves. Following the Series, the New York Giants and the Brooklyn Dodgers left for California, leaving the Yankees as New York's only team. In the 1958 World Series, the Yankees got their revenge against the Braves, and became the second team to win the Series after being down three games to one. For the decade, the Yankees won six World Series championships ('50, 51, '52, '53, '56, '58) and eight American League pennants (those six plus '55 and '57). Led by Mantle, Ford, Berra, Elston Howard (the Yankees' first African-American player), and the newly acquired Roger Maris, the Yankees entered the 1960's seeking to replicate the remarkable success of the 1950s.

The M&M Boys: the Mantle and Maris Era (1960-1964)
Arnold Johnson, owner of the Kansas City Athletics, former owner of the Stadium and longtime business associate of then-Yankees co-owners Del Webb and Dan Topping, had a "special relationship" with the Yankees. He would trade young players for cash and aging veterans. Invariably, these trades ended up being heavily tilted in the Yankees' favor, leading to accusations that the Athletics were little more than a Yankee farm team at the major league level. Ironically, Kansas City had been home to the Yankees' top farm team for almost 20 years before the Athletics moved there from Philadelphia in 1954. In 1960, Charles O. Finley purchased the A's, and put a cease to the trades. However, before this, the Yankees strengthened their supply of future prospects, including a young outfielder, Roger Maris. In 1960, Maris led the league in slugging percentage, RBIs, and extra base hits, finished second in home runs (one behind Mantle), and total bases, and won a Gold Glove and the American League MVP award.
The year 1961 would prove to be one of the most memorable in Yankee history. Throughout the summer, Mantle and Maris hit home runs at a fast pace, the media calling them the "M&M Boys". Ultimately, a severe hip infection forced Mantle to leave the lineup and drop out of the race. Maris continued, and on October 1, the last day of the season, hit home run number 61, surpassing Babe Ruth's single season home run record of 60. However, Commissioner Ford Frick (who, as it was discovered later, had ghostwritten for the Babe during his career) decreed that, since Maris had broken the record on the last day of a season that was eight games longer than the season Ruth hit his 60, two separate records would be kept. It would be 30 years before the dual record would be done away with, and Maris would hold the record alone until Mark McGwire broke it in 1998. Maris still holds the AL record.
The Yankees won the pennant with a 109-53 record and went on to defeat the Cincinnati Reds in the 1961 World Series. The team finished the year with a then record 240 home runs. In 1962, the sports scene in New York changed when the National League expanded to include a new team, the New York Mets of nearby Flushing, Queens. The Mets would lose a record 120 games while the Yankees would win the 1962 World Series, their tenth in the past sixteen years, defeating the San Francisco Giants in seven games.
The Yankees would reach the 1963 Fall Classic, but only to be swept by the Los Angeles Dodgers. After the season, Yogi Berra, who had just retired from playing, took over managerial duties. The aging Yankees returned the next year for a fifth straight world series, but were felled in seven games by the St. Louis Cardinals. It would be the last appearance for the Yanks in the World Series for over ten years.

New ownership and a steep decline: the CBS Era (1964-1972)
After the 1964 season, CBS purchased 80% of the Yankees from Topping and Webb for $11.2 million. With the new ownership, the team would begin to decline. In fact, the Yankees finished in the second division for the first time in 40 years in 1965. This was made worse by the introduction of the major league amateur draft that year, which meant that the Yankees could no longer sign any player they wanted. Webb sold his 10 percent stake to CBS before the year was out.
In 1966, the Yankees finished last in the AL for the first time since 1912. After they finished next-to-last in the 1967 season, the team's fortunes improved somewhat, but they would not become serious contenders again until 1974. Various reasons have been given for the decline, but the single biggest one was the Yankees' inability to replace their aging superstars with new ones, as they had done consistently in the previous five decades. Topping and Webb had owned the Yankees for 20 years, missing the World Series only five times and going 10-5 in the ones they did get to. By contrast, the CBS-owned teams never went to the World Series.
Also during this period the Yankees lost two of their signature broadcasters. The legendary "Voice of the Yankees", Mel Allen, was fired after the 1964 season, supposedly due to cost-cutting measures by long time broadcast sponsor Ballantine Beer. Two years later, Red Barber was let go. Some say this was because of his on-air mention of a paltry showing of 413 fans at then 67,000-seat Yankee Stadium during a game against the White Sox. Sports biographer David J. Halberstam also noted Barber's less-than-happy relationship with Joe Garagiola and even Phil Rizzuto, ex-major leaguers with whom he shared the booth.

