'We won when we had to': How the 2000 Yankees made history

NEW YORK -- Winning three consecutive championships is one of the most elusive feats sports have to offer. Only two franchises in Major League Baseball history have managed a three-peat. One was the A’s, from 1972-74.

The other, of course, was the Yankees: Joe DiMaggio’s “Golden Era” Yanks won four straight titles from 1936-39, and Mickey Mantle’s Bronx Bombers won five straight from 1949-53 -- MLB’s all-time record for consecutive World Series championships.

Entering the 2000 season, the Yankees had a chance to etch their name in history alongside those franchise-defining dynasties of yore, returning New York to its sitting place as the pinnacle of baseball. The 1998 club had compiled a then-AL record 114 regular-season victories en route to a World Series sweep of the Padres, while the 1999 team soared through the postseason with an 11-1 record, culminating in another Fall Classic sweep of the Braves.

“[Manager Joe Torre] just talked about how special it would be to win three in a row during the season,” Jorge Posada, who assumed the starting catcher role after the departure of free agent Joe Girardi, recalled two decades later. “We were proud of what we had done, but we really felt like there was more to do in 2000.”

The 2000 campaign turned out to be anything but a cakewalk for the Yankees, whose roller-coaster ride of a regular season ended with an 87-74 overall record, the lowest winning percentage (.540) of any postseason qualifier that year, as well as yet another AL East title -- their third of what would be nine consecutive years atop the division.

Despite a strong start to the season -- highlighted by an eight-game winning streak in April -- the wheels started to come off their hinges in May, when the Yankees went just 13-13. The season fully went off the rails in June, when they went 10-15.

Owner George Steinbrenner was none too pleased with the proceedings. And general manager Brian Cashman, in his second full season in the role at age 32, was tasked with rebuilding the team on the run in order to fix what ailed the Yankees.

“There was a great deal of pressure from above. You know, ‘The Boss’ did not handle losing very well,” Cashman told MLB.com recently. “We were better than we were performing. ‘Fix it’ -- that was the charge.”

So Cashman did his job, casting a wide net in a busy summer of activity. He acquired the likes of Glenallen Hill, Denny Neagle, José Vizcaíno and Luis Sojo -- all of whom, in his own way, made a lasting mark on the roster. But no move proved as consequential as the June 29 trade for David Justice, a three-time All-Star and 1990 NL Rookie of the Year, which Cashman called “arguably one of the best deals I ever made.”

“We really loved the profile of David Justice, a left-handed-hitting outfielder with power, plate discipline, and thought he would be a perfect fit for us,” Cashman said of the 34-year-old slugger. “He was so impactful. He was arguably taking a shot at becoming an MVP the way he performed for us.”

With those new pieces in tow, the Yankees found their footing coming out of the All-Star break, posting a pair of 18-win months in July and August. They were 25 games over .500 on Sept. 13 and had built up a season-high nine-game lead over the Red Sox in the division.

But then it all came crashing down again. The Yankees lost 15 of their final 18 games of the year, including seven straight at one point. If not for Boston’s own struggles down the stretch, New York’s fiercest rivals might have been able to wrest the crown. Instead, the Yanks claimed the AL East by 2 1/2 games and moved on to the playoffs.

October presented a new opportunity. The slate was clean, and armed with the experiences of postseasons past, the Yankees were eager to prove that they were still the team to beat and that a three-peat was still within their grasp.

“When you’re talking Derek Jeter and [Paul] O’Neill and Tino [Martinez] and Bernie [Williams] and Mariano [Rivera], and that team had [Roger] Clemens -- there was a toughness, without a doubt,” Cashman said. “Obviously it’s still the team that wet the bed in June and backed into the playoffs in September, but there was still this inner toughness that somehow, someway, they were never going to be denied. They were going to find a way. And they did.

“These people were tough, and they were hungry, and they wanted to win. That was important to them at all times. So despite having slumps here and there, when it was lights, camera, action and the most important time to play was October, they were showing up.”

