When Joe Girardi reflects on the Yankees’ 2009 World Series title, a specific image comes to mind.
Amid the mayhem that followed the final out of their series-clinching Game 6 win, third baseman Alex Rodriguez and first baseman Mark Teixeira darted across the Yankee Stadium diamond and found each other for a frenzied embrace as their teammates mobbed the mound.
“Those guys had been great players,” Girardi, the Yankees’ manager at the time, recalled to the Daily News, “and they hadn’t had a chance to do that.”
The 2009 title remains the most recent of the 27 championships won by the Yankees, who seek to end that 15-year drought in the 2024 World Series against the Dodgers, beginning Friday night in Los Angeles.
That victory immortalized Rodriguez and Teixeira in Yankees lore, adding them to the exclusive fraternity of players who won rings in pinstripes.
It’s a star-studded club that also includes Babe Ruth, Lou Gehrig, Joe DiMaggio, Yogi Berra, Mickey Mantle, Reggie Jackson, Derek Jeter and Mariano Rivera, each of whom navigated the challenges of their respective eras to be crowned champions.
“When you get it, you’re part of forever,” said David Cone, a pitcher on four Yankees title teams from 1996-2000 and now an analyst on YES Network and ESPN.
“You’re gonna be called back 15 years from now, 25 years from now,” he told The News. “You’re gonna have celebrations for that championship team, and that’s hard to describe. I live that life now, and the further removed I get from any of those championships, the more thankful I am.”
Aaron Judge, Gerrit Cole, Juan Soto and Giancarlo Stanton hope to join that illustrious list this year. To do so, they will have to emerge victorious in the 12th-ever World Series meeting between the Yankees and Dodgers, who last faced each other in the Fall Classic in 1981.
That 1981 postseason capped an epic five-year run in which the Yankees played the Dodgers in three World Series.
Aiming to end their own 15-year title drought, that era’s Yankees signed the power-hitting Jackson to an unprecedented five-year, $3.5 million contract before the 1977 season.
Jackson immediately delivered, hitting five home runs in the 1977 World Series — including three in the decisive Game 6 — to lead the Yankees past the Dodgers and solidify his standing as baseball’s “Mr. October.”
“It was magical,” said Willie Randolph, the Yankees’ second baseman from 1976-88 before spending 1989 with the Dodgers.
“You never see a situation like that, where one guy rises to the occasion and does something as dramatic as he did,” Randolph told The News. “We kind of expected it because that’s Reggie, but when you’re living it, it’s just really surreal.”
The Yankees also defeated the Dodgers in the 1978 World Series, and Los Angeles returned the favor in 1981.
“The Dodgers had great players, man. Dusty Baker and Steve Garvey,” said Randolph, who missed the 1978 playoffs with a hamstring injury.
“We had the same kind of thing [as this year], star power on both sides. East Coast-West Coast. That’s what I remember about those teams. It’s different now, but back then, we didn’t like each other. I think that brings a certain element to it.”
Another 15 years passed before the Yankees returned to the World Series. Led by manager Joe Torre, the 1996 Yankees boasted a blend of battle-tested veterans including Cone, Girardi and Paul O’Neill and a fast-rising young core headlined by Jeter, Rivera and Andy Pettitte.
“We had a young Derek Jeter at shortstop that we didn’t know was a Hall of Famer yet,” Cone said. “We were just happy that we had somebody young and athletic that looked like he could be a leadoff hitter.”
The Yankees overcame a 2-0 deficit in the 1996 World Series to defeat the Braves in six games, ultimately outpitching an Atlanta rotation featuring future Hall of Famers in John Smoltz, Greg Maddux and Tom Glavine.
That kicked off the most recent dynasty for the Yankees, who won four championships in five years, including a 1998 World Series sweep of the Padres; a 1999 sweep in a rematch with the Braves; and a five-game victory over the Mets in the Subway Series.
“There’s no way to get around it: You’re gonna feel the intensity of every pitch,” said Cone, who went 2-0 with a 2.12 ERA in six World Series appearances. “The crowd lets you know if you walk a batter with two outs in the third inning. The crowd goes nuts. That’s not something you see in a regular-season game.”
“Everything is so magnified,” he said. “That’s the hardest thing to deal with as a pitcher, and that’s why I see a lot of guys get worn out a lot easier, because it’s not just about pitch counts. It’s about emotional energy.”
The Yankees returned to the World Series in 2001 and 2003 but lost in both, then fell short of the Fall Classic in each of the next five years, sometimes in excruciating fashion.
They made a managerial change after the 2007 season, replacing Torre with Girardi, who won championships as a Yankees catcher in 1996, 1998 and 1999.
After missing the postseason in 2008, the Yankees retooled with the franchise-altering free-agent signings of CC Sabathia, A.J. Burnett and Teixeira and a trade for Nick Swisher.
Each played prominent roles during the Yankees’ 2009 World Series run, as did Rodriguez, who shook off past postseason shortcomings to hit .365 with six home runs and 18 RBI in 15 playoff games that year.
“There were a lot of come-from-behind victories during the course of the season,” said Girardi, now a YES analyst who is part of the network’s 2024 World Series coverage, which includes 90-minute pregame and postgame shows for every game.
“It was a team that was really youthful even though it didn’t necessarily have a ton of youth. A.J. brought a lot of that. Swish and Melky [Cabrera]. I just remember how much the guys enjoyed being on the team together and how they worked so hard together. It was just an unbelievable year.”
In the 14 years that followed, the Yankees repeatedly came close to returning to the World Series, advancing to the ALCS in 2010, 2012, 2017, 2019 and 2022 but ultimately coming up short each time.
Leading the Yankees to their long-awaited 28th title this year won’t come easily for Judge, Cole, Soto and Stanton, as an MLB-best Dodgers team headlined by Shohei Ohtani, Mookie Betts and Freddie Freeman stands in their way.
But, as former Yankee champions can attest, doing so would be life-changing.
“You realize you’re part of something bigger,” Cone said. “When you understand that concept, you realize that it will never be forgotten.”
