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| Birth Name(s) : Billy Martin |
Date of Birth: N/A |
| Status:
Single
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Full Billy Martin Biography
As Player
- New York Yankees (1950-1957)
- Kansas City Athletics (1957)
- Detroit Tigers (1958)
- Cleveland Indians (1959)
- Cincinnati Reds (1960)
- Milwaukee Braves (1961)
- Minnesota Twins (1961)
In the 1953 season, Martin had career highs in home runs (15), RBIs (75), doubles (24), triples (6), and times hit by pitch (6). He was the MVP of the 1953 World Series, as he batted .500 with a .958 slugging percentage. Martin was an All-Star in 1956. In 1958, Martin led the league in sacrifice hits, with 13.
After his 1957 trade to the Kansas City Athletics (see Altercations below), Martin's career declined, with several short stints with six different teams over the final 4½ years of his playing career: the Athletics, the Detroit Tigers, the Cleveland Indians, the Cincinnati Reds, the Milwaukee Braves and the Minnesota Twins.
Martin was well known for drinking to excess and for rowdy behavior when drinking. In 1957, a group of Yankees met at the famous Copacabana nightclub to celebrate Martin's 29th birthday; the party ultimately erupted into a much publicized brawl. A month later, General manager George Weiss—believing Martin's nightlife was a bad influence on teammates Whitey Ford and Mickey Mantle—exiled him to the Kansas City Athletics. Martin felt betrayed by manager Casey Stengel, with whom he had a strong father-son relationship, for failing to prevent the trade, and the two did not speak for years.
On August 4, 1960, Martin, then playing for the Cincinnati Reds, charged the mound in the second inning after receiving a brushback pitch from Chicago Cubs pitcher Jim Brewer. Martin threw his bat at Brewer, who picked up the bat and started to hand it to Martin as he approached. Martin punched Brewer in the right eye, breaking his cheekbone. Brewer was hospitalized for two months, and Martin served a five-day suspension. The Cubs sued Martin for $1 million for the loss of Brewer's services. While the Cubs dropped their case, Brewer pursued his, and in 1969, a judge ordered Martin to pay $10,000 in damages. When informed of the judgment by the press, Billy asked sarcastically, "How do they want it? Cash or check?"
Martin's fights as a player also included bouts with Jimmy Piersall, Clint Courtney (twice), Matt Batts and Tommy Lasorda.
Martin was hired Yankees' manager in 1975, and took the Yankees to the World Series in 1976 and 1977, winning in 1977. He feuded publicly with both Yankee owner George Steinbrenner and star outfielder Reggie Jackson. In one especially infamous incident, on June 18, 1977, in the middle game of what would prove to be a three-game series sweep by the Boston Red Sox at Fenway Park, Martin pulled Jackson off the field in mid-inning for failing to hustle on a ball hit to the outfield. The extremely angry and highly animated Martin had to be restrained by his coaches from getting into a fight with Jackson in the dugout during the the nationally-televised Saturday afternoon game.
In 1979, the Yankees got off to a slow start under Lemon. Injuries to Reggie Jackson and Goose Gossage as well as the tragic death of Thurman Munson mid-season had the Yankees reeling. Steinbrenner fired Lemon and brought back Martin earlier than previously planned. The Yankees failed to improve, however, and their streak of American League East division titles ended at three. After the 1979 season, Martin got into his now-infamous fight with marshmallow salesman Joseph Cooper at a hotel in Minneapolis. Steinbrenner fired him after that and replaced him with Dick Howser for the 1980 season.
Martin's sparring opponents as a manager also included two traveling secretaries (Minnesota's Howard Fox and Texas' Burt Hawkins) in a fight outside of Howard Wong's in Bloomington, Minnesota; Jack Sears, a fan outside Tiger Stadium; a Chicago cab driver who preferred soccer to baseball; sportswriter Ray Hagar, in a Reno casino; marshmallow salesman Joseph Cooper; two bar patrons, in Anaheim and in Baltimore; and two bouncers in an Arlington topless bar.
On the TV show "Bizarre," the turbulent Yankee manager situation was parodied by having press conferences every 10 minutes hiring or firing a fictitious Yankees manager named "Martin Billy Lemon" (combining the names of Yankee managers Bob Lemon and Billy Martin). Martin also appeared on the show in person as manager of the As, where the fictitious stunt man Super Dave Osborne (famous for his spectacular failures) did a stunt where he had to say a bunch of insults at Billy Martin and "deal" with Martin's violent reaction.
Martin was played by John Turturro in the 2007 ESPN mini-series The Bronx is Burning which follows the tumultuous summer of 1977 in New York.
Billy Martin was eulogized by John Cardinal O'Connor at St. Patrick's Cathedral, New York, before his funeral at Gate of Heaven Cemetery in Hawthorne, New York. His grave is located about 150 feet from the grave of Babe Ruth. The following epitaph by Billy Martin himself appears on the headstone: I may not have been the greatest Yankee to put on the uniform but I was the proudest. Former President of the United States Richard Nixon attended Martin's funeral. |
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