Former New York Yankees All-Star Gil McDougald dies at 82 - ESPN New York

Former New York Yankees All-Star Gil McDougald dies at 82

After looking at his baseball cards for years, I actually got to see this guy regularly when I was a college senior at Fordham. He was our new baseball coach that year.

The saddest thing about history's image of Gil is that he is most often recalled because of something negative. He hit the line drive that nearly killed Herb Score. Gil was shaken by that incident, and went to the hospital immediately after the game.

People forget that he was, in his jack-of-all-trades way, nearly as good a defensive player as Bill Mazeroski or Ozzie Smith, except that his career was quite short and he never settled into a single position. Bill James has noted that defensive statistics must have some relevance, because the good numbers followed Gil no matter which position he played. Although he played second base in the minors, he was the starting third baseman for the 1953 Yankees because that's where he was needed (Billy Martin was the same age as Gil, and also played second.) Gil became the regular second baseman in 1955 because Martin was injured and a promising youngster named Andy Carey was learning to play third. He gave up second and moved to short in 1956 to accomodate Martin's return. When Martin was shipped off to KC in 1957, Stengel wanted to play a very young Bobby Richardson at second, so Gil started at short. He then moved back to second in 1958 to allow a very young Tony Kubek to play short. When all the kids were ready to start in 1959, Gil became the utility guy for a couple of years. He was that guy. The guy that every great team needs.

Bottom line: in ten years in the majors he played in eight World Series and won five of them. 'Nuff said.