July 18, 1995: Faltering Jack McDowell founders, flips finger to fans in frustration

He was crowned the Yankee Flipper by the foul ball of fame.
He gave 50,000 fans the finger, but we’d like to share a little bit of the blame.

— Lyrics from “The Yankee Flipper” by The Baseball Project1

New York Yankees fans had plenty of reasons to boo midway into 1995.

Before a strike prematurely ended the 1994 season, the Yankees were the only American League team with 70 wins and seemed a lock for their first playoff appearance since losing the 1981 World Series, the team’s longest postseason drought since winning their first AL pennant in 1921. After a 10-5 start in ’95 made it seem like they might pick up where they’d left off, the Yankees dropped 19 of their next 24 games and lost staff ace Jimmy Key to a rotator cuff injury.

Without Key, who’d led the majors with 17 wins and finished second in the AL Cy Young Award voting in 1994, the Yankees leaned on rookies Andy Pettitte and Mariano Rivera to pick up his starts and the newly acquired Jack McDowell to eat innings.2 Almost 30 years later, McDowell recalled, “When Jimmy went down, [Yankees manager Buck Showalter] told me… ‘You’re going to have to suck it up this year. You’re gonna have to take the ball and if you’re getting beat up, you’re going to have to stay out there.’”3

In his next 12 starts after Key went down, McDowell pitched into the seventh inning or beyond 11 times. But the Yankees had just a .500 record in his starts, including losing his first five, and McDowell’s ERA of 4.47 over that span was nearly a run higher than his 3.50 career ERA, which made him and his $5.4 million salary a lightning rod for fans’ frustrations. “[When I was having a bad day,] I was giving up seven runs in seven innings and stayed out there to get pounded on,” McDowell recounted. “I had a couple of those starts in a row and I was getting booed. And then the White Sox came into town.”4

Until the previous winter, McDowell had been one of the most recognizable faces on the Chicago White Sox. From 1991-94, he represented the team in three All-Star games, led the AL in wins and complete games, and won the 1993 AL Cy Young Award. But McDowell and Chicago’s front office butted heads over contract terms, and the White Sox traded him to New York.5

Like the Yankees, the White Sox had led their division when the 1994 strike ended the season, and also like the Yankees, they were mired in fourth place in 1995. That was in part because their offseason search to replace McDowell led to signing journeymen like pitcher José DeLeón and former stars at the end of their careers, like their two starters for this rare Tuesday doubleheader.6

For the opener, Chicago sent former Yankee Jim Abbott to the mound. The lefty surrendered 13 hits, tying his career-worst mark, but pitched a complete game for a 9-4 win. Brian Boehringer, another Yankees rookie, didn’t make it out of the fourth inning, forcing Showalter to go to his bullpen early and use three of his relievers, amping up the pressure on McDowell to go deep into the second game.

Facing his former teammates, McDowell wanted desperately to show Chicago executives what they were missing. Instead, Tim Raines hit McDowell’s third pitch over the fence in right-center field, and four pitches later, Frank Thomas blasted another to right, his 24th of the season, tying Mo Vaughn and Mark McGwire for the major-league lead. The restless crowd only got more upset when John Kruk, Dave Martinez, and Norberto Martin hit back-to-back-to-back singles, scoring two more runs to put the Yankees in a 4-0 hole after a just a half-inning.

Chicago’s starter also was facing his former team. Dave Righetti, who’d made his big-league debut with the Yankees in 1979 and stayed with the franchise until 1990, was promoted from Triple-A Nashville to make the start.7 “I was really just going to retire,” the 36-year-old confessed. “I really didn’t think there was any hope to come [back to the majors]… and here I am at Yankee Stadium.”8

McDowell’s teammates fought back to erase the deficit over the next two innings. Bernie Williams and Jim Leyritz both singled to start the first and scored when Paul O’Neill belted a three-run homer down the right-field line that stayed just fair and made it a one-run game. After McDowell threw a scoreless second, Tony Fernández tied things up, scoring from first on a Randy Velarde double in the bottom of the inning.

Handed a new ballgame, however, McDowell immediately crumbled, surrendering a leadoff single to Thomas and another to Kruk, followed by an upper-deck home run to Martinez, the 20th surrendered by McDowell, tying him for worst in the majors.9 The White Sox tacked on a triple and a walk before McDowell escaped the inning.

Righetti protected his 7-4 lead, allowing a pair of singles in both the third and fourth innings but no runs.

