Yogi

The iron filings of karma are attracted only where a magnet of the personal ego still exists.
—YOGI PARAMAHANSA YOGANANDA

A good ball club.
—YOGI BERRA when asked what makes a good manager

Since 1960, the Yankees and their fellow New Yorkers, the Mets, have won 11 pennants. Yogi, who served with the Mets as coach from 1965 through 71 and as manager from '72 through part of '75, is the only person who has been a player or a coach or a manager on every one of those pennant-winning teams. When he was fired by the Yankees after losing to St. Louis in the '64 World Series and also when he was fired by the Mets in '75 although his '73 team had won a pennant, Yogi's critics said he had lost control of his players. But a yogi doesn't try to control others. "Every individual," says the Maharishi Mahesh Yogi, "is responsible for his own development in any field." Were the Maharishi a baseball fan, he would add "and at the plate." A yogi attempts to control himself.

Too nice a guy, Yogi's detractors have said of him. But "gentleness of mind is an attribute of a yogi, whose heart melts at all suffering," said the Yogi B.K.S. Iyengar. Robert Burnes, a St. Louis baseball writer, once went with Berra to a church father-and-son banquet. Every son received a bat and a ball and came up to have Yogi autograph them. At a corner table were some kids from a local orphanage. They sat there with no balls or bats. "Aren't they getting anything?" Yogi asked. An organizer of the banquet told him that a couple of balls were being sent to the home for the orphans' use. "We think it's enough of a thrill for them just to be here," the man added.

Yogi got up from the head table, went to the orphans' table, sat down and began autographing whatever the orphans had. Someone at the head table finally said, "Yogi, we'd like you to come back up here and say a few words."

"Go on with the program," Yogi snapped. "I'm busy. I'm talking to some friends." And he stayed with the orphans the rest of the evening. As he and Burnes left, Yogi said, "I'll never forget that as long as I live."

When Yogi was promoted to manager this winter—he'd rejoined the Yankees as a coach in '76—Boston sports talk show host Eddie Andelman said that what the Yankees were actually getting was a "designated schmoo." Yogi's shape and good nature may resemble a schmoo's, but he may be more than that. He may be the man of the hour.

The time is now and now is the time.
—YOGI BHAJAN

You mean right now?
—YOGI BERRA when someone asked him what time it was

To speak of the history of the Steinbrenner Yankees is difficult, because who wants to wade through all that again? To speak of Berra's history is difficult because so much of what's said about him—no one, including Yogi, seems to know how much—is legend.