Yankees on Verge of Clinch

Oct. 2, 1964 - The Yankees could hardly cheer, their throats were so dry. No champagne in the clubhouse. The manager was still being patient.

The television cameras set up in anticipation of the traditional pennant celebration went unmanned. The Yankees had defeated the Cleveland Indians, 5-2, but that merely clinched a tie, and who cheers for ties?

“We haven’t won it yet,” Yogi Berra (pictured) cautioned. “Besides, I got to get up to see my kids bowl at 9:30 in the morning.” But up in the mezzanine at Yankee Stadium, the perennial green tables for the World Series press section were waiting.

Ballplayers talked calmly about going home to sleep, about not sitting by radios, of wanting to be surprised by the White Sox score in the morning papers. The party would wait until after tomorrow afternoon’s game.

“They say they’re going to bed, but you can be sure nobody will be asleep until after they’ve heard the news,” said Tom Tresh, who was sipping just a little beer from a little plastic coffee cup in a little celebration of his three-run home run. “If the White Sox lose, you can be sure there’ll be some parties tonight,” he said. “You can stake your life on it.”

Berra was fighting back the celebration he really felt, whether the White Sox won their second game or not. (They did.) He was being patient, and Tresh had just had a demonstration of the patience that has been the most distinguishing characteristic of the way Berra has managed — except for the harmonica incident, that is.

Tresh had hit a three-run line drive into the right-field stands in the third inning to break the tie Elston Howard’s two-run double had just created. “It made me feel a little better,” Tresh said. He’s had a kind of disappointing year, and the homer had gotten him off the hook for tonight.

Tresh missed the bunt sign Frank Crosetti had relayed and hit into a double play with two on and none out in the second inning while the Indians were leading, 2-0.

“I was looking right at Crow and didn’t see it,” Tresh said. “I didn’t realize I had missed it until I got back to the dugout and Yogi called me over. He sort of whispered in my ear.

“I felt bad. I must have looked right through Crow. Things like that upset me, not physical errors. You should never make a mental mistake like that.”

But Berra, with the Phillies’ collapse glowing in his mind, didn’t snap at Tresh. “Nobody on the bench knew he had said anything to me,” Tresh said. “I have to admire that. That’s the way a ballplayer wants it. He didn’t embarrass me. I think that’s very commendable.”

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