The Myth Becomes a Manager

Nobody ever accused the New York Yankees of having a sense of humor--until last week. Or maybe it was a sense of destiny. They had won their 28th American League pennant by 10 1/2 games, but New York fans merely yawned--the impossible Mets had drawn almost as many people. Then the Yankees got shut out 4-0 in the World Series, and everybody cheered. There was only one thing to do. Last week the staid old Yankees took a deep breath and signed Yogi Berra as their manager.

It was the first time in baseball history that a myth became a manager--although the Berra myth was mostly fact. Over 18 seasons with the Yankees, he batted .285, hit 358 home runs, set World Series records for hits (71) and R.B.I.s (39). He played in more games (2,116) than any Yankee except Lou Gehrig, and he was the most dangerous clutch hitter in baseball. "Anything I can reach, I can hit," he boasted, and he is probably the only player who got shoe polish on his bat from golfing one over the fence. He won three Most Valuable Player awards (nobody has won more), and saw his salary climb to $55,000, highest ever for a catcher. But manager of the Yankees? That was like putting Harpo Marx in the White House, only funnier.

Pinned Together. Yogi was born Lawrence Peter Berra 38 years and a million laughs ago. He grew up in St. Louis, in what was then unselfconsciously known as the "Dago Hill" section. He never got through the ninth grade. When people asked him how he liked school, he replied, "Closed." Yankee scouts found him on the sandlots, and the first time he showed up for spring training, the veterans just stared. He had a frame like a fire hydrant and a face like a fallen souffle, and when he walked, he looked as if his trousers were pinned together at the knees. He could hit and catch all right. But somehow everything he did or said turned up funny.

He trundled out to bat with his shin guards still on, showed up behind the plate without his catcher's mask. He once hit a pitcher on the chest with a throw to second base; another time he beaned the second-base umpire, and one day he caught a fly ball with his forehead. His face creased in concentration, Yogi was always the first Yankee to report for work. "I know I'm going to take the wrong subway, so I leave an hour early."

He read comic books in the dugout ("I like the ones about crooks best"), once turned down an invitation to dinner at a famous restaurant with the comment: "Nobody goes there any more. It's too crowded." On a trip to Italy in 1961, Yogi took in Tosca at La Scala. "It was pretty good," he said. "Even the music was nice." And who can ever forget Lawrence Berra Night in his home town of St. Louis? Yogi stepped up to the microphone and announced: "I want to thank all the baseball fans and everyone else who made this night necessary."

Sportswriters called him "the ballplayer Ring Lardner missed," and when Yogi was beaned in Detroit, the papers reported: "Xray pictures of Berra's head showed nothing." Rival players hung by one hand from the dugout roof when he came to bat, scratching their armpits with the other. "Hey, Yog," they yelled. "You still sleeping in trees?" One opposing catcher used to watch Yogi step into the batting cage, then bellow: "Quick, men! Shut the gate! You got him." TV even got into the act with a "Yogi Bear" cartoon series about an animal that walks like a man.

No Kidding. Ah, but Yogi was smarter than the average bear. While he was getting yuks, Yankee pitchers were getting the sign and the team was winning pennants--ten under Casey Stengel, three straight under laconic Ralph Houk. For fun and profit, Yogi built a bowling alley in Clifton, N.J., became a vice president of something called Yoo-Hoo chocolate drink, and prospered to the point that he could claim to be "half a millionaire." Stengel liked to call him "Mr. Berra, my assistant manager," and Houk promoted him to player-coach this year. No one could figure out if they were kidding. Asked about his coaching talents, Mickey Mantle cracked: "Yogi helps most when he keeps out of the way."

But the Yankee front office never kids. Owners Dan Topping and Del Webb started thinking about Berra a year ago, right after the 1962 World Series. General Manager Roy Hamey wanted to retire, Ralph Houk looked like the right man for that job, and with Yogi taking over on the field the Yankees could at least expect a rise in attendance. Even if they lost, Yogi was sure to tickle the turnstiles. For once, Berra was speechless. He kept mum about it all year long, just standing there in the first-base coach's box "observing," as he put it, "by watching." A couple of other clubs--the Boston Red Sox and the Baltimore Orioles-had ideas about Berra, too. The Yankees politely told them to relax.

As manager, Yogi will take a pay cut of perhaps $10,000 ("We'll make do," says his wife), and the mantle of dignity rests a bit awkwardly on his bulky shoulders. Last week he chuckled happily over congratulatory telegrams, including one from Mantle and Pitcher Whitey Ford: WE WOULD LIKE OUR UNCONDITIONAL RELEASE TO BECOME PROFESSIONAL GOLFERS.

Suave in a dark business suit, Yogi signed his one-year contract, sweated through his first press conference ("Maybe I shoulda stayed a player"), and then raced home to Montclair, N.J., to report the day's big doings to his family. "You," asked Lawrence Peter Berra Jr., 13, "a manager?"

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