Steinbrenner, Martin, Jackson, and Munson: the Bronx Zoo Era (1973-1981)
A group of investors, led by Cleveland-based shipbuilder George Steinbrenner, purchased the club from CBS on January 3, 1973 for $8.7 million. Mike Burke stayed on as president until he quit in April. Within a year, Steinbrenner bought out most of his other partners and became the team's principal owner, although Burke continued to hold a minority share into the 1980s.
One of Steinbrenner's major goals was to repair the Stadium, which had greatly deteriorated (along with the surrounding area) by the late 60's. CBS had suggested renovations, but the team would have to play elsewhere, and the Mets refused to open their home, Shea Stadium, to the Yankees. A new stadium in the Meadowlands, across town in New Jersey was also suggested. Finally, in mid-1972, Mayor John Lindsay stepped in. The city bought the Stadium, and began an extensive two-year renovation period. Since the city also owned Shea, the Mets had to allow the Yankees to play the two seasons out there. The renovations modernized the look of the stadium and reconfigured some of the seating.
After the 1974 season, Steinbrenner made a move that started the modern era of free agency, signing star pitcher James Augustus "Catfish" Hunter away from Oakland. Midway through the 1975 season, Steinbrenner made another move, hiring former second baseman Billy Martin as manager. With Martin as the helm, the Yankees reached the 1976 World Series, but were swept by the Cincinnati Reds, the famed "Big Red Machine".
Steinbrenner then added star Oakland outfielder Reggie Jackson to his roster. Jackson made a controversial comment during spring training, about the Yankee captain, catcher Thurman Munson, and he already had bad blood with Billy Martin, who had managed the Detroit Tigers and met Jackson in the 1972 postseason. Jackson, Martin, and Steinbrenner would repeatedly feud throughout Jackson's five-year contract. Martin was hired and fired by Steinbrenner five times over the next 13 years. This conflict, combined with the extremely rowdy Yankees fans of the late 1970s and the bad conditions of the Bronx, led to the organization and stadium being referred to as the "Bronx Zoo". Despite the turmoil, Jackson proved his worth in the 1977 World Series when he hit four home runs on four consecutive pitches from four different Dodgers' pitchers, three of them in the same game. Jackson's great performance in the postseason earned him the nickname "Mr. October".
Throughout the late 1970s, the race for the pennant often came to a close competition between the Yankees and the Red Sox. In the 1950s and early 1960s, the Yankees had been dominant while the Red Sox hadn't been a factor. In the late 1960s and early 1970s, the Yankees had been in last place while the Red Sox took charge. This was one of the first times that the two were contending and locked in a close fight, and every game between the two suddenly became important. The Yankees-Red Sox rivalry was at its helm, and was often bitter and ruthless, with brawls frequently erupting between players and fans.
On July 14, 1978, the Yankees were 14.5 games behind the Red Sox. Suddenly, the Yanks went on a winning streak, and by the time they met up for a pivotal four-game series at Fenway Park in early September, they were only four games out. The Yankees would sweep the Red Sox in what would become known as the "Boston Massacre", winning the games 15-3, 13-2, 7-0, and 7-4. The third game was a shutout pitched by "Louisiana Lightning" Ron Guidry, who would lead the majors with nine shutouts, 25 wins (only three losses), and a 1.74 ERA. Guidry also finished with 248 strikeouts, but Nolan Ryan's 260 strikeouts deprived Guidry of the pitching Triple Crown.
On the last day of the season, the two clubs finished in a tie for first place in the AL East. A one-game playoff (the 163rd game of the regular season) between the two teams was held to decide who would go on to the playoffs, with the game being held at Boston's Fenway Park. With Guidry matched up against former Yankee Mike Torrez, the Red Sox took an early 2-0 lead. In the seventh inning, the Yankees drove a stake through the hearts of their rivals' fans when Bucky Dent drove a three-run home run over the "Green Monster" (Fenway Park's famed left field wall), putting the Yankees up 3-2. Reggie Jackson's solo home run in the following inning would seal the eventual 5-4 win that gave the Yankees their 100th win of the season and their third straight AL East title; it also gave Guidry his 25th win. (The outcome of this game, for Red Sox fans, was one of several emotional moments in their team's history that had their fans wondering if the Red Sox were under some kind of Yankee curse.)
