Curry makes case for ’98 Yankees as ‘greatest baseball team ever’

ALBANY, N.Y. — The 1998 New York Yankees truly exemplified the meaning of the word team. From one to 25 to winning 125, in one season, that club may have been the most complete and dominant in the history of baseball. To celebrate that team’s twenty-fifth anniversary, New York Times bestselling author and YES Network analyst Jack Curry has chronicled that squad with a book set for release on May 2, 2023, titled, “The 1998 Yankees.”

Curry, who covered the team for the New York Times, was gracious enough to talk about that magical season, what made that Yankee team the best ever, and why he decided to write the book.

“I’ve covered baseball for more than 30 years and when I think about the great players that I’ve covered and the great teams that I’ve covered, that team stands on the mountaintop. It’s the twenty-fifth anniversary. People love anniversaries. So, in talking with my editor we just said this is a perfect time to do a book about this team,” Curry remarked on what inspired him to pen the book.

“I had done books with Paul O’Neill and David Cone who were both on that team. So it almost seemed as if it was a perfect symmetry to go from a pitching book to a hitting book, to now a team book,” Curry continued.

“I was fascinated by that team then and going back and pretty much interviewing every player from that team, my fascination and my respect for that team grew even more just based on talking to guys again and recapping and reminiscing what happened that season,” Curry noted.

“From the first man to the 25th man on the roster, I don’t think there’s a team that had more talent and a team whose players knew their roles as well as our players did,” Cone, who won 20 games that season, noted on the depth, talent and selflessness of the team in the book.

With guys like Tim Raines, Darryl Strawberry, Chili Davis, Joe Girardi, and Luis Sojo coming off the bench, the players checked their egos at the door. The team endeared itself to fans with what Tino Martinez noted as a blue-collar, hard hat-wearing crew that had each other’s back’s in every game, including when Martinez was plunked in the back by Armando Benitez, resulting in a brawl with Baltimore at Yankee Stadium.

Curry echoed those sentiments and commented on how every puzzle piece seemingly fit that season.

“I think that’s a big part of it and I agree with Coney, he was there every day and he saw this team perform. I think whether it was Homer Bush or Bernie Williams or Mariano Rivera, everyone knew his role,” Curry concurred.

“The thing players said to me too was that they not only knew their role but their teammates had confidence in them performing their role, so that made them confident in themselves. I’ve covered a lot of teams where I don’t think players would say that as readily,” Curry added regarding the team chemistry.

Curry also pointed out some of the superb stats which made that team stand out.

“It wasn’t just that they knew their role or the roster construction. I point out a lot of numbers in the book and a lot of stats that back up how good this team was. No one’s ever won 125 games. They’ve got a top-five winning percentage. They led the major leagues in runs scored. They led the American League in fewest runs allowed. Every starter had an on-base percentage of .350,” Curry detailed.

“I just think the dominance was there. I just think they went out to dominate you every day,” Curry added.

In the book, Curry described a team that would grind, was relentless, and wanted to beat you not only each game but every inning. They were a competitive bunch on the field and also in the clubhouse with Derek Jeter and Scott Brosius squaring off in games of Connect Four.

Curry also spoke about the accountability with that team on a mission.

“Jeter said they wanted to pummel teams, they wanted to win every inning. I’ve never had another player say that. I thought that really stood out to me. I think what we saw in this team is that if Paul O’Neill was in the batting cage working and David Cone was talking to El Duque about pitches, is if you’re ‘player x’ you might say to yourself, well I should be doing something too. I think these guys made each other better. I think they had a mentality of winning every day,” Curry said.

“In baseball, you can lose 60 games in baseball and you’re great. You can go 102-60. These guys had a mission to be way better than that and if they didn’t stumble in September, they would’ve won more than 114 games. They might’ve won 120 because they had a stretch in September where they were 9-11,” Curry continued.

‘”They were just a team for the ages. They really were a team who understood what it was and went out there with a very disciplined but also a dominant way to just destroy teams,” Curry added regarding the methodical way that squad could beat you.

From the outset of the book, Jeter didn’t mince words in his assessment of the team as the greatest team ever.

“So, for selfish reasons, I say it’s the greatest team,” Jeter said. “I would put it up there against any team in history. And I would like our chances.

Curry also commented on Jeter’s straightforward answer.

“A little bit surprised because Jeter was so guarded during his career but I also wasn’t surprised because I know from talking to Jeter over the years how proud he is of that team and of his career. You saw Jeter’s documentary in his retirement he’s become a little more open about reviewing his career. In 1998, I don’t think Jeter would’ve been that open in saying that but Jeter also says which I agree with that it’s probably impossible to say this team was the best team ever but listen [sports fans] argue about everything, we argue about LeBron versus Michael Jordan, we argue about who’s the best pitcher in Major League Baseball, so why not argue about who’s the best team of all-time?” Curry opined.

