American baseball player and coach (1926-2012)
This article is about the baseball player. For the pioneer American balloonist, see
Ed Yost
.
Baseball player
Eddie Yost
|
---|
Yost, circa 1959
|
Third baseman
|
Born:
(
1926-10-13
)
October 13, 1926
Brooklyn, New York
, U.S.
|
Died:
October 16, 2012
(2012-10-16)
(aged 86)
Weston, Massachusetts
, U.S.
|
Batted:
Right
Threw:
Right
|
|
August 16, 1944, for the Washington Senators
|
|
July 28, 1962, for the Los Angeles Angels
|
|
Batting average
| .254
|
---|
Home runs
| 139
|
---|
Runs batted in
| 683
|
---|
|
---|
|
As player
As manager
|
|
|
Edward Frederick Joseph Yost
(October 13, 1926 ? October 16, 2012)
[1]
was an American
professional baseball
player and
coach
.
[2]
He played most of his
Major League Baseball
career as a
third baseman
for the
Washington Senators
, then played two seasons each with the
Detroit Tigers
and the
Los Angeles Angels
before retiring in 1962.
[2]
The 5 ft 10 in (1.78 m), 170 lb (77 kg) Yost batted and threw right-handed.
[2]
He was nicknamed "The Walking Man" for the numerous
bases on balls
he drew, and continues to rank 11th all-time among major leaguers in that category, ahead of the likes of
Pete Rose
,
Willie Mays
,
Stan Musial
, and
Hank Aaron
.
[3]
[4]
Yost was considered one of the best
leadoff
hitters and defensive third basemen of his era.
[5]
[6]
[7]
[8]
Major League career
[
edit
]
Yost was born in
Brooklyn
,
New York
, where he played baseball and basketball at
New York University
(NYU) before signing with the Washington Senators as an amateur
free agent
in 1944.
[2]
He made his Major League debut with the Senators at the age of 17 on August 16, 1944, having never played in the
minor leagues
.
[2]
[9]
Yost spent the 1945 season in the
United States Navy
before returning to the Senators in 1946.
[10]
In 1950, Yost posted career highs with a .295
batting average
and a .440
on-base percentage
.
[2]
In 1951, he led the American League with 36
doubles
and produced a career-high 65
runs batted in
.
[2]
He earned a place as a reserve player for the American League team in the
1952 All-Star Game
.
[11]
Between August 30, 1949, and May 11, 1955, Yost played in 829 consecutive games for the Senators, the ninth-longest
consecutive game streak
in major league history.
[12]
Yost's
home run
totals were limited by Washington's cavernous
Griffith Stadium
.
[13]
Between 1944 and
1953
, he hit only three home runs at
home
while hitting 52 home runs on the
road
.
[14]
[15]
On December 6, 1958, after 14 seasons with the Senators, Yost was traded to the Detroit Tigers, allowing the Senators to make room for young prospect
Harmon Killebrew
.
[8]
[16]
[17]
Playing in
hitter
-friendly
Tiger Stadium
in 1959, his home run production climbed to a career-high of 21 and, he led the American League with 115
runs
scored, 135
base on balls
and a .435
on-base percentage
.
[18]
In 1960, he again led the league in base on balls and on-base percentage.
[19]
Yost spent two seasons with the Tigers before being selected by the Los Angeles Angels in the 1961 American League expansion draft.
[17]
Yost was the first Angels player to appear in a major league game,
leading off
in the team's first game, played at
Baltimore
on April 11, 1961.
[20]
In his last plate appearance as a major league player, he received a base on balls.
[8]
Career statistics
[
edit
]
In an 18-year career, Yost played in 2,109
games
, accumulating 1,863
hits
in 7,346
at bats
for a .254 career batting average along with 139 home runs, 683 runs batted in and an
on-base percentage
of .394.
[2]
He ended his career with a .957
fielding percentage
.
[2]
Yost led the
American League
in bases on balls on six occasions and logged 1,614 over his 18-year career, ranking him 11th on the all-time walks list.
[21]
In 1956, he had a .412 on-base percentage while posting a .231 batting average, the lowest batting average with a .400 on-base percentage in major league history.
[22]
Yost hit 28 home runs to lead off a game, a record which stood until
Bobby Bonds
broke it in the 1970s.
[8]
Yost led American League third basemen eight times in
putouts
, seven times in
double plays
, three times in
assists
and twice in fielding percentage.