After beating the Kansas City Royals for the third consecutive year in the 1978 ALCS, the Yankees faced the Dodgers again in the World Series. They lost the first two games on the West Coast, but then came home to win all three games at Yankee Stadium. The team then would wrap up their 22nd World Championship in Game Six back in Los Angeles.
The 1970s would end on a tragic note for the Yankees. Munson, a devoted family man, attained a pilot's license and a private plane so that he could fly home on off days. On August 2, 1979, Munson was doing some test flights of his plane and crashed, dying from his injuries. Four days later, the entire team flew out to Canton, Ohio for the funeral, despite having a game later that day against the Orioles. Martin adamantly stated that the funeral was more important, and that he didn't care if they made it back in time, but they did return in time to play. It was a nationally televised game, and the emotional contest was highlighted by Bobby Murcer, a close friend of Munson's who was one the Yankees chose to give a eulogy that morning at the funeral. He used Munson's bat (which he gave to his fallen friend's wife after the game), and drove in all five of the team's runs in a dramatic 5-4 victory.
Before the game, Munson's locker sat empty except for his catching gear, a sad reminder for his teammates. His locker, labeled with his number 15, stands empty in the Yankee clubhouse to this day as a memorial. The number 15 has also been retired by the team.

The Mattingly Era (1982-1995)
Following the team's loss to the Dodgers in the 1981 World Series, the Yankees would go into their longest absence from the playoffs since 1921.
The Yankees of the 1980s, led by their All-Star first baseman Don Mattingly, had the most total wins of any major league team but failed to win a World Series (the first such team since the 1910s). They consistently had powerful offensive teams: Mattingly at various times was teammate to Dave Winfield, Rickey Henderson, Mike Pagliarulo, Steve Sax and Jesse Barfield, but the starting pitching rarely matched the team's performance at the plate. After posting a 22-6 record in 1985, arm problems caught up with Ron Guidry, and his career went into a steep decline in the next three years. Dennis Rasmussen, who won 18 games in 1986, could never match the feat. Rick Rhoden, acquired from the Pittsburgh Pirates in 1987, won 16 games that year but went only 14-14 in 1988.
The team came close to winning the AL East in 1985 and 1986, finishing second to the Toronto Blue Jays and Boston Red Sox respectively, but fell to fourth place in 1987 and fifth in 1988, despite having mid-season leads in the AL East standings both years.
By the end of the decade, the Yankees' offense was also on the decline. Henderson and Pagliarulo had departed by the middle of 1989, while back problems caught up with both Winfield (who missed the entire '89 season) and Mattingly (who missed almost the entire second half of 1990). Winfield's tenure with the team ended when he was dealt to the California Angels in May 1990 for Mike Witt. From 1989 to 1992, the team had a losing record, having spent large amounts of money on free-agent players and draft picks that did not meet up to expectations. In 1990, the Yankees had the worst record in Major League Baseball, and their first last-place finish since 1966.
On July 1, 1990, pitcher Andy Hawkins became the first Yankee ever to lose a no-hitter. Third baseman Mike Blowers committed an error, followed by two walks and an error by the left fielder Jim Leyritz with the bases loaded, scoring all three runners and the batter. The 4-0 loss to the Chicago White Sox was the largest margin of any no-hitter loss in the 20th century. Ironically, the Yankees (and Hawkins) were again no-hit for six innings in a rain-shortened game against the White Sox eleven days later.
The poor showing in the 1980s and 1990s would soon start to change as Steinbrenner hired Howard Spira to uncover damaging information on Winfield; Steinbrenner was suspended from day-to-day team operations by then-Commissioner Fay Vincent when the plot was revealed. This allowed management to implement a coherent acquisition/development program without interference. General managers Gene and Bob Watson, along with manager Buck Showalter, shifted the club's emphasis from buying talent to developing talent through the farm system, and then holding on to it. This new system brought up key players such as Bernie Williams, Derek Jeter, Jorge Posada, Andy Pettitte and Mariano Rivera, who might have been traded away early for big-name talent had Steinbrenner remained in charge. The first significant success came in 1994, when the Yankees had the best record in the AL. However, the season was cut short by the 1994 baseball strike, and there were no playoffs. A year later, they made it to the playoffs in the new wild card slot, and were eliminated only after a memorable 1995 American League Division Series against the Seattle Mariners where the Yankees won the first two games at home and dropped the next three in Seattle.
