TAMPA, Fla. — The Yankees have retired more numbers than any franchise in professional sports. From Babe Ruth to Derek Jeter, from Lou Gehrig to Mariano Rivera, the names on those Monument Park plaques tell the story of the most decorated organization in baseball history.
This September, another name joins that exclusive group. And for anyone who watched the Yankees win the 2009 World Series, this one will hit close to home.
Sabathia’s journey from Cleveland ace to Cooperstown
CC Sabathia spent 19 seasons in the major leagues. He won a Cy Young Award with Cleveland in 2007. He made six All-Star teams. He finished his career with a 251-161 record, a 3.74 ERA and 3,093 strikeouts across 3,577.1 innings. He started 560 of the 561 games he appeared in over nearly two decades.
But it was his time in pinstripes that defined his legacy. Sabathia signed with the Yankees before the 2009 season and immediately delivered. He went 19-8 with a 3.37 ERA in his first year in the Bronx, won the ALCS MVP and helped the Yankees capture their 27th championship.
The following season, he went 21-7, becoming the last Yankee to win 20 games in a single year. Over 11 seasons in New York, Sabathia pitched to a 3.81 ERA across 307 games. He recorded his 3,000th career strikeout as a Yankee, a milestone only 17 pitchers in baseball history have reached.
He retired after the 2019 season in dramatic fashion, walking off the mound during the ALCS with a dislocated shoulder. It was the last pitch of a career that earned him a first-ballot induction into the National Baseball Hall of Fame last summer.
No. 52 will be retired on Sept. 26 at Yankee Stadium
The Yankees announced Wednesday night that Sabathia’s No. 52 will be retired and a plaque unveiled in Monument Park before the Yankees host the Orioles on Saturday, Sept. 26. He will become the 25th player to have his number retired by the franchise, the most of any team in the league.
Sabathia will be the first Yankee honored with a retired number since Paul O’Neill’s No. 21 was hung in 2022. He also becomes the fifth member of the 2009 championship team to receive the distinction, joining Jeter (No. 2), Jorge Posada (No. 20), Rivera (No. 42) and Andy Pettitte (No. 46).
“From the first number that hung in my locker to 52 forever hanging in Monument Park — this HOF journey has come full circle,” Sabathia wrote on social media. “To have my number retired by the New York Yankees this year is one of the greatest honors of my life. The LegaCCy continues.”
Boone remembers the teammate who brought people together
Yankees manager Aaron Boone has a unique perspective on Sabathia. He was his teammate in Cleveland from 2005 to 2006. He later managed him during the final two seasons of Sabathia’s career in 2018 and 2019. Few people in the organization know the big left-hander as well as Boone does.
“When I think of him, I think of teammate,” Boone said. “He brought people together. He connected with a lot of different people from a lot of different walks of life while having the presence of being a superstar. He made you feel welcome, and then between the lines he was just a really great competitor.”
Boone recalled the fire that Sabathia brought to the mound, even when it sometimes got the better of him early in his career.
“I loved playing with him because he was so intense,” Boone said. “And at that time in Cleveland, he was still learning how to harness. Sometimes he’d get real emotional out there on the mound and it would get the best of him, and he learned how to really harness that later into his career. But just an awesome competitor and the best of the best in teammates.”
Sabathia currently serves as a Yankees special advisor. Boone said he hopes the big lefty will visit Tampa before spring training ends for some guest coaching, though a recent surgery may affect the timeline.
The full list of retired Yankees numbers
With Sabathia’s addition, the Yankees will have 23 retired numbers honoring 25 individuals. No. 8 is shared by Yogi Berra and Bill Dickey. No. 42 honors both Mariano Rivera and Jackie Robinson, whose number was retired league-wide.
The complete roll call: Billy Martin (1), Derek Jeter (2), Babe Ruth (3), Lou Gehrig (4), Joe DiMaggio (5), Joe Torre (6), Mickey Mantle (7), Yogi Berra and Bill Dickey (8), Roger Maris (9), Phil Rizzuto (10), Thurman Munson (15), Whitey Ford (16), Jorge Posada (20), Paul O’Neill (21), Don Mattingly (23), Elston Howard (32), Casey Stengel (37), Mariano Rivera and Jackie Robinson (42), Reggie Jackson (44), Andy Pettitte (46), Ron Guidry (49), Bernie Williams (51) and now CC Sabathia (52).
It is a list that spans generations of Yankees greatness, from the Ruth and Gehrig era through the dynasty years of the late 1990s and into the modern game. For Sabathia, joining that group puts the final stamp on a career that brought a championship back to the Bronx and a bulldog presence to the mound for more than a decade.
Sept. 26 will be a day for Yankees fans to celebrate one of their own. And in Monument Park, No. 52 will hang forever.
What do you think? Leave your comment below.
