 Hello again, everyone, and welcome to another edition of Yes, We're Here. I'm Jack Curry, and I'm thrilled today to be joined by Hall of Famer Tim Reigns. He was part of the Yankee Championship teams in 1996 and 1998. Tim, first of all, welcome to the show, but second of all, I need to ask you, how are you and your family doing during these challenging times? Well, thanks for having me. Me and my family is doing great. I mean, my twin daughters will be 10 in September, so obviously they don't like being stuck in the house and not being able to go outside. They're very active, but we're having a good time trying to figure out things to do for them. But we are doing great. We're hoping that things get better here pretty soon and hoping everybody is taking care of themselves. Tim, you retired in 2002, and then five years after that, you go on the Hall of Fame ballot. I want to tell you, I have a Hall of Fame vote, and I was voting for you at the beginning, but it took until the 10th season for you to get into the Hall of Fame. What was that journey like? What were you thinking as you were taking to that journey and wondering if you were going to get more than 75% and get into Cooperstown? Well, when my name was first put on about it, I was just hoping that I got enough votes to stay on for the next year. I wasn't really thinking about it that much. I felt like I had a decent career that it wasn't at least staying on the ballot for a little while. But as the years went on, I thought I was thinking a little more because the votes started creeping up more and more and more. And when I got to like the seventh year, I think it's really when the tension started because I wasn't really sure if I was going to make it. And then the rule changed. So I wasn't sure because I only had two years left when they changed the rules. The rules were that 15 years, then all of a sudden they cut it down to 10. So I was I was shortened seven of those years. So it got kind of nervous. I was feeling that, OK, if I deserve to be in here, they'll give me a year. If I don't just get enough votes to even get to there. So as a vote got, you know, a year before I got in, I was like 23 votes short. But a year left and I felt like it definitely had to be 23 guys that could could vote my way to get me in. But I wasn't really sure. And it was really, really nervous. It was a nervous time leading up to, you know, me getting the call. But I really didn't sleep that well, even though I felt like it should have been a shoe in. But, you know, until the phone run, I felt nervous. First of all, I need to correct you. You said you had a decent career. You didn't have a decent career. You had a great career. You had a Hall of Fame career. But before that vote, Tim, you're a great player. After that vote, everyone identifies you as Hall of Famer. How magical is that even on a show like this? When I said Tim Reigns is with us, it's Hall of Famer Tim Reigns. To have that designation before your first name, how magical is that? I think it's as magical as it gets being a professional athlete. You know, when you go into your profession, you know, you go in, you know, just trying to survive, you know, you have to prove yourself, you know, from day one to it's time for you to leave. You know, when I first started, you know, I was called up September call up in 79. And I was just happy to wear a uniform. I didn't really play. I was a pinch runner. So just being in the clubhouse, being around, you know, the players and just feeling like, you know, I don't know if I belong here yet, but, you know, hopefully I'm going to take advantage of the situation I have, you know, going up for the last month of the season, I think I pinch ran two or three times. But, you know, being able to not only be up there, but contribute in a way. And it wasn't like playing defense or hitting, but, you know, based on, for me, was, you know, at the top of my list as far as the skills that I had at that time. But as the years went on two, three years after that, I realized that I belong here and, you know, the guys welcome me there, you know, playing with guys like Dawson and Carter, all the famous, you know, I knew that, you know, if I could be around these guys long enough, they would show me the way and hopefully I had the skills well enough that they could look at me and say, all right, kid, you know, let's go, let's go do this. And, you know, it could have been better, you know, playing with Dawson and Carter because those guys were great players and they were great mentors. And I thank God for getting the opportunity to play with them. You had such an impact in Montreal when you were there, too. You talked about welcoming. How were you welcomed when you were treated to the Yankees in 1996? And what did you think about the news when you found out that the Yankees had acquired you? Well, I wasn't real sure at first because I even asked around other players who had played there and only played there for a short period of time. And I asked some guys who had played there for a long period of time. And, you know, playing in Montreal, it wasn't the same, you know. Being in Montreal, you can kind of, you can kind of do what you want and, you know, unless you're playing in the big cities, no one, you know, knows you around. But you can, you know, you got away with a lot of stuff. In New York, I don't think you can get away with too much stuff, you know. Good or bad, I think. And I just wanted to be really sure. But then I looked at myself and I said, you know, this is an opportunity to get a chance to go to a World Series. And that's what I was looking for. It was like my 17th season, I think, when I went to New York. And I haven't got a chance. I want you to play off once with the expose. That was my rookie season. So I went a couple of times with the White Sox and we just didn't get over the hump. And I never got a chance to get to a World Series. But in 96, we went to New York, took a while for me to get healthy. And I got healthy at the right time right around September area. I think I went in there. And I did some good things offensively. You know, I started hitting some homeruns. I really wasn't a homerun hitter, but I hit some homerun in September to kind of get us over the hump and then going into the World Series. And the first one and winning it and that was the icing on the cake. I mean, you know, as players, you know, surely we want to take care of our families, we want to make some money. But as players that love the game and want to want to get to a World Series and win a World Series, that was the one thing that I felt like I was missing and I felt New York would get me to that position and maybe it. Tim, across these last few weeks, I've had the chance to talk to about 10 players from that 1996 team. And when you look back at what that team accomplished, the Braves had three future Hall of Famers in their rotation. And you guys still figured out a way to bounce back from a two