Mattingly, suffering greatly from his back injury, retired after the 1995 season. He had the unfortunate distinction of beginning and ending his career on years bracketed by Yankee World Series appearances (1981 and 1996).

A new dynasty: the Torre, Jeter, and Rivera Era (1996-2000)
After the Yankees fell to the Mariners, Steinbrenner replaced Showalter with Joe Torre, who brought in Don Zimmer as bench coach and former Yankees pitching star Mel Stottlemyre as pitching coach. One of Showalter's coaches, popular former Yankees second baseman Willie Randolph, was retained by Torre as a third-base coach. Torre had a mediocre run as a manager in the National League, and the choice was initially derided ("Clueless Joe" ran the headline on the New York Post). However, his smooth manner proved to be what the team needed, and his tenure would prove to be, by far, the longest under Steinbrenner's ownership.
The Yankees not only made it to the 1996 playoffs, but they went 8-0 on the road. Following a win in the ALCS against the Baltimore Orioles (which included an instance of fan interference by young Jeffrey Maier, which was called a home run for the Yankees), the team went to the World Series against the Atlanta Braves. Despite losing the first two games at home by a combined score of 16-1, they won in six games and ended the team's 18-year championship drought. Homegrown shortstop Derek Jeter was named Rookie of the Year, an auspicious start to his career with the Yankees. After their first World Series win since 1978, the Yankees signed lefties David Wells and Mike Stanton to improve the pitching staff. They also allowed closer (and Series MVP) John Wetteland to leave as a free agent. The empty spot was filled with Wetteland's setup man, Mariano Rivera.
In 1997, the team made it to the playoffs again, but lost in the 1997 ALDS to the Cleveland Indians. Watson was fired as GM, and was replaced by Brian Cashman, a former Yankee intern. Cashman made many key acquisitions to improve the team, including third baseman Scott Brosius, second baseman and leadoff man Chuck Knoblauch, outfielder Darryl Strawberry and starting pitcher Orlando "El Duque" Hernandez.
The 1998 Yankees are widely acknowledged to be one of the greatest teams in baseball history, compiling a then-AL record 114 regular season wins against just 48 losses and then sweeping the San Diego Padres in the 1998 World Series. They went 11-2 in the playoffs for a combined record of 125-50. Their 125 wins is a major league record, though their AL regular season record was surpassed by the 2001 Seattle Mariners, who went 116-46. On top of all this, on May 17, 1998 David Wells, who would later claim to have been hungover that day, pitched a perfect game against the Minnesota Twins at Yankee Stadium. After the 1998 season, Wells would be traded to the Toronto Blue Jays for Roger Clemens, who had just completed two consecutive Cy Young Award and pitching triple crown seasons.
A little over a year later, on July 18, 1999, which was "Yogi Berra Day" at the Stadium, David Cone pitched a perfect game against the Montréal Expos. Coincidentally, Don Larsen, who pitched the perfect game in the 1956 World Series, was in attendance and had thrown out the ceremonial first pitch to Berra, his catcher for that storied game. Another coincidence is that Larsen and Wells both attended Point Loma High School in San , California.
After winning the Eastern division that year, and defeating the Texas Rangers for the third time in the ALDS, the Yankees met up with their longtime rivals, the Boston Red Sox in the ALCS, the first meeting of the two in a true post-season series. Clemens, a former Red Sox star pitcher, pitched in the third game against new pitching star Pedro Martinez, who was the year's winner of the Cy Young Award and pitching triple crown. The greatly hyped matchup was billed "Cy Young vs Cy Old" by Red Sox fans. The Sox would blast Clemens 13-1, but it was the only win they had, as they lost the series in five games. the Yankees would go on to win the 1999 World Series, Clemens winning the clinching fourth game in the Bronx. This gave the 1998-1999 Yankees a 22-3 record (including four series sweeps) in six consecutive post-season series.
