Final Voyage

The 2014 season will the last time Derek
Jeter plays MLB baseball.

For years Major League Baseball has seen players come and go, but yesterday afternoon was different. 

This is an end of an era.

Nearly a year after Mariano Rivera announced that the 2013 season would be his final in professional baseball, Derek Jeter followed suit.

In a 15-paragraph letter, Jeter used his Facebook page to announce his inevitable retirement from baseball.

"I could not be more sure. I know it in my heart. The 2014 season will be my last year playing professional baseball," Jeter wrote.

Jeter's announcement does not come as a surprise after playing in just 17 games a year ago that resulted in 73 plate appearances, his fewest since 1995. It was in Game 1 of the 2012 American League Championship Series against the Detroit Tigers that Jeter suffered a fracture in his left ankle that ultimately ended his aura of invincibility.

But marked the beginning of the end.

After leading the majors in hits (216) for only the second time in career that same season, Jeter had to watch his team get swept out of the postseason and for the first time in his career, the writing was on the wall.

Father time is undefeated. So why did we think Jeter was any different? One word.

Winner.

Jeter has always defied the odds and come out on top.

He once told his fourth-grade teacher in an essay that he would play shortstop for the New York Yankees. Less than ten years later, Jeter saw that dream come true after being selected as the sixth overall pick in the 1992 Draft by his childhood team.

But that almost didn't happened.

The Houston Astros held the first overall pick and Hall of Famer Hal Newhouser insisted they draft the lanky, 18-year-old high school shortstop from Michigan. However, the organization went a different direction, taking third baseman Phil Nevin out of Cal State Fullerton.

Following that decision, Newhouser quit and said he would never work in baseball again. He passed away in 1998, only getting a glimpse of how great Jeter would become.

But Newhouser wasn't the only scout that saw the potential in Jeter.

In 1992, Jeter realized his childhood dream,
being drafted by the Yankees.

Scout Dick Groat was once asked whether or not he thought Jeter would accept his athletic scholarship to play baseball at the University of Michigan or enter the draft. His response, "the only place Derek Jeter's going is to Cooperstown."

Boy, was he ever right, but it didn't always look like it.

In his first professional season with the Gulf Coast Yankees at the Rookie-level, Jeter batted .202 in just 47 games and called home crying almost every night, wondering if baseball was his future.

Just two years later, Jeter was rapidly ascending through the Yankees' minor league system, playing at three different levels, including Class AAA for the Columbus Clippers. He was named the Minor League Player of the Year and deemed ready to play at the next level.

On May 30, 1995, a day after making his Major League debut, Jeter recorded his first Major League hit in the Kingdome off right-hander Tim Belcher, it would be the first of many more to come.

The following spring newly hired manager Joe Torre said New York would break camp with Jeter as their starting shortstop. But Jeter struggled that spring and raised concerned for many in the organization, especially Clyde King, who was an advisor to owner George Steinbrenner.

Steinbrenner approved a trade that would have sent Rivera to the Seattle Mariners in exchange for shortstop, Felix Fermin, but general manager Gene Michael and assistant GM Brian Cashman convinced the Boss not to.

How different history might have been.

Jeter quickly rewarded them.

On Opening Day 1996 in Cleveland, Jeter hit first first career home run, leaving the yard in his first at-bat of the season. Also, he making an incredible over the shoulder catch, laying the groundwork for awarding winning season.

Jeter was named the the '96 American League Rookie of the Year, becoming the first Yankee to capture the award since Dave Righetti did so in 1981.

In Game 1 of ALCS against the Baltimore Orioles, Jeter hit a controversial home run that was pulled over the wall by a young boy by the name of Jeffrey Maier sitting the right field bleachers. The home run tied the game and eventually lead to a 5-4 Yankee win in 11innings.

The infamous home run shifted the moment of the series and propelled New York to win their first A.L. Pennant in 25 years.

Jeter capped his rookie campaign with the greatest prize of all, the Yankees' first World Series title since 1978, the beginning of the next Yankee dynasty.

In 1998, Jeter set a career-high in runs (127), was selected to his first All-Star Game and led the Yankees to their second World Series title in three years. New York finished the season, including the postseason, with 125 wins, still a Major League record.

