ROBIN RAYNE NELSONYanks’ 1978 World Series hero Brian Doyle at home with his dog.
The World Series ring from that remarkable October sits on the ring finger of Brian Doyle’s right hand, every single day. Doyle, an improbable star of the Yankees’ memorable 1978 championship, loves that people want to talk about it when they see it, loves that the words “Pride” and “Tradition” are engraved on one side.
He only takes it off to sleep or to shower. He’s worn the ring so much that it’s been re-faced four times.
“It still looks good,” Doyle says. “It just shakes a lot right now.”
That’s because Doyle, the little-used infielder who forever will have a spot in Yankee lore for his sparkling play in that Series, has mid-stage Parkinson’s disease. Tremors like that can be part of daily life with Parkinson’s, the progressive nervous system disorder that affects movement and has no cure.
For a while, Doyle had trouble keeping his balance, and falling was a real danger. Medication adjustments helped. The Doyles had a stair-lift put into their two-story home just outside Atlanta in Newnan, Ga. The only day Doyle has been mad since he was diagnosed last year came on the day the lift was installed, says Connie, his wife of 41 years.
“But he’s been so grateful,” Connie adds. “It’s been three weeks since he’s fallen.”
There were times he did not believe the diagnosis. Then he watched YouTube videos of Michael J. Fox and read about the symptoms. “Yeah, it was crystal clear,” Doyle says.
Then he pauses and says, “I’ll start speaking a little better here in a minute. I won’t be stuttering as much because I just took my medication.”
This is the second life-changing health battle for the 60-year-old Doyle. Twenty-one years ago he was diagnosed with leukemia and given six months to live. George Steinbrenner called often then, telling Doyle he was a winner who had beat leukemia. And he did, with the help of powerful chemotherapy treatments. But Doyle and his family now wonder if the chemo perhaps led to the bone and joint problems that resulted in two replaced knees, a rebuilt left shoulder and multiple neck surgeries.
While Doyle’s health has changed, his outlook has not. Doyle leans on his strong Christian faith — he was ordained as a minister 10 years ago, and was a pastor at First Baptist Church in Fort Lauderdale before he and Connie moved to Georgia to be near their two children, Kirk and Kristin, and five grandchildren.
FOCUS ON SPORT/GETTY IMAGESBrian Doyle gets a champagne shower after helping lead the Yanks to the 1978 World Series title. A lifetime .161 hitter, Doyle bats .438 in the Series.
“This sounds like a sob story, but it’s not,” Doyle says. “I am very joyful. I’m restricted. I can’t drive. Sometimes I can’t even type. But I’m writing my autobiography and a couple of other books.
“It’s another opportunity for me to show that there’s hope, that you just don’t stop living when something like this happens.
“I have no regrets. And, bud, nothing, absolutely nothing, is going to steal my joy.”
* * *
Doyle hit .438 in that six-game Fall Classic victory over the Dodgers 37 years ago as a sub for Willie Randolph, who was injured. Doyle, a career .161 hitter over parts of four seasons in the majors, was just “a little big leaguer who played very little,” as he puts it. But he shined on an enormous stage, scoring four runs and knocking in two.
Some say he should’ve been the MVP instead of Bucky Dent.
Either way, that World Series is still a part of Doyle’s daily life, he says, and memories flood back easily. They’re sure to flow again at the Yankees’ 69th annual Old-Timer’s Day June 20 at the Stadium. Doyle, a regular at the event, plans to attend to see the ceremony dedicating a Monument Park plaque to Randolph, a friend since they played together.
Doyle didn’t even know until the day of Game 1 that he’d be on the World Series roster because Randolph was testing his injured hamstring. He found out he was eligible when he got into a cab with Catfish Hunter and Yogi Berra and Berra told him he was on the roster.
Randolph, as the former star puts it now, “was devastated” he couldn’t play. But Doyle says Randolph was his biggest cheerleader during the Series, anyway.
GENE KAPPOCK/NEW YORK DAILY NEWSBrian Doyle and Willie Randolph take care of the front end of a double play against the Red Sox.
“He was easy to root for,” Randolph recalls. “He rooted for me. I just thought it was a great story — every World Series there’s unsung heroes. I can’t say I was surprised. He was always ready to play, never scared. He looked at it like his shot.