In 2000, the Yankees battled through the post-season, winning the ALDS against the Oakland A's after the full five games, and beating the Mariners in the sixth game of the ALCS. This led to a much anticipated meeting with crosstown rivals and National League Champions, the New York Mets, in the first Subway Series championship since 1956. The Yankees won the first two, but a Mets win in the third game snapped their streak of World Series wins at 14 (from 1996-2000). This beat the club's previous record of 12 (in 1927, 1928, and 1932). A run scored by the Mets off of Rivera snapped his string of 34⅓ consecutive scoreless innings in the playoffs, which broke Whitey Ford's streak, a record he took from Ruth. The team would go on to win the fourth game and then, in the fifth game, Mets star catcher Mike Piazza would hit a long fly ball to deep center in the bottom of the ninth, which would just miss leaving Shea, instead landing in Bernie Williams's glove and completing the Yankees' threepeat. During this feat, the total post-season record was 33-8. The Yankees are the most recent major league team to repeat as World Series champions and after the 2000 season they joined the Yankee teams of 1936-1939 and 1949-1953, as well as the 1972-1974 Oakland Athletics as the only teams to win at least three consecutive World Series.

Falling just short: the Torre, Jeter, Rivera, and A-Rod Era (2001-2007)
The next seven years were marked by successful regular seasons and playoff appearances, but the Yankees were unable to win any championships.
In the emotional times of October 2001 in New York City, following the September 11 attack on New York's World Trade Center, the Yankees defeated the Oakland A's three games to two in the ALDS, and then the Seattle Mariners, who had won 116 games, four games to one in the ALCS. By winning the pennant for a fourth straight year, the 1998-2001 Yankees joined the 1921-1924 New York Giants, and the Yankee teams of '36-'39, '49-'53, '55-'58 and '60-'64 as the only dynasties to reach at least four straight pennants. The Yankees had now won eleven consecutive postseason series in consecutive years. However, the Yankees lost the World Series to the Arizona Diamondbacks in seven games, when Yankee star closer Mariano Rivera uncharacteristically lost the lead - and the Series - in the bottom of the ninth inning of the final game.
After the 2001 season, the Yankees lost 4 key members of their championship teams, Paul O'Neill, Scott Brosius, Tino Martinez and Chuck Knoblauch. But the Yankees still finished the 2002 season with an AL best record of 103-58, winning the division by 10.5 games over the Red Sox. The season was highlighted by Alfonso Soriano becoming the first second baseman ever to hit 30 home runs and steal 30 bases in a season, as well as newly acquired first baseman Jaso Giambi's 41 home runs, including a walkoff grand slam with the Yankees down by 3 runs in the 14th inning to the Minnesota Twins. In the ALDS, the Yankees lost to the Anaheim Angels in four games.
In 2003, the Yankees once again had the best league record (101-61), highlighted by Roger Clemens winning his 300th game and reaching 4000 strikeouts, joining Nolan Ryan and Steve Carlton as the only pitchers with more than 4000 strikeouts. They easily defeated the Minnesota Twins in the ALDS, three games to one. In the ALCS, they defeated their rival Boston Red Sox in a dramatic seven game series, which featured a bench-clearing brawl in Game Three and a series-ending walk-off home run by Aaron Boone in the bottom of the 11th inning of game seven. In the 2003 World Series the Yankees were heavily favored against the surprising wild-card winning Florida Marlins. However, the series would turn out to be very similar to the 2001 series against Arizona, as Marlins' pitching shut down the Yankees offense and took the series in six games.
After the 2003 season, the Yankees added two all-star sluggers, Gary Sheffield and Alex Rodriguez, with Rodriguez moving to third base with Jeter entrenched at shortstop. Throughout 2004, however, the Yankees' weakness was their starting pitching, but despite this, they managed to win over 100 games for the third straight year. In the ALDS, the Yankees once again met and defeated the Twins three games to one. In the ALCS, the Yankees met their rival Boston Red Sox again, and became the first team in professional baseball history, and only the third team in North American pro sports history, to lose a best-of-seven series after taking a 3-0 series lead.
