A moment after the Toronto Blue Jays won Game 7 of the American League Championship Series, Jim Leyritz hit “send’’ on a congratulatory text to their bench coach, Don Mattingly.
As Yankees teammates from 1990-95, “Donnie has always been one of my favorites,’’ said Leyritz, not alone in his sentiment.
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For those around Mattingly late in a formidable pinstriped playing career, each empty October was accompanied by a little more heartache for the best Yankee to never experience a World Series.
Even four years as a Yankees coach under Joe Torre and three first-place finishes while managing the Los Angeles Dodgers didn’t lead to a pennant-winning champagne party.
That all changed for Mattingly, 64, with Monday night’s comeback win at Toronto against the Seattle Mariners – the same organization that ended Mattingly’s lone, brief taste of the postseason as a player 30 years ago.
Don Mattingly’s impact on Yankees
That 1995 season was Mattingly’s final playing season, due to a debilitating back issue, and “from spring training on, that’s what the talk was,’’ Leyritz said of getting to the postseason for their captain and first baseman.
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“I don’t think people know what he went through, how much pain he was in those last few years and what he did to play,’’ said broadcaster Suzyn Waldman, recalling how Mattingly had to stretch out his back on medievalesque piece of clubhouse machinery before each game.
Leyritz walked into that Yankee Stadium clubhouse as a rookie in 1990 and found his locker next to Mattingly’s now-retired No. 23 space.
After visiting Monument Park and calling his dad, excitedly telling him of his locker location, Mattingly appeared from the trainer’s room.
Mattingly quickly informed Leyritz why they were new clubhouse neighbors.
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“If you don’t ask questions, you won’t be here very long,’’ Mattingly told Leyritz, who added that, “Donnie was probably tired of me’’ by season’s end due to his constant baseball queries.
Late in a late September game, Pat Kelly’s homer against the Blue Jays sent the ’95 Yankees to the postseason as a wild card, and Leyritz’s overwhelming memory was “just how happy Donnie was’’ to play in October, and how thrilled manager Buck Showalter was for Mattingly.
By then, “we knew it was his last year,’’ said Leyritz.
Mattingly was just 34, but as Leyritz says, “The amount of preparation he had to go to get himself on the field every day,’’ due to the back issue, seemed impossible to keep up.
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“I thought the place was going to come down when they introduced him,’’ Waldman said of the affection the Stadium crowd showed before Game 1.
Leyritz famously won Game 2 of that best-of-five Division Series with a 15th-inning home run, and Mattingly batted .417 (10-for-24) against the Mariners, who came back from a two-game deficit to eliminate the Yankees.
Despite his physical pain, “there’s an adrenaline rush you get in postseason, and that’s what happened with Donnie,’’ Leyritz said.
“It was great to see that. And even though we got beat, he knows he went out on a really, really high note.’’
Waldman recalls the long, solemn plane ride back from Seattle, with Mattingly walking up the aisle to say his goodbyes.
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“He’s always had a way of talking to everybody that made you feel what you do is important,’’ said Waldman. “If you asked five different people in that clubhouse, they’d say their best friend was Don Mattingly.’’
How Don Mattingly reached his first World Series
To get to his first World Series, Mattingly’s Blue Jays had to get past the 2025 Yankees in a four-game AL Division Series, which was clinched in the Bronx.
There, his old team saw some of that Mattingly influence with the Jays, from their ability to keep putting the ball in play – with more than occasional power – to Vladimir Guerrero Jr.’s deftness at first base.
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“It’s different,’’ Waldman said of Mattingly getting to the World Series as a coach, 30 years after his last game as a player, “but he’s there.
“He’s everything that’s good about this game. That’s why ‘Donnie Baseball’ is so apt.’’
This article originally appeared on NorthJersey.com: Don Mattingly, Yankees icon, finally gets World Series chance with Blue Jays
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