New York Yankees Starting Lineup: 1998 World Series Game 4
1. Chuck Knoblauch, 2B
Chuck Knoblauch would come to the Yankees in a trade with the Minnesota Twins that involved the Yankees sending four players to the Twins, none of whom would spend significant time in the majors.
He played in 150 games for the Yankees and had a little more than 600 at bats. He would hit for an average of only .265, but would add 76 walks that pushed his on base percentage up to .361, which was all the Yankees needed from him. Because following him in the lineup was enough to drive him home 117 times.
Knoblauch would play three more years with the Yankees and have his best season with them in 1999, but it was clear that he had left his best baseball with the Twins. With the rest of the lineup going full bore, he was hardly noticed.
His career would spiral backwards and eventually force him out of baseball when he developed a case of “the yips”. This was a condition where he would field a ball cleanly but then double or triple pump the throw, eventually throwing embarrassingly wild for an error. On one occasion, he removed himself from a game after three errors in succession.
Following his separation from baseball, things really spun out of control for Knoblauch and those around him. In 2014, he was arrested for the second time on charges of domestic abuse against his wife, this time for hurling a humidifier at her. This caused the Twins to cancel his induction into their Hall of Fame.
Still not done with his erratic behavior, Knoblauch took it upon himself to guarantee that he would never be seen in a Yankees uniform again when he criticized the Yankees for retiring the number 46 worn by his former teammate Andy Pettitte when he sent out this tweet:
Chuck Knoblauch @chuckknoblauch
Congrats to 46. Yankees retiring his number. Hopefully they don’t retire it like his HGH testimony.
For the record, though, in Game 4 Knoblauch went 1-for-5 and did not score or drive in any of the Yankees’ three runs.