One medical emergency may have dramatically modified the panorama of baseball within the Nineties.
Greg Maddux, who was a key a part of the Braves’ powerhouse groups within the Nineties, revealed on an episode of the “Toeing the Slab” podcast with David Cone that he didn’t intend on signing with Atlanta in any respect. Matter of reality, he traveled to New York in 1992 with designs on signing with the group that twice defeated them within the World Collection.
“I went there to signal with the Yankees,” Maddux stated. “I imply, I used to be shocked I didn’t get supplied a contract. It’s not school — I didn’t go there only for a recruiting journey. You form of go there to signal the contract and every little thing. I had the good day, went round, went to a present, went to dinner, and so they stated, we’ll be in contact with a contract provide.”
The provide by no means got here. Why was that?
“I don’t know who it was, however … one of many guys had a coronary heart assault,” Maddux stated. “And that’s why I wasn’t made a proposal.
“I acquired on the airplane, went residence, we had a layover in Chicago … and I keep in mind touchdown in Chicago and calling Scott [Boras, Maddux’s agent], and he stated the Braves have been in a position to make me a proposal. Which initially was the group I needed to go to, earlier than I went to New York.”
Maddux was coming off the ultimate 12 months of his run with the Cubs in ’92, by which he gained his first Cy Younger Award. He was essentially the most coveted free agent of the offseason, and the Yankees have been gearing up for a return to prominence after not making the playoffs in over a decade.
Per The Submit’s Joel Sherman, the Yankees’ early-’90s mess made the franchise undesirable and was the rationale for Maddux’s pivot to Atlanta for much less cash.
Clearly, issues labored out superb for the Yankees, who gained 4 championships throughout Maddux’s 11-year tenure with the Braves. And Maddux was a key motive for Atlanta’s success, by which they appeared in three World Collection and he gained three straight Cy Youngs.
If not for the unnamed Yankees govt struggling a coronary heart assault, issues may have been actual completely different for every of the storied franchises.
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