One of the rarest feats in MLB history is a long home run streak. In all of MLB history, only three players have hit home runs in eight consecutive games: Dale Long, Ken Griffey Jr. and Don Mattingly. By comparison, pitching a perfect game seems downright pedestrian (23 of them in history, as we mention a few times in our auction descriptions). The Greatest Yankee Moment of the 1980s celebrates Mattingly's truly Herculean feat, when he hit home runs in eight consecutive games in a thrilling July of 1987.
Mattingly's streak began at the game on July 8th. In the prior two seasons, Mattingly hit 35 and 31 home runs, but before that game, he had only 8 home runs as the Yankees were just past the halfway point of the 1987 season. That uncharacteristic power outage was about to come to an exciting end.
Donnie Baseball hit two home runs in the first game of his streak. He followed by destroying White Sox pitching in the next series by hitting four home runs in the four game series (including a grand slam) and extending his streak to five games in a row before baseball hit the All-Star break. After the break with the Yankees on a road trip, Mattingly took up where he left off, hitting another grand slam and a two-run shot in the first post-break game. The next night he extended the streak to seven games in a row with a solo HR. By this time, the media was well aware of the significance of Mattingly's home run tear and the pressure only intensified to break the then record of eight consecutive HR games set by Long. In the eighth game Mattingly came through again, earning the rare standing ovation on the road.
Although Mattingly's streak ended in a tie with Long and Griffey, Mattingly hit 10 HRs, while the others hit eight HRs during their eight-game streaks. In addition to the HR streak, Mattingly also broke another AL record in July of 1987 held by a fellow you may have heard of - Babe Ruth. Mattingly broke Ruth's record of at least one extra-base hit in 10 consecutive games.
This framed memorabilia package is almost as special as the streak itself. This custom, one-of-a-kind framed collection consists of Mattingly's #23 jersey autographed personally by Mattingly, an authentic original ticket to the third game of the streak in Yankee Stadium and a "First Day Cover" also autographed personally by Mattingly that describes his home run streak. Two Mattingly autographs in one framed piece!
Includes certificates of authenticity from Fanatics (for the jersey) and JSA (for the First Day Cover)."