In 2005 the Yankees spent most of the season chasing the Red Sox for the division title, but finally clinched the division in the second-to-last game of the season against the Red Sox. Alex Rodriguez won the American League MVP award, becoming the first Yankee to win the award since Don Mattingly in 1985. Giambi was named Comeback Player of the Year, as voted by fans. Another highlight of the season was the record-setting pitching by journeyman Aaron Small, who became just the fourth pitcher in history to win at least ten games without a loss. In the ALDS, the Angels defeated the Yankees in five games in the first round of the postseason, marking the second time in four years that the Angels beat the Yankees in the first round.
In the 2005-06 offseason, general manager Brian Cashman was given more control of the direction of the Yankees, and the Yankees signed center fielder Johnny Damon from the archrival Red Sox. The Yankees again chased the Red Sox through the first four months of 2006, but on August 18 the Yankees entered Fenway Park for a five game series with a 1.5 game lead. The series opened up with a doubleheader that the Yankees swept 12-4 and 14-11, echoing the Boston Massacre of 1978, and prompting the Boston Globe's Dan Shaughnessy to dub the doubleheader sweep the "Son of Massacre". The Yankees went on to sweep all five games (calling the series the "Second Boston Massacre", outscoring the Red Sox 49-26, and the Red Sox never recovered, eventually finishing 3rd in the division.
The division win was the ninth consecutive AL East title for the Yankees. When the New York Mets won their division (snapping the Atlanta Braves' eleven-year stranglehold on the NL East), it marked the first time ever that both New York teams won their respective divisions in the same year. Their 97-65 record tied the Mets for the best record of the year, giving New Yorkers hopes for another Subway Series. However, the Yankees lost to the Detroit Tigers in four games in the ALDS, while the Mets lost the NLCS to the St. Louis Cardinals in seven games.
On October 11, 2006, days after the ALDS was over, tragedy struck when pitcher Cory Lidle died when his plane crashed into a highrise apartment building in Manhattan. Lidle was the second active Yankee to be killed in a crash of his own private plane, following Thurman Munson's death in 1979.
During the 2006-2007 off-season, the Yankees traded away Gary Sheffield and Randy Johnson, did not re-sign longtime outfielder Bernie Williams, and signed former Yankee Andy Pettitte.
The start of the 2007 season was highlighted by Alex Rodriguez setting or tying AL and/or MLB records for most home runs in his team's first 14 games, 15 games, and 18 games, finally setting the AL record and tying Albert Pujols for the MLB record for most home runs, 14, in the month of April. But pitching problems hurt early on, "highlighted" by the Yankees using five or more pitchers in 10 consecutive games to end the month of April, the longest such streak in the majors in the past 50 years. On May 7, the Yankees set another undesirable pitching record by being the first team in MLB history to use 10 different starting pitchers in its first 30 games, and ultimately the Yankees set an AL record by making over 500 pitching changes during the season. The pitching problems led to the signing of Roger Clemens for close to $18 million for the last 4 months of the season. On May 29, the Yankees were 14.5 games behind the Boston Red Sox in the American League East, and were also 8.5 games out of the wild card spot.
On June 18, 2007 the Yankees broke new ground by bringing the first two professional baseball players from the People's Republic of China to the MLB, and also became the first team in MLB history to sign an advertising deal with a Chinese company.
Although failing to be above .500 going into the All-Star break for the first time since 1995, the Yankees were the hottest team in the majors the second half of the year, and on September 26 they clinched a Wild Card spot in the ALDS. However, although they cut the lead to 1.5 games in late September, they were unable to catch the Red Sox for the AL East title, breaking their streak of nine straight AL East division titles. Highlights of the season included Alex Rodriguez hitting his 500th home run at Yankee Stadium, being the first player to hit his 500th at Yankee Stadium since Mickey Mantle and the youngest player to have ever reached that mark, and winning the MVP. Also, Derek Jeter hit for his 6th consecutive 200-hit season, a feat matched in Yankee history only by Lou Gehrig.
In the 2007 ALDS against the Cleveland Indians, the Yankees lost Game 1 as the Indians pounded 19-game winner Chien-Ming Wang. In Game 2, Andy Pettitte dominated the Indians, until the 8th inning when Joba Chamberlain was bothered by an infestation of mayflies and lost the lead, and the Yankees eventually lost the game in extra innings. In Game 3 the Yankees rallied from a 3-1 deficit to win. However, in Game 4 the Indians won the series by defeating the Yankees, 6-4, with Wang again pitching poorly.

**WIKIPEDIA.ORG