[8]
He set American League career records with 2,356 putouts, 3,659 assists, and 6,285
total chances
.
[8]
His 2,356 putouts ranks him third all-time among third basemen behind
Brooks Robinson
and
Jimmy Collins
.
[23]
In 1960, he surpassed
Pie Traynor
's major league record for most games played as a third baseman with 1,865 games.
[24]
Yost was the first third baseman in history to appear in more than 2,000 games.
[8]
Baseball historian
Bill James
ranked Yost 24th all-time among third baseman in his
Historical Baseball Abstract
.
[14]
Yost attended
New York University
during the off-season, from which he earned a
Master's degree
in physical education in 1953.
[13]
[14]
[24]
Coaching career
[
edit
]
Yost followed his long playing career with a 23-season career as a
coach
. After a brief stint as a playing coach with the
1962 Angels
, Yost returned to Washington in
1963
as the third-base coach of the second
Senators
franchise, under his old teammate, manager
Mickey Vernon
.
[6]
After Washington began the season by losing 26 of its first 40 games, Vernon was replaced by
Gil Hodges
. Yost served as
interim manager
during the brief transition, losing his only game as manager, 9?3 to the
Chicago White Sox
, on May 22, 1963.
[25]
[26]
[27]
Yost then continued on Hodges' Washington staff through
1967
.
[6]
When Hodges became manager of the
New York Mets
in
1968
, he took Yost with him;
Shea Stadium
, the Mets' home field, was located only eight miles (13 km) from Yost's off-season home in
South Ozone Park, Queens
.
[8]
[6]
Yost was the Mets' third-base coach from 1968 to
1976
, and was a member of both the
1969 "Miracle Mets"
World Series champion
and the
1973 Mets
, who won the
National League
pennant
but fell in that season's
Fall Classic
in seven games.
In
1977
, he continued his coaching career with the
Boston Red Sox
, coaching at third base for eight more seasons, through
1984
, under skippers
Don Zimmer
and
Ralph Houk
. By his retirement at the close of the 1984 campaign, Yost had spent 40 years in uniform in
professional baseball
, all of them at the major-league level.
Personal life and family
[
edit
]
While playing for the
Detroit Tigers
, Yost married Patricia Healy, who worked for their front office in
public relations
.
[28]
They had two daughters, Felita Yost Carr and Alexis; a son, Mike; and two grandsons, Edward and Joseph. Patricia died on January 6, 2007.
[29]
Yost's daughter Felita competed in
ice dancing
during the
1997 U.S. Figure Skating Championships
.
[30]
[31]
Following her active career in ice skating, she is now a coach of
figure skating
.
[32]
[33]
Eddie's son, Michael is current Boston College indoor pole vault record holder.
[34]
His grandson Edward played varsity baseball at
Huntington Beach High School
in
California
and is a lefthand
pitcher
.
[35]
Edward was a member of the 2015 HBHS varsity baseball team which won the
California Interscholastic Federation ? Southern Section
Division 1 Championship on June 6, 2015.
[36]
Edward Yost is currently playing for
Pepperdine University
as part of the
Pepperdine Waves
baseball team.
[37]
Yost and his family had moved to
Boston's western suburbs
during his tenure with the Red Sox and he lived there in retirement. He died of
cardiovascular disease
in
Weston, Massachusetts
, on October 16, 2012, aged 86.
[38]
See also
[
edit
]
References
[
edit
]
- ^
"Eddie Yost, dubbed "The Walking Man", passes away at age 86"
.
NBC Sports
. 2012-10-16.
- ^
a
b
c
d
e
f
g
h
i
"Eddie Yost"
. Baseball Reference
. Retrieved
24 October
2010
.
- ^
Heft, Herb (October 1950).
Washington's Yost Becomes Majors' New Walking Man
. Retrieved
25 October
2010
.
[
permanent dead link
]
- ^
Povich, Shirley (May 1953).
Walking Man Starts Swinging
. Retrieved
25 October
2010
.
[
permanent dead link
]
- ^
Dexter Charles (June 1958).
Oh, Where Are The Lead Off Men?
. Retrieved
25 October
2010
.
[
permanent dead link
]
- ^
a
b
c
d
Gapay, Les (December 1971).
Major League Coaches Labor In Obscurity
. Retrieved
25 October
2010
.
[
permanent dead link
]
- ^
Vass, George (August 1999).
20th Century All-Overlooked Stars
. Retrieved
25 October
2010
.
