NY Yankees: The five best Yankee managers of all-time

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New York Yankee all-time greatest managers – No. 5: Billy Martin

The tempestuous relationship between Martin and George Steinbrenner has been well chronicled. Martin was fired and then rehired a remarkable five different times between 1975 and 1988. He was the skipper for a total of eight years. (He would have earned a sixth stint as Yankee skipper if he had not been in a fatal car accident on Christmas Day 1989.)

Martin’s win-loss record with the Yanks was 556-385 for an impressive .591 winning percentage. A huge favorite of Yankee fans up until his death, Martin won one World Series (in 1977 against the Los Angeles Dodgers, 4-2) and two American League pennants (in 1976 and 1977) as manager of the Bombers. (He won four other World Series as a player.)

He was well known to be able to get the best out of his players by motivating them to win at all costs and to keep their cool on the field (even if he often couldn’t do this himself). His players adopted his drive and played hard for him.

His uniform number “1” was retired in August 1986 in a ceremony at Yankee Stadium. During the ceremony, he remarked: “I may not have been the greatest Yankee to put on the uniform, but I was the proudest.”