In the fifth, McDowell and the Yankee crowd both reached their breaking points. Martinez led off with his third hit of the game, a line-drive single to left, and Martín followed with a blooper to right-center. For his 101st pitch of the game, McDowell uncorked a wild pitch that allowed Martinez to score and Martín to trot safely to third base, putting him in position to score when Mike LaValliere grounded out two pitches later. When Lance Johnson smacked a grounder up the middle for a two-out single, McDowell’s night was over.10

Showalter emerged from the dugout and the crowd of 21,188 rose in a sarcastic standing ovation, filling the ballpark with a cacophony of boos. “The most frustrating part is I’m busting my butt for your team, guys…” McDowell explained. “Don’t be booing me when this is the team that kicked me out. [It felt like] I’ve got two teams against me.”11

Walking to the dugout, the pitcher responded by throwing his right arm in the air with his middle finger extended. The image—sometimes blurred—was spotlighted on ESPN’s SportsCenter12 and covered the next day’s New York tabloids, with headlines like the New York Daily News’ blunt “Jack Ass.”13

Reliever Joe Ausanio struck out Raines to end the inning and held the White Sox scoreless for two more innings. Chicago added two more runs off Steve Howe in the eighth inning. Righetti didn’t surrender another hit, lasting into the seventh inning, and the White Sox bullpen held the Yankees scoreless the rest of the way. In contrast to McDowell’s departure, when Chicago manager Terry Bevington relieved Righetti, Yankee fans cheered the veteran.

“I ran off quickly,” Righetti said. “I’ve never been one to walk off the field. But I probably should have. Even if I don’t win another ballgame, I’ve got this one.”14 This was Righetti’s final appearance in Yankee Stadium.

After the game, the big story wasn’t Righetti’s triumphant return, Martinez’s moonshot homer, or Thomas’s bid for the home run title. “It was dead wrong to do,” Yankees owner George Steinbrenner complained about McDowell’s gesture. “We’re trying to win the fans back.”15 McDowell apologized and paid the Yankees a $5,000 fine.

He expected fans to ride him the next time he took the mound but was more concerned about the backlash he’d get from veterans taking part in the annual Old Timers Game the following weekend.

Instead, he found support. Ron Guidry told McDowell, “If anyone would have known how many times Thurman Munson did that to our crowd – it was crazy.”16

Chicago’s doubleheader sweep still left the White Sox 20 games back of the first-place Cleveland Indians in the AL Central Division. They went on to finish third in the division with a record of 68-76, 32 games behind 100-44 Cleveland.

Whether intended or not, McDowell’s gesture became a turning point for both himself and the team. After this game, his 17th start of the season, he was 7-6 with a 4.87 ERA. In his 13 remaining starts, McDowell posted a record of 8-4 with a 2.81 ERA and gave up just five more home runs.17

In the same vein, the Yankees won their next seven games and 16 of their next 20. They went 46-25 the rest of the season to finish 79-65. That left them seven games out of the AL East lead, but 1½ games ahead of the California Angels for the first ever AL Wild Card, breaking the franchise’s postseason drought.

The AL Division Series matched New York with the AL West champion Seattle Mariners, a team making its first ever playoff appearance. The Yankees lost in the 11th inning of the fifth game of a five-game series when Edgar Martínez hit a walk-off two-run double off McDowell.

Author’s Note

Years later, the story came out that McDowell’s performance may have resulted from what R.E.M. guitarist Scott McCaughey described as an “accidental night on the town,”18 partying with band members after a Madison Square Garden show the night before the game.19

McCaughey wrote “The Yankee Flipper” for The Baseball Project’s debut album in 2008, detailing his limited memory of the incident. “We always felt bad about it so that’s why writing the song was sort of my sharing a little bit of the blame with him,” McCaughey said.20 It included the lyrics:

I’m told Jack ended up on the cold tiles of the floor,
With his mom, who was visiting, banging on the bathroom door.
Next time he took the mound, well, it wasn’t a pretty sight,
And I’ve always figured it had a lot to do with that night.21

While it’s a funny story and a catchy song, R.E.M. didn’t perform at Madison Square Garden on July 17, 1995, the night before this game. The Monster Tour played three dates there from June 22-24, 1995, and the band was touring Europe in mid-July.22

Acknowledgments

This article was fact-checked by Carl Riechers and copy-edited by Keith Thursby.

Photo credit: Jack McDowell, Trading Card Database.

Sources

In addition to the sources cited in the Notes, the author also accessed Baseball-Reference.com, Stathead.com, and Retrosheet.org.

https://www.baseball-reference.com/boxes/NYA/NYA199507182.shtml

https://www.retrosheet.org/boxesetc/1995/B07182NYA1995.htm

Notes

1 The Baseball Project, “The Yankee Flipper,” written by Scott McCaughey, track 12 on Volume 1: Frozen Ropes and Dying Quails, 2008. The Baseball Project is an alt-rock supergroup that sings songs about baseball history. Also, these lyrics more than double the actual attendance of the game.

2 Ten days after this game, the Yankees bolstered their rotation by acquiring 1994 Cy Young Award winner David Cone via trade with the Toronto Blue Jays.

3 Eddie Mata, “Black Jack McDowell: Cy Young Award Winner,” The Eddie Mata Show, February 12, 2022, https://youtu.be/nN2DG6EM5xE&t=3728, accessed September 3, 2025.

