The Babe and Jackie: One in the same
Legends of Ruth, Robinson tied together in Ray Negron's new book
By Jon Lane / YESNetwork.com
 One is considered the greatest ballplayer that ever lived. He was larger than life and brought the home run into the mainstream. He was once the Yankees' single-season record holder for homers and the game's all-time leader in the category. Off the field, however, Babe Ruth had a reputation for reckless behavior, for he was known as a hard-core partier and womanizer.
The other broke down Major League Baseball's racial barriers, ending approximately 80 years of baseball segregation by becoming the first African-American player of the modern era in 1947. Both off and on the field, however, Jackie Robinson was a man scorned strictly due to the color of his skin, hated as much as Ruth was loved.
Both changed the game forever. And both are connected more closely than you think. Yankees senior advisor Ray Negron's new book unlocks the mystery to the unique relationship between the two legends in "The Babe and Jackie: The Greatest Story Never Told." The story, released on Tuesday, is about, to paraphrase Sammy Davis Jr., love, peace and togetherness.
"The Babe and Jackie were about the aspect of togetherness," Negron said. "People didn't see the actual heart and soul of what these two guys represented, which is the same thing, especially when it came to kids."
Much of Negron's role with the Yankees is devoted to community relations and children in need. A frequent visitor to children's hospitals and a good-will ambassador to numerous charities, Little League organizations and the Boys & Girls Club to help raise funds for their programs, Negron is off the success of his first book, "The Boy of Steel," which rose to No. 2 on the New York Times Bestseller List and is on display at the Baseball Hall of Fame. Negron did not make a dime off "The Boy of Steel." All proceeds were distributed through the New York Yankees Foundation for cancer research and education.
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Inside Man: A Bronx Tale
by Alex Belth
1/15/2008
A Four-Part Bronx Banter Exclusive
[Author's Note: This story was written last summer. It covers Ray Negron's life from the spring of 2006 through the spring of '07. Some of the basic facts stated in the piece have changed: Joe Torre is no longer the manager of the Yankees; Hank and Hal Steinbrenner have taken control of the team; Negron has just completed his seventh children's book for Harper Collins. But, despite these events, the essence of Ray's story remains true. I hope you enjoy.]
Part One
"Let me show you the Boss's suite," says Ray Negron. It is a cool evening in early May, 2006, and Negron's boss, George Steinbrenner, the principal owner of the New York Yankees, is out of town. Several hours before game time, Negron, 51, is walking down the outer corridor of the loge section at Yankee Stadium, his head cocked like an upper classman with the run of the school. He exudes an insouciant confidence, the kind of man who is used to keeping his cool in hot situations. Negron has short black hair and skin the color of café au lait. His large, liquid brown eyes and long eyelashes are almost feminine; his cheeks sag--the sign of a thin man growing older—and lend a sense of gravity to an otherwise boyish countenance. As usual, Negron looks crisp. He is wearing a gray, patterned suit and slim brown shoes. On his right ring finger is a massive gold World Series ring from the 1996 Yankees.
"I can't wait for the new Stadium," Negron says. "Maybe I'll get an office."
"The ubiquitous Ray Negron," a veteran New York sportswriter calls him. Negron is a gypsy, constantly on the move, from the executive suites through the press box down to the locker room. He does not even have his own desk; instead, he totes everything he needs in a leather-bound book with a Spaulding logo embossed on the cover: Negron serves as a director of community relations for the sporting goods company, one of his many jobs. The book is filled with notes scribbled in different colored inks--reminders, phone numbers and addresses. Continue Reading Part One .:
Part Two
Prince of the City
Ray Negron was only supposed to work a couple of games to re-pay his debt, but then one of the regular bat boys got sick, and in no time, Negron had himself a steady job. He moved on the field with the languid movements of a professional, his uniform fitting tightly, his stirrups pulled up just so. At 145 lbs, Negron was too skinny to be confused with a big leaguer though the players occasionally tried to pass him off as one of them when he was on the road with them, to get him laid. "You said it, not me," Negron squeals with delight, remembering today.
When the Yankees took batting practice, Negron was busy with the daily clubhouse chores, but he would sneak in a couple of swings in the batting cage or hang around at shortstop and take ground balls while the visiting team came to hit. One day, the Texas Rangers were in town and Negron was playing short against live bp when he made a couple of good fielding plays. Billy Martin, the Rangers manager, a man rarely without a fungo bat in his hand, was standing on the third base side of home plate. He turned his attention to the boy, motioned with his hand and then tossed a ball up and cracked a hard groundball at him.
"Billy noticed that I could play," Negron recalls. "Later, he introduced me to two of his middle infielders, Lenny Randle and Davey Nelson. Every time Texas came to town, I would ball boy down the right field line so I could hang with them. They taught me and to this day, I can honestly say that I'm still friends with both of them." Continue Reading Part Two .:
Part Three
Real Life
 When Reggie Jackson left New York, Ray Negron's glory days came to an end. Now, he had to adjust to a more mundane reality, and a greater challenge—how to advocate for himself. Negron had defined himself by what he could provide to other, more famous men.