“He was unbelievable. We don’t get past that Series without him.”
During the Series, Doyle flashed back to his childhood in Kentucky, where he grew up in a baseball family that included his brothers, Denny, who played eight years in the majors, and Blake, the Rockies’ current hitting coach.
He was 9 years old, standing in the backyard on a piece of cardboard that served as second base, imagining Yankee Stadium. He slid into home and jogged to the ditch by a gravel road that served as the Yanks’ dugout. Mickey Mantle, Elston Howard and Berra patted him and said, “Nice going, kid.”
At the real Stadium, all those years later, Doyle stood on second base during the sixth inning of Game 6 after knocking in a run, tears running down his face. “I’m sure Davey Lopes and Bill Russell were thinking, ‘What in the world is going on?’ ” Doyle recalls, chuckling. “All I could think about was that 9-year-old boy on that cardboard base. And then I scored and slid into the real plate.
“If you’re 90 or 9, if you’re not dreaming, you’re not living.”
* * *
Doyle’s major-league dream was brief — he never played in more than 39 games in a season and was finished after hurting his shoulder while playing for Oakland in 1980. He went on to do just about everything in the game, though. He and his brothers founded Doyle Baseball, a baseball school, in 1978. Doyle has worked as a scout, a major-league coach, a minor-league manager, an executive and an agent.
He has traveled to places such as Cuba and Israel with a ministry called Global Baseball, talking about the Gospel and the gospel of baseball. He can’t travel now, but he still writes curriculum, still has a passion for sharing his faith and his game.
ROBIN RAYNE NELSONBrian Doyle only takes off his World Series ring to shower or sleep.
He hopes he can talk to folks who face the kinds of challenges he’s facing with Parkinson’s, much like he did when he spoke to cancer patients. Maybe his story, complete with an ongoing attempt to get disability benefits from the state of Georgia, will help.
“I can’t, obviously, work,” says Doyle, who draws a small MLB pension. “We’ve been going almost three years without me bringing in an income.”
Connie had not worked in years, but found a job in accounts payable at a propane gas company so the family could have health benefits.
“We’ve been blessed with friends and family who have helped us,” says Connie. “We have food on the table and we’re very grateful.
“This has been kind of surreal. We are Christians and we do feel like there’s been a divine hand that’s held us through this.”
Sometimes, when Doyle goes to see his doctors at Emory University, they are upbeat, Connie says. Other times, they’ve said, “It’s progressing faster than average,” Connie adds.
Connie shares her husband’s outlook, though. “We expect and believe he’ll have many, many more years,” she says. “He’s already feeling better since we’ve had his medicine tweaked several times.”
“It breaks your heart,” adds Randolph. “But the beauty of Brian Doyle is he’s one of the most caring, giving and, really, spiritual people I’ve been around. That’s going to get him through this.
“If anyone can handle it, he can.”
ROBIN RAYNE NELSONA replica World Series trophy is part of Brian Doyle's memorabilia from his '78 triumph with Yanks.
* * *
As part of his therapy, Doyle walks around a track at the local YMCA for 30 minutes “trying to get my right leg to take a big step,” he says. “The right side of my body right now is what has been affected.”
Once he is into what he calls a “big movement,” he can sometimes look like his old self. He was throwing a ball with a grandson recently and could not hit a specified target, something, of course, that he did thousands of times as a pro athlete.
“He asked our grandson to throw it to him, like he would be turning a double play,” Connie recalls. “He hit the target.”
Doyle has two big events looming next month. He’ll be at Old-Timer’s Day and the following day, he’ll be honored as part of a “Yankee Legends Game” at the Yanks’ Triple-A affiliate in Moosic, Pa. Part of the proceeds of the Scranton/Wilkes-Barre game will benefit the National Parkinson’s Foundation and the Michael J. Fox Foundation.
Doyle has something special in mind for both days — he wants to jog onto the field when his name is announced. He revealed that to his daughter while walking around that track, then he took off.
“I jogged as smooth as if I didn’t have Parkinson’s,” Doyle recalls. “We’re still working on it. Some days I can do it and some days I can’t.
“That’s a big thing for me. I can’t tell you how big that is. It sounds kind of idiotic — that’s your goal, to jog? But for me, it’s huge.”
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