by Episode Two centered around twisted relationships, and lack of hitting. It starts with Mel Halls bizarre relationship with a 15-year-old, and ends with George Steinbrenner nearly losing his franchise after a toxic relationship with degenerate gambler Howie Spira. Oh yeah, we talk a little baseball too. Here is your episode two recap.
Mel Hall was a strange dude, and maybe still is?
Mel Hall was not a “clubhouse guy” to say the least. We learned in episode one that he brought cougars in the locker room, was cheap and refused to pay other teammates when they “picked things up” for him amongst other issues. However, it went next level this episode when we dug deep into his relationship with a 15-year-old fan.
He found high school student Chaz Easterly in the crowd one game and became enamored with her. It wasn’t long until he tracked down her home address and swung by with a limo after a game once to pick her up and take her to a local arcade.
Making things even weirder, once the family met him a few times, they fell in love with Hall and invited him to live with them. It gets worse, as he and the 15-year-old Chaz moved into the parents’ bedroom, and the parents, moved into a smaller bedroom. How horrific is that thought? It gets worse as he not only attended her prom, using that photo as his Yankee yearbook photo, but also built an inground pool in their backyard so she couldn’t leave and go to the beach, he didn’t want anyone else looking at her in public.
Easterly was forced to sit with the players wife’s at games, and when she didn’t, she had to sit right next to the dugout so Hall could know where she was at all times. Again, what in the Hell where the parents thinking during all of this? Prostituting their own daughter our for free Yankees tickets. It doesn’t make any sense, and eventually Hall would get popped for pedophilia, and is now serving a 40 year sentence in prison. When interviewing Hall in prison he showed zero remorse.
1990 was a season of coming and goings
First year manager Bucky Dent was gone by the All Star Break with a 18-33 record. Stump Merrill came in but didn’t fear much better. Apparently he enjoyed cleaning out his tobacco stained teeth with his own disgusting sweat socks after games, in front of reporters.
While Dent leaving was seen as a fail, they made 3 huge selections in the draft and undrafted free agency that season however. In 1990, they landed Andy Pettite, Jorge Posada and Mariano Rivera who would become cornerstones in their late 90’s run to 4 titles in 5 years. ( 96,98,99,00)
They lost a no hitter 4-0 at Chicago
Comisky’s windy environment caused the Yankees to have 3 straight errors by Mike Blowers, Jim Leyritz and Jesse Barfield in the bottom of the 8th, which caused starting pitcher Andy Hawkins to lose a start in which he tossed a no hitter. The Yankees couldn’t buy a run and when the bottom dropped out of the 8th, they endured one of the most embarrassing losses of all time.
They lost the battle of Deon vs Bo
As the nation watched the clash between the Yankees vs Royals for the sole reason of the only two sport athletes playing each other, they got several memories to take away. Bo Jackson hit homeruns off of Yankee pitching in his first three at bats. Meanwhile, Sanders answered with a wild inside the park homerun. It was a little spark for the Yankees but it didn’t last.
The curious case of Howie Spira, Dave Winfield and The Boss
Basically, degenerate gambler and beat writer Howie Spira went to work for the Dave Winfield foundation in an effort to pay off massive gambling debts to several crime families. Winfield never paid him what he expected and Spira claims that Winfield was embezzling funds to open up personal ventures. This all led to Spira contacting George Steinbrenner in order to spill the beans about his superstar.
Steinbrenner flew Spira to Tampa and put him up in a nice hotel, going as far as to send a high-priced hooker to his room. Spira spilled the beans, thinking Steinbrenner was going to pay off his gambling debts of 150K plus. The opposite happened as Steinbrenner took the info and forced Winfield to come clean and then never paid Spira.
Finally, after four plus years of harassing Steinbrenner and his entire family for the money, The Boss gave in and gave him to checks for $20,000. It wasn’t nearly enough and Spira went public with the tapes he had on The Boss.
Word of all of this gets back to commissioner Fay Vincent who had just suspended Pete Rose for life for gambling, and now will decide the fate of The Yankees in episode three.
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