4 Mata, “Black Jack McDowell.”

5 In exchange for McDowell, the Yankees sent the White Sox a pair of minor leaguer prospects: outfielder Lyle Mouton and starting pitcher Keith Heberling, who missed the 1995 season with an injury, was released without ever pitching in the White Sox system, and retired after throwing one inning for the Pittsburgh Pirates’ rookie-league affiliate in 1996. Mouton was originally a “player to be named” and didn’t join the White Sox system until April 1995.

6 The previous night’s game ended in rainout after seven innings with the score knotted at one run apiece, so it was replayed in its entirety as the first game of the doubleheader. They were the Yankees’ seventh and eighth games in seven days, part of a 19-day span without a day off.

7 Chicago’s starters in this doubleheader were, coincidentally, the only Yankee pitchers to throw no-hitters in Yankee Stadium since Don Larsen’s perfect game in the 1956 World Series, Abbott in 1993 and Righetti in 1983. Dwight Gooden was the next to do so in 1996.

8 Paul Sullivan, “Perfect Ending to Sox’s Day,” Chicago Tribune, July 19, 1995: Section 4-3. Chicago traded outfielder Warren Newsome to the Mariners to make room on the roster. This was Righetti’s first start at Yankee Stadium since leaving the team as a free agent after the 1990 season. He’d pitched 2 1/3 relief innings in April 1994 for the Oakland A’s in his only other appearance as an opponent.

9 Earlier that afternoon, Minnesota Twins starter Kevin Tapani surrendered his 19th and 20th against the Blue Jays. McDowell and Tapani both leapfrogged rookie Brad Radke, also of the Twins, who had 19. He surrendered his 20th the following evening to Rafael Palmeiro of the Baltimore Orioles. At season’s end, Radke and Chicago Cubs pitcher Kevin Foster led the majors, each surrendering 32 homers.

10 Using the Game Score metric, this was the worst start of McDowell’s career to this point and would be the second worst at his retirement. Three of his worst career starts happened between May and July this season. The worst came with the Anaheim Angels in the penultimate game of his career, in which he surrendered nine runs to the Kansas City Royals in three innings on August 2, 1999.

11 Mata, “Black Jack McDowell.”

12 “Chicago White Sox vs New York Yankees (July 18, 1995) ‘Jack McDowell Tells Yankees Fans They Are #1,’” SportsCenter, July 18, 1995, posted to YouTube by SPORTS ODYSSEY, May 4, 2021, https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=XJUZC3_UZsE, accessed September 3, 2025.

13 “Jack Ass,” New York Daily News, July 19, 1995.

14 Jason Diamos, “Yankees Go 0 for 2 Against Ex-Yanks,” New York Times, July 19, 1995: B9. Righetti made eight more starts for Chicago and finished the season 3-2 with a 4.20 ERA.

15 Bob Hertzel, “Will Jack Be Welcomed Back?,” Hackensack (New Jersey) Record, July 20, 1995: S-2.

16 Mata, “Black Jack McDowell.” According to Guidry, Munson showed Yankee Stadium the bird whenever the crowd booed any of his teammates.

17 Opponents batted .273 with an OPS of .809 through this game and .230 with an OPS of .627 the rest of the season.

18 Dave Gil de Rubio, “Hardball Academy,” Long Island Press, September 20, 2009, https://archive.longislandpress.com/2009/09/20/hardball-academy/. McCaughey joined R.E.M. as a second guitarist for the 1995 Monster Tour.

19 McDowell confirmed that he’d spent an evening out drinking with the musicians. “I was late for stretching the next day. Let’s put it that way, It was a Saturday night and there was a Sunday day game, and I was late the next day.” Adam Gimbel, “Start Spreading the Boos!,” ChinMusic!, original publication date unknown; reprinted online as “Jack McDowell Chin Music Interview,” YerDoingGreat.com, August 12, 2014, https://yerdoingreat.wordpress.com/2014/08/12/jack-mcdowell-chin-music-interview/.

20 De Rubio, “Hardball Academy.”

21 The Baseball Project, “The Yankee Flipper.”

22 “Steve Dollar, “Surgery Sidelines R.E.M. Bass Player,” Atlanta Constitution, July 12, 1995: A1; “R.E.M. ’95 Tour,” R.E.M. Timeline, https://remtimeline.com/1995.html; “R.E.M. Concert Map: Monster,” setlist.fm, https://www.setlist.fm/stats/concert-map/rem-33d6b859.html?tour=3d68dd7. Furthermore, R.E.M. was scheduled to play in Zaragoza, Spain, on July 17, but the show was canceled because bassist Mike Mills, who is mentioned by name in “The Yankee Flipper” and is a member of The Baseball Project, needed emergency abdominal surgery. Since McDowell pitched on the night of Friday, June 23, earning his fourth win, giving up two runs to the Blue Jays in 6 1/3 innings, it seems likely he went to the June 24 show, which was “a Saturday night and there was a Sunday day game” as he described, and perhaps he “was late the next day” but it didn’t matter because he wasn’t starting.