Curry further made his case for what makes the 1998 Yankees the greatest team ever.

“I feel like I’ve backed up this Yankee argument with facts but I also have other people chiming in. John Thorn, MLB’s official historian, he thinks the Yankees are the best of all time. I think it’s a fun debate to have and if there’s somebody out there who wants to buy the book and they think that their favorite team is the best team of all time, that’s great, we can have a debate about it but I felt strongly about this team and that’s why I wrote the book,” Curry said.

“So where did they not dominate?” Thorn said in the book. “You could have played that Yankees team against the American League All-Stars in a seven-game series and the Yankees would have won.”

High praise indeed.

Curry additionally detailed his criteria for singling out this World Series-winning club as the best of them all.

“In the book, I pointed out in my estimation if you’re picking out the greatest team of all time, we’re talking about one season. We’re not talking about the A’s of ’72, ’73, ’74, or The Big Red Machine of ’75-’76, or the Yankees of ’98-’99-’00. It’s one season,” Curry explained.

He also described how the team was so methodical and machine-like that they were nearly overshadowed by a home run race by Mark McGwire and Sammy Sosa.

“I wouldn’t say underrated but you brought up something that was very interesting, I would say that in the ’98 season I think they were so successful and so machine-like with their success that they were overlooked. And you brought up the reason why, McGwire and Sosa,” Curry remarked.

“It was a great baseball story at that moment everyone thought it was this wholesome, cordial battle between two guys trying to knock down the record and I actually as a national baseball writer for the Times, I was in the ballpark for when McGwire hit his sixty-second in St. Louis. So, the Yankees did not get anywhere near the amount of media attention that McGwire and Sosa did because it was a compelling, fascinating race, whereas the Yankees were just beating up on teams every day,” Curry continued.

“Jeter has a funny line in the book where he says we pretty much had the division wrapped up in April. They did feel like they were just a team on a mission. At one point they won 64 out of 80 games, that’s an .800 winning percentage, that’s just insane,” Curry added regarding the team’s dominance.

For all of their success, Curry also noted how the 1998 season was to quote Bob Marley, a “Redemption Song,” of sorts for the team and individual players. Rivera rebounded from yielding a late homer to Sandy Alomar Jr. in the 1997 ALDS, as did Williams after recording the final out of that series. Newly minted general manager Brian Cashman survived a hounding from owner George Steinbrenner following 0-3 and 1-4 starts.

David Wells went from getting rocked in Texas, arguing with manager Joe Torre, and boozing with Jimmy Fallon to tossing a perfect game against Minnesota, and finding comfort traveling on the road with Cone. Chuck Knoblauch from letting the ball roll away in the 1998 ALCS to homering in the World Series. Martinez bounced back from a subpar 1996 World Series to belting a grand slam in the 1998 Fall Classic. Strawberry proved he could still hammer the ball with 24 homers, after dealing with addiction and the team rallied for him in his bout with colon cancer.

Brosius went from a subpar 1997 with the Oakland Athletics, to being a player to be named later in a salary dump trade for Kenny Rogers, to having his agent tell him the news by serenading him with “New York-New York” to winning World Series MVP. After being banned from pitching by dictator Fidel Castro in Cuba, Orlando “El Duque” Hernandez proved how he could pitch on a big stage and got a perfect season back on track in Game 4 of the ALCS. Toiling in the minors for years, Shane Spencer and Ricky Ledee made their marks in September and October.

“I think when you’re trying to tell the story of a team, if a team is great or extraordinary, they’ve usually had some contributors that you didn’t expect and you just hit upon a few of them. If you asked the Yankees in spring training, who will Brosius, El Duque, and Shane Spencer be, you had a guy who just hit .200 in Oakland, you had a pitcher coming over from Cuba who was still a bit of a mystery to them and you had a career minor leaguer and then look at seasons that they had. The Yankees don’t win without those three guys having the seasons that they had,” Curry remarked on the importance of having so many players step up and make contributions.

Asked if he believes the 1998 Yankees still stand up not only to other teams of the past but also to the modern game, Curry gave a resounding yes.

“Yes, I think that their accomplishment grows. I think their accomplishment has gotten greater because we’ve seen how hard it is to do what they did. The Yankees won 125 games, obviously, expanded playoffs had something to do with that but no one’s come close to that since then and there’ve been dozens of teams who’ve had the opportunity. So, I absolutely believe that their accomplishment has grown in stature across these last 25 years,” Curry added regarding why he feels so strongly about the 1998 Yankees as the greatest baseball team ever.