"Growing up is hard," says Negron. "In baseball, you are a kid forever. When I left the Yankees, I didn't have the players to protect me anymore." Negron married his longtime girlfriend Barbara Wood in 1981; they got an apartment in Far Rockaway, had a son four years later, and were divorced before the end of the decade. "It was hard to give my heart and soul to a situation when I didn't really want to be there," he says. Continue Reading Part Three .:
Part Four
Soul Survivor
It is a cold, gray December morning. Ray Negron pulls up in front of Yankee Stadium in a white GMC, a leased car he uses when he's in New York. He is fifteen minutes late. The car is messy—Reggie Jackson would not approve.
With him is Aris Sakellaridis, a stocky, square-jawed retired corrections officer in his mid-forties. He is originally from Washington Heights. "I'm a ghetto Greek," he says with a laugh. Aris is wearing a gold Georgia Tech baseball cap and a white jump suit with a thick navy blue strip with gold trim down the side. Around his waist is a black fanny pack. Sakellaridis lives on a pension; he wrote Retired Yankee Numbers, a glossy picture book illustrated by the caricaturist, John Pennisi. Sakellaridis hands me his card, which features an illustration of himself by Pennisi. Sakellaridis is smiling broadly wearing a baseball uniform with the number 69.
Negron is on his way to speak at a community center and has agreed to make a slight detour to show me his old neighborhood in Hunt's Point but he's not sure exactly how to get there. "Outside of Yankee Stadium I don't know shit about the Bronx," he says. Negron tells me that a niece that he's never met—the daughter of one of his estranged half-brothers—had recently contacted him through the Internet. He talks about future book projects and how he approaches his work with humility and sincerity, and he is annoyed that there is a perception that his intentions aren't always genuine.
"You know what worries me honestly," says Aris cocking his head to the side. "Steinbrenner, he ain't in as good a health today from what you read. What happens when he goes? They going to get rid of Ray? But hey, Ray lives, man," Aris continues. "He'll be alright. Ha-ha-ha." Continue Reading Part Four .:
Former bat boy Negron recalls '77
Yankees exec had front-row seat for Bronx escapades
By Jon Lane / YESNetwork.com
07/06/2007 4:00 PM ET
Ray Negron was just 21 years old, but he was a dead-on witness to an incident that snapped a national viewing audience at attention. The feud between Billy Martin and Reggie Jackson had reached 212 degrees Fahrenheit and Negron's ears were fine-tuned to words muted to those staring at a tube in disbelief.
It was theater made for soap opera writers who build and tease for weeks before pushing the climatic red button. The year 1977 would be a challenging one for New York City. A blackout sapped New York of its power -- when temperatures were in triple-digits -- causing looting and riots that obliterated Crown Heights and Bushwick. President Jimmy Carter subsequently turned his back on a city whose mayor, Abraham Beame, was on his knees begging for federal aid. Partygoers flocked to Studio 54 for disco and drugs. The innocent hid from the Son of Sam.
Sheltered from one crazy summer were a group of players and coaches who composed the 1977 Yankees, a team off its first AL pennant in 12 years and still searching for its first World Championship since 1963. But to think the clubhouse was a peaceful haven is to be naïve. Jackson had alienated himself from his manager, Martin, and captain, the respected Thurman Munson, since accepting George Steinbrenner's big bucks and bringing his star from Baltimore as baseball's marquee free-agent.
Negron was the Yankees' bat boy responsible for all tasks menial and great, a kid who had a 20/10 view of the circus that surrounded a group under perpetual scrutiny from Steinbrenner, its impulsive, win-now-or-else principal owner. Yet Negron insists it was a lot of fun too, even though he often bore the brunt of tomfoolery, like the time Ron Guidry, Sparky Lyle and Dick Tidrow threw him in a garbage bin.
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Making the Play
An Ex-Yankee still creates drama in the Bronx
by Melissa Segura read article .:
Hitting the write note for kids
Babe, Boss star in Yank exec's children's books
BY ANDREW J. HAWKINS
Daily News
Tuesday, July 17th 2007
Yankees executive Ray Negron said he owes his newfound success as a children's book author to the big man upstairs - George Steinbrenner.
"What he's done for me and a lot of other kids is just wonderful," Negron, 51, said of "The Boss."
As a teenage tough growing up in Queens during the turbulent '70s, Negron was caught spraying graffiti on the side of Yankee Stadium by Steinbrenner himself. Rather than bust the troubled youth, the Yankees owner showed mercy and made Negron a bat boy.
Years later, Negron is living up to his potential. He is a special adviser to Steinbrenner, he has acted in several movies, and now he's making his name as an acclaimed writer. read article .:
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