[
permanent dead link
]
- ^
a
b
c
d
e
f
g
h
Eddie Yost
at the
SABR Baseball Biography Project
, by Andrew Schiff and Matthew Silverman, Retrieved 31 October 2010.
- ^
Richman, Milton (February 1949).
Yost Bypasses All Farms
. Retrieved
25 October
2010
.
[
permanent dead link
]
- ^
Dexter, Charles (March 1951).
Yost-Senator From New York
. Retrieved
25 October
2010
.
[
permanent dead link
]
- ^
"1952 All-Star Game"
. Baseball Reference
. Retrieved
25 October
2010
.
- ^
"Consecutive Games Played"
. Baseball Almanac
. Retrieved
25 October
2010
.
- ^
a
b
Middlesworth, Hal (December 1960).
12 Years In The Wrong Park!
. Retrieved
25 October
2010
.
[
permanent dead link
]
- ^
a
b
c
James, Bill (2001).
The Bill James Historical Baseball Abstract
. New York: Free Press. p.
558
.
ISBN
0-684-80697-5
.
- ^
"Eddie Yost Home Run Log"
. Baseball Reference
. Retrieved
25 October
2010
.
- ^
"Nats Trade Eddie Yost To Detroit"
.
The Pittsburgh Press
. 6 December 1958. p. 43.
- ^
a
b
"Eddie Yost Trades and Transactions"
. Baseball Almanac
. Retrieved
25 October
2010
.
- ^
"1959 American League Batting Leaders"
. Baseball Reference
. Retrieved
25 October
2010
.
- ^
"1960 American League Batting Leaders"
. Baseball Reference
. Retrieved
25 October
2010
.
- ^
"April 11, 1961 Angels-Orioles box score"
. retrosheet.org
. Retrieved
25 October
2010
.
- ^
"Career Leaders & Records for Bases on Balls"
. Baseball Reference
. Retrieved
25 October
2010
.
- ^
Lowest Batting Average With .400 On Base Percentage
. June 2004
. Retrieved
24 October
2010
.
[
permanent dead link
]
- ^
"Career Leaders & Records for Putouts as Third Baseman"
. Baseball Reference
. Retrieved
1 November
2010
.
- ^
a
b
Middlesworth, Hal (October 1960).
17 Years At Third Base!
. Retrieved
25 October
2010
.
[
permanent dead link
]
- ^
"1963 Washington Senators"
. retrosheet.org
. Retrieved
25 October
2010
.
- ^
"May 22, 1963 White Sox-Senators box score"
. retrosheet.org
. Retrieved
25 October
2010
.
- ^
"Eddie Yost Manager Record"
. Baseball Reference
. Retrieved
25 October
2010
.
- ^
Ferrigno, Michael.
"Wellesley's 'Walking Man,' Eddie Yost"
. WickedLocal.
- ^
Weber, Bruce (October 17, 2012).
"Eddie Yost, Baseball's Walking Man, Dies at 86"
.
The New York Times
.
- ^
"Starting Orders 1997 US Championships"
. Ice Skating International. Archived from
the original
on 2016-03-05.
- ^
"U.S. Figure Skating Results"
.
Las Vegas Sun
. February 12, 1997.
- ^
"Jade Esposito & Nathan Rensing ? Winter Skate Finale"
. Patriot Palace. Archived from
the original
on 2015-12-08
. Retrieved
2015-11-30
.
- ^
Mittan, Barry (27 September 2003).
"The Ballerina and the Sailor"
. Golden Skate.
- ^
"Indoor Records"
.
Boston College Men's Track & Field
. 2017-03-27
. Retrieved
2019-07-01
.
- ^
Sciacca, Mike (May 13, 2015).
"High School Baseball Roundup: OV captures Golden West League title"
.
Los Angeles Times
. Archived from
the original
on December 8, 2015.
- ^
Sondheimer, Eric (June 6, 2015).
"Baseball: Huntington Beach wins first Division 1 championship"
.
Los Angeles Times
.
- ^
"Official Baseball Roster ? 2015-16 Fall Roster"
.
Pepperdine Waves
. Archived from
the original
on 2015-09-05
. Retrieved
2015-11-30
.
- ^
Mitchell, Houston (October 18, 2012).
"Eddie Yost dies, baseball player nicknamed 'The Walking Man'
"
.
Los Angeles Times
. Retrieved
2012-10-18
.
External links
[
edit
]