A wonderful life: Berra’s family, Yankees honor Yogi

I’ll tell you about optimism: Most of us who played baseball at Wasmer Elementary thought we had at least an outside chance to make the majors – the big leagues.

In the midst of their first West Coast swing on a spring training tour against Pacific Coast League clubs, the Yankees drew sellouts against the Hollywood Stars, Oakland Oaks, San Francisco Seals and Solons.

“It ain’t over “til it’s over” is among eight ‘Yogi-isms” included in Bartlett’s.

And then the agent comes along and he says we’ve got to build our brand. His on-the-field career, including his incredible World Series statistics, often receives more attention than his off-the-field influence, especially on the sports world. “He will truly be missed”.

“No! Say it ain’t so”. “It would be very special to get a win for him today”.

The famous chocolate drink gave us one of Yogi’s best ever one-liners.

Fans posed for pictures with the plaque and told stories about Berra.

It took a good 43 years to pass before I actually cornered him in person. The famous moment was captured in photographs published in newspapers around the world.

Coincidentally, when I began delivering the “round file” reports, the Yankees went on a winning spree, winning the pennant and then the World Series. Berra vowed never to return to Yankee Stadium as long as Steinbrenner owned the team.

But in 1999 Berra finally relented throwing out the ceremonial first pitch of the Yankees’ season-opening game.

Larsen played with Berra on the Yankees from 1955-59. He was a three-time MVP and 15-time All-Star who won the World Series 10 times as a player.

Growing up, he was anything but a natural.

Righetti’s first few years in New York, Berra was a coach. He simply had a way of reaching and relating to people that was unmatched. From then on, his career skyrocketed.

His breakthrough season came in 1948, when he hit.315 with 14 homers and 98 RBIs while improving his fielding. He led the American League in saves one year while pitching for the Blue Jays during Joe Carter’s day. In 1928, the same team basically walked into the World Series and swept the Cardinals in 4 games.

And so on. When ordering a pizza, Berra supposedly said he wanted it sliced into four pieces because he didn’t think he could eat six. Have you seen my wife, Mrs. Jones? This was led by Babe Ruth, with whom Huggins originally had a rocky start with, but soon became good friends.

Lawrence Peter Berra was born in St. Louis on May 12 1925 the son of Pietro a laborer in a brickyard and Pauline Berra. He grew up in “The Hill”, or Italian district, with three older brothers and a younger sister. Berra went on to support his family by playing baseball after he dropped out of eighth grade. He took jobs in a coal yard, as a truck driver and in a shoe factory. Amateur guitar player. Reluctant cook.

Berra, the colorful Yankees legend, died early Wednesday morning. Carmen died in 2014. Theirs was a genuine romance, in Yogi’s storybook tale. Yogi Berra, from whom the cartoon bear came. And he would step into the visiting manager’s office every time the Tigers were in New York.

Dale Berra was recalling that day during a news conference Thursday at the Yogi Berra Museum and Learning Center on the campus of Montclair State University. Probably just after the team changed its name to Astros from Colt.45s. Bill remembers talking with Yogi in 1998. I never corrected him because I’d no more have interrupted Yogi Berra than I’d have interrupted Casey Stengel.

He tickled TV viewers in recent years by bringing his malapropisms to a commercial with the AFLAC duck.

While Berra said he had quit doing cocaine in 1985, and never did it as a member of the Yankees, what happened to him in 1989 might call this into question. I know those numbers don’t seem like much now, but for a national league 3B/SS in 1982, it’s really not so bad.