The New York Yankees Have Retired 16 Numbers: Have They Gone Too Far?

(Zell's Pinstripe Blog)

The New York Yankees have retired 16 numbers. That is the most amount of numbers retired by any team in the history of baseball. The question is...Have they gone too far?

I think so.

I know the Yankees have had an enormous amount of history over the years, and they had some of the best players of all-time, but that doesn’t mean every player that walks into pinstripes deserves their number retired.

I believe some teams have guidelines and certain milestones players need to reach in order to have there number retired, but there are no such rules with the Yanks. They just retire any number they feel like retiring. 

I’m not saying that the players on the list below don’t deserve there number retired, but I feel like they should have set guidelines like other teams.

Some day the shortstop for the Yankees will be wearing the number 99. Do we want that? Not any time soon, but years from now a lot of the numbers will be taken away.

Derek Jeter and Mariano Rivera are locks to have their numbers retired when they retire. Who else could have their number retired? I don’t know...maybe Willie Randolph or Bernie Williams. Alex Rodriguez, when he is all said and done probably will. Jorge Posada as well.

As you can see...the list can go on and on. So where does it end? Will any numbers ever be reinstated? I don’t know what they could do, but I think something should be done about it.

Yankees Retired Numbers

1- Billy Martin

3- Babe Ruth

4- Lou Gehrig

5- Joe Dimaggio

7- Mickey Mantle

8- Yogi Berra

8- Bill Dickey

9- Roger Maris

10- Phil Rizzuto

15-Thurman Munson

16- Whitey Ford

23- Don Mattingly

32- Elston Howard

37- Casey Stengel

44- Reggie Jackson

49- Ron Guidry