Today, the Yankees will honor newly-minted Hall of Famer CC Sabathia’s induction into Cooperstown at Yankee Stadium prior to the important series finale against the Blue Jays. The team will also be giving out a replica plaque to the first 40,000 fans, a rare day when they do a giveaway where fans don’t have to line up six hours before the game
to get the item. Sabathia even joined the YES booth during Friday’s game ahead of the important day.Sunday should not be the end of the team’s honoring of CC,
however. The first-ballot Hall of Famer deserves a spot in Monument Park, whether that includes his No. 52 being removed from circulation, or not.
It’s hard to stand out as a player when you are associated with a brand and team as historic as the New York Yankees, so while the tenure of Sabathia might not scream Yankee legend, he certainly fits the bill. There’s a reason why PSA ranked him 28th on the site’s all-time Top 100 Yankees at the beginning of last year.
The Yankees signed Sabathia during a big 2008-09 offseason splash following the franchise’s first year without a postseason since captain Derek Jeter was a mere prospect. They wanted him to be both a leader in the clubhouse and the ace the team needed to get the aging Core Four one more World Series crown. He followed up a fourth-place finish in Cy Young voting that year with a 1.98 ERA across 34 postseason innings, including two outstanding starts against the Angels that earned him 2009 ALCS MVP.
While they never lifted the Commissioner’s Trophy again with Sabathia in pinstripes, he would be a steady force in their rotation for the next decade, making at least 27 starts in nine different seasons. After knee issues and his battle with alcoholism threatened to derail his career in 2014 and 2015, he recovered by managing to average 152 innings a year for the next five years in his mid-to-late 30s.
As a Yankee, Sabathia made three All-Star teams, was top four in Cy Young voting four times, and tossed nearly 2,000 innings across 306 starts. He is fourth in franchise history in strikeouts, seventh in starts, and 11th in innings pitched despite pitching in an era where starting pitchers pitch significantly fewer innings than ever before. Doing that for a franchise with 27 World Series championships and a small army in Cooperstown is extremely impressive.
Further, he went into Cooperstown as a Yankee. Sabathia didn’t have to, at all. He won a Cy Young Award and had some of his most dominant seasons in Cleveland, he had a historic playoff run with Milwaukee that has the city eternally grateful. He could’ve gone in with a blank cap like Greg Maddux, Mike Mussina, and others, and nobody would’ve had a problem.
Instead, CC went in as a Yankee.
I probably don’t need to convince you that the Yankees should unveil a plaque in Monument Park for CC in he near future. You’d be hard-pressed to find someone who believes he isn’t worthy of it. The only question that’s up for debate is whether his time in pinstripes has elevated him past the Mel Stottlemyre, Tino Martinez, Lefty Gomez, and Willie Randolphs of the world and into the inner circle of number retirement.
While I won’t be making a case on the issue by comparing him statistics-wise to other Yankees legends, I will make the case that CC Sabathia deserves to see No. 52 officially removed from circulation and become the 23rd retired number in franchise history.
First, it’s already been informally retired. Since Sabathia’s retirement in 2019, no Yankee has worn 52 in six consecutive seasons. No other number earlier than No. 60 has been out of commission for more than a season or two, but nobody has dared to grab the number of a franchise icon (or the Yankees simply declined to issue it). Of course, this happened to A-Rod’s No. 13 until it was taken by Joey Gallo (lol) in 2021, but that’s an entirely different story. The point is, the team has already essentially operated as if no player will ever wear No. 52 again, so why not make it official?
Just as a player, Sabathia being a first-ballot Hall of Famer who went in as a Yankee should be enough. There are only 24 men who went into Cooperstown with the interlocking NY on their cap and only six of them were first ballot (although more should be, the old system was archaic). The other five all have their numbers retired, including Reggie Jackson — another icon who took his star to New York in free agency and excelled.
As for what qualifies CC to join the likes of Ruth, Gehrig, and Mantle? You could probably make the argument that he was the best player of a generation. During the generation between the end of the Core Four’s prime in the early 2010s and the start of the Aaron Judge era in 2017, Sabathia was the guy for the Yankees.
Even after the Yankees entered a new era with Judge as their franchise cornerstone, Sabathia was the team’s leader through the end of the 2019 season. He embodied the pinstripes and the leadership he displayed was no exaggeration. Remember when he gave away a chance at a $500,000 bonus to get back at the Rays for throwing at Austin Romine?
What defines a player being worthy of such an honor, to me, was not only being an incredible player and leader, but someone who would do anything for the team. The final pitch Sabathia threw as a Yankee, as in Game 4 of the 2019 ALCS. Sabathia, who had suffered a degenerative knee for years and was pitching through shoulder discomfort for weeks, pitched in relief at Yankee Stadium in a crucial game, getting the first two outs of the eighth inning before hurting his shoulder on a 1-1 pitch to George Springer.
Sabathia tried to plead his case to remain in the game to Aaron Boone and Steve Donahue and threw a warmup pitch, but he had absolutely nothing left. He left the mound in tears, suffering a left shoulder subluxation that would ultimately end his career. That’s what CC Sabathia was. He left everything on the field for the Yankees until his body failed him, even as he approached his 40th birthday. He cared more about finishing the inning, in a playoff game that was likely out of reach, than anything in the world.
All of that is what makes him a Yankee legend. In my eyes, no Yankee should ever wear No. 52 again, but at the very least, let’s start with a plaque in Monument Park.