nothing deficit, win that series in six games. You're smiling even before I ask the question. What was what was special about that 96 team that it had that ability to be so resilient and to be so strong? Well, we had a bunch of rebels on that team. I mean, we had players from from all over baseball from other organization. Obviously, Jeter, it was his rookie season. We had Posada and we had Bernie, who organizational guys. And then, you know, we we brought a guy from everywhere. You know, we had myself, we had strawberry, you know, we had Cecil Fielder, we had Wade Boggs. I mean, we had guys from from from all over both leagues. And we wasn't young. I mean, we're older guys, but we still could play the game. And I think, you know, having Joe Torrey as the manager, it was a great place to be because Joe kind of let us play. I mean, we had some some guys not playing every day. I didn't play every day, starting play every day. We're attuning here and there. But that team genuinely got along together to whether I think any team could have gotten along, especially being, you know, from from other organizations. We had we had stars from every from from teams from everywhere. And I think in baseball, you know, not that everyone has to be alone, but I feel like that team got along as well as any team that I had ever been with, even though we came from different organizations. I think we we all wanted the same thing that was to win a World Series. And we played together. We've won together and we lost together. And I think we went down to nothing and we lost our first two games in New York. So I think George at the time felt like there was no chance we were going to win. So we went to Atlanta. George came in and said, you know, you guys have a good year. I don't think you're going to be to beat the praise and, you know, just go out and do the best you can. And I think when he came in and said that, we all kind of kind of looked at him and said, OK, we'll show you. And, you know, going in extra and that's the first game and winning that first was all it took. I mean, even though they had, like you said, three whole of famed pitchers, we felt like we had enough offense and enough pitching that if we can get that first game, we felt like we got to be able to win the series and we ended up winning the next three. You talk about that team coming together and how that team got along. If you walked into the clubhouse in those days and you looked towards your left, there were normally two guys who were having a back and forth. You and young Jeter, you and Mr. Jeter really developed a bond and you seem to be able to make him laugh, maybe more than any other guy I've ever seen around Jeter. And he always talks about you as being one of his favorite teammates, because you never let a bad day bleed into the next day. You were always upbeat. How did that bond develop between you and Jeter? Well, you know, I think what happens a lot of times in the way it used to be back in the olden days. And I remember those olden days when a rookie came in and took a picture of the rookie. They made him do all kinds of things. Signed shoes, carry their bags, carried the big jumbo music boxes. I mean, I had to do all that stuff when I was a rookie. And I just felt like for myself being a, you know, 15 or 16 year vet, making sure that the young rookie Jeter would feel like he was a part of us. And I kind of made sure that no one really got on him. But most rookie used to get on back in the day. And I felt like we really needed him to be him. And in order for him to be him, he had to be relaxed and be able to deal with a lot of veteran players who might want to, you know, take advantage of his rookie status. I made sure no one mess with him, you know? I made sure that if he was going to do the things that we felt like he could do, he had to be comfortable with everyone in the clubhouse. And I kind of made sure that we only played together three years. But I just think that three years that I spent with him was three of the best seasons I think, you know, teammates could have. You know, he would start his Hall of Fame career. I was in the tail end of my career. But as far as, you know, watching him grow from his rookie season to the end of his career was remarkable. When I first saw him in spring training that first year in 96, I didn't think that he was ready to be leagues at that time. I mean, I remember spring training. He's having a tough time turning the double play. We weren't really sure if he was really going to make the team. And Tony Fernandez, I think broke his leg or arm or something. And he was out for the year. And the next guy in line was Derek Jeter. And we were hoping that, you know, that he'd be ready. We wasn't really sure. But from day one, the first game of that season, I think hit a home run. They had two or three hits. And he kind of carried the team pretty much by himself that first game. And from the first game on, he's been he's been an all-star and so, so happy for him because, you know, he's a great kid. He had a great career and he deserve everything he gets. Tim, you had a great career yourself. And as we wrap this up here, it's a Hall of Fame career. You had over 2600 hits, over 800 stolen bases, seven all-star appearances. You're on the MVP ballot seven different years where you got votes. 385 on base percent. I lay out all those numbers. What are you most proud of about your career? I would say the hits, you know, the average, the home base percentage, those things, you know, and I think I was the honorary defensive player, you know, never had a strong arm in the outfield. So I, you know, I remember one year leading the league in the six, though, in the outfield, I played set of field. So I had myself voted back for that because I was never, I was never, you know, recognized as a defensive player because, you know, when bigger people think of my name, they always talk about, you know, the stolen base. But I'm more proud of the home base percentage, you know, the RBI. I don't think people realize that I drove in a lot of runs as a lead-off guy. It's not too many lead-off guys. You know, other than Ricky Henderson and guys that were normal lead-off guys, drove in the runs, and I was a clutch hitter too. So don't mean that it was kind of overlooked over my career because the first thing he thought was how many bases he was going to steal and not the other things that I did on the field. Well, Tim, it was a pleasure to cover you. It's a pleasure to talk to you again today. And we really thank you for giving us some time. And once things get back to normal, I know you want to get back to a baseball field. And we all want to see a baseball season come back at some point. Thank you so much for your time. Well, thanks for having me. And I just want to continue to tell people to play. We're going to get back to normal. And as long as we do our part and do what we need to do to get back to normalcy, it's going to get better.