The Yankees’ first test came in the form of the A’s and their AL Most Valuable Player Jason Giambi in the Division Series. After dropping Game 1, the Yanks took Games 2 and 3 thanks to strong starts from Andy Pettitte and Orlando “El Duque” Hernandez. But the A’s tagged Clemens for six runs in a Game 4 blowout, leading to a pivotal Game 5 in Oakland.

The Yankees jumped all over A’s starter Gil Heredia in the top of the first, batting around in a decisive six-run frame that was highlighted by a bases-clearing double from Martinez. So off to the AL Championship Series they went, where the Wild Card-winning Mariners and their 24-year-old superstar Alex Rodriguez were awaiting them, coming off a sweep of the top-seeded White Sox.

“They never got tired of winning,” Torre recalled last year. “… To me, when you stop to admire what you’ve accomplished, you stop doing it. And that’s what these guys never did. They just wanted more and more and more.”

After another Game 1 loss, the Yankees ripped off three straight wins in Games 2-4, outscoring the Mariners, 20-3, with victories for Hernandez, Pettitte and Clemens. After a five-run fifth from Seattle downed the Yanks in Game 5, they had another chance to clinch a spot in the Fall Classic with the series shifting back to New York for Game 6.

Down 4-3 in the bottom of the seventh, the Yankees had two on with only one out. Into the batter’s box strolled a man who knew big moments well, having won a World Series title with the vaunted Braves half a decade prior: Justice. Swinging gleefully at a 3-1 fastball, Justice launched a rocket to the upper deck in right field at the old Yankee Stadium: a go-ahead, three-run homer that sent his new team to the World Series. (“I’m not sure if I ever heard the stadium louder,” Cashman said of the eventual ALCS MVP.)

“I don’t think we knew at the time how rare [it] was,” said Posada, who proved to be the team’s best player in a breakthrough All-Star season. “We dealt with adversity and a lot of pressure in 2000, and we won when we had to. It capped off one of the greatest dynasties in baseball history.”

There was one last hill for the Yankees to climb in order to make that a reality -- a long-awaited, highly anticipated Subway Series showdown against the crosstown-rival Mets. Not since 1956 had two titans of New York clashed in a battle for baseball’s ultimate prize.

Game 1 quickly lived up to the hype, as the Yankees and Mets were locked in a stalemate until the 12th inning. With the bases loaded for Vizcaíno, the midseason acquisition smacked the first pitch he saw to left field for a dramatic walk-off win. In Game 2, the Yanks staved off a ninth-inning collapse after Clemens twirled eight scoreless frames -- and weathered a benches-clearing incident prompted by his throwing of a broken-bat comebacker into the path of Mike Piazza.

The Mets responded in Game 3 when the series moved to Shea Stadium, snapping the Yankees’ 14-game Fall Classic win streak that dated back to Game 2 of the 1996 WS. But before the Mets could build momentum in Game 4, leadoff hitter Jeter decided to take matters into his own hands, launching a home run on the first pitch of the night.

So then came Game 5, with the Yankees on the precipice of history. In the top of the ninth, the score was tied at 2, there were two outs and two men were on base when Sojo came up to bat. First-pitch swinging came up clutch once again for the Yanks, as the August acquisition lined a single up the middle. The Mets’ relay throw home hit the sliding Posada and bounced into their dugout, allowing both runners to score and giving the Yankees their World Series-winning play.

“If we didn’t win that World Series against the Mets, I think I would have moved out of the city,” said WS MVP Jeter in a 2020 interview. “Because in my mind, it was a battle for New York. And we were playing for something that’s pretty special, winning three championships in a row. The Mets had a great team, and all eyes were on New York at that particular time. We had to win. I felt as though we had everything to lose.”

That proved to be an apt description for the 2000 season as a whole. The Yankees could have lost it all at several points during the year, but instead, they made all the right moves and dug deep when it mattered most. For that, they joined the most illustrious of echelons, claiming a three-peat and capping a dynasty.

“If this team is not the best ever, it’s up there,” said Justice on that WS-winning night. “It’s hard to compare different decades. But this is definitely one of the best teams ever assembled. And this has been one of the best runs in history.”