RIP Mel Stottlemyre

Murderer's Crow

Dragon Wangler 216
SoSH Member
Jul 15, 2005
23,482
Garden City
Mel will be missed, can never forget his trots out to the mound and the companionship he always seemed to have with the players during those championship years.
 

bankshot1

Member
SoSH Member
Feb 12, 2003
24,661
where I was last at
I remember when Stottlemyre first came up in '64, and he was pretty good, and thinking, another Yankee star. Unfortunately for him he came up as the 60s Yankees got old and began a decade of suck, and he never achieved the acclaim he might have otherwise earned.

RIP Mel
 

Big John

New Member
Dec 9, 2016
2,086
Stottlemyre was a star in my mind. They would not have won the pennant without him in '64, and he went on to win 20 games three times for bad teams. Consummate professional.
 
Last edited:

terrynever

Well-Known Member
Lifetime Member
SoSH Member
Aug 25, 2005
21,717
pawtucket
Mel came up to the Yankees just in time to get Mantle and the aging stars into one last World Series. A young stud among a group of dying redwoods. He threw a heavy sinker. I remember that 1964 pennant race more than most because it was the last one for the Yankees for a decade. Stottlemyre was implacable as a rookie. Whitey Ford’s body gave out in Game 1 of the World Series. Stott beat Bob Gibson in Game 2, then matched up with Gibson in Game 5. He gave up two unearned runs in the sixth inning. Yanks lost 5-2 in 10 innings.
Stottlemyre got the ball again in Game 7. He and Gibby were both weary but the Cards hung on, 7-5. Stott pitched 3 huge World Series games as a rookie.
The Yankees wore Stottlemyre out over the next decade, until his shoulder finally gave out. He was a horse, and then a wonderful pitching coach for the Mets and Yankees. Two of his sons pitched in the big leagues but the youngest died of leukemia in 1981.
Of all the Yankees I have watched, Mel Stottlemyre was the most dignified. He carried himself with a quiet confidence, even as a rookie.
 
Last edited:

Pandarama

New Member
Aug 20, 2018
149
Seattle Times: Mel Stottlemyre was a great pitcher and coach, and a firm believer in doing the right thing

When I was working at the Yakima Herald-Republic in the early 1980s, I did a story on Harlond Clift, a former major-league star who in his old age was living a lonely life of near-poverty in a trailer home in Yakima.

It wasn’t until years later I found out that Mel Stottlemyre, another former major-league great abiding in Yakima, had been moved to action by that article. He took it upon himself to visit Clift (with his sons in tow) and help him out, starting a relationship that he maintained for years.

When I was covering Mel’s son, Todd, with the Oakland A’s in 1995, he told me that story. He said his dad simply felt an obligation to aid a fellow major-leaguer, a fellow product of the Yakima Valley – a fellow human being who had hit hard times.
 

ThePrideofShiner

Crests prematurely
SoSH Member
Jul 16, 2005
10,687
Washington
That article by Larry Stone was great.

I sent it to my dad, who sent me this story in return:

As a junior high basketball player from Zillah, I got off our school bus dressed and ready for our game in Mabton. My lifelong love for the Yankees began as a small child and I was struck with awe when I opened the gym door and saw our new sensational pitcher Mel Stottlemyre standing there in a referee shirt.

Our coach told us to leave him alone and not seek autographs, but while I sat out the second quarter (we could only play three so I had to sit one) I got a fan in the stands to give me a pencil. I found a scrap of paper on the floor and during a time out when my coach had his back to me, I got my prized autograph which I still have. I had to hid the paper until the game was over and then retrieve it and take it to the bus with me. Mel was a delight to watch pitch and I've followed his journey with interest. He was always a class act.