The 1999 season was even better to Jeter after he set career-highs in batting average (.349) and hits. His 219 hits led the majors and capped another All-Star season with his third and second consecutive World Series win. It was the first time since 1976-78, the Yankees had appeared in three straight Fall Classics and were able to win back-to-back championships.

As if that wasn't enough, at the turn of the century, Jeter was able to accomplish something no other player ever has.

In the 2000 All-Star Game in Atlanta, Jeter went 3-for-3 with 4 total bases and was named the game's Most Valuable Player in a 6-3 A.L. victory. Then four months later, Jeter carried the Yankees to their fourth straight World Series appearance and first ever Subway Series.

Jeter help lead the Yankees to
four titles in five years.

During that series, five of Jeter's nine hits were for extra bases (13 total bases), two in which left the yard. One of those home runs was a momentum shifting, leadoff bomb in the pivotal Game 4 off right-hander Bobby Jones.

The Yankees went on to win the series in five games with Jeter being named MVP after batting .409.

In 2003, Jeter was named the team's 14th captain in franchise history by Steinbrenner and only the 6th since he had bought the team in 1973.

The next five seasons yielded mixed results for Jeter.

While his individual success on the field continued to rise, the team wasn't meeting expectations. From 2004-2007, New York failed to reach the World Series and only made in past the divisional once, where they experienced the greatest collapse in postseason, squandering a 3-0 series lead to the hated Boston Red Sox.

That four-span ultimately lead to the resignation of Torre, basically the only manager Jeter knew. Torre had become a father figure to Jeter and his departure from the Bronx wasn't easy.

In 2008, New York hired Jeter's former teammate Joe Girardi to replace Torre at the helm and for the first time in Jeter's big league career, the team missed the postseason in Yankee Stadium's final season.

But the following year might have been the most gratifying of Jeter's career.

For the first time since being named captain, Jeter and the Yankees brought home the 27th World Series title in franchise history, defeating the Phillies in six games.

In 2011, Jeter wowed us again on a hot summer day in July.

After singling in the first inning off starter Tampa Bay's David Price and needing only one more hit to join the elusive 3,000 hit club, Jeter deposited a hanging, 78-mph curveball into the left field bleachers, becoming only the 28th player in history to reach that milestone.

Wade Boggs is the only other player to hit a home run for hit No. 3,000.

Jeter finished the game 5-for-5 and gave New York fans another magical day at the Stadium.

Since that time, Jeter has continued to climb up the all-time hit list, passing 18 Hall of Famers along the way. His 3,316 career hits is good enough for ninth on that list. Entering his final season, the 13x All-Star needs 115 hits to pass Honus Wagner (3,430) for the most by a shortstop.

He needs 184 hits to become only the sixth player in history to total more than 3,500 hits and 200 to pass Tris Speaker's 3,515 to crack the top five.

Over the years, Jeter has taken a lot
of heat for his defense.

As for his defense, despite being a five-time Gold Glover, many believe Jeter has been more of a liability at shortstop than an asset. That his signature jump throw would be a routine ground ball for almost every other shortstop in the game.

But what about the in the sixth inning of Game 1 of the '00 World Series, when Jeter made a perfect off balance, relay throw to nail Timo Perez at the plate and keep the game scoreless that eventually lead to a Yankee win.

Or the famous flip play that showed Jeremy Giambi and youngsters alike it's always better to slide and preserved a 1-0 lead in the seventh inning of Game 3 of the 2001 A.L. Division Series against the Oakland Athletics.

How about his 2004 dive into the stands against the Red Sox that left his face bloody and battered?

And then again in Game 3 of the ALDS against the Minnesota Twins when Jeter fielded a Denard Span chopper and instead trying to throw out the speedy center fielder, he caught Nick Punto wandering off third base too far, throwing home and eventually picking him off.

There is only one Ozzie Smith, but when it mattered most Jeter was at his best.

Jeter will leave the game as one of the greatest in Yankee history, doing so with grace and class.

Jeter is the final member remaining of
the Core Four.

He ranks first in franchise history in plate appearances (11,968), at-bats (10,614), games (2,602), hits (3,316) and stolen bases (348).

The five-time World Series champion has the most plate appearances (734), at-bats (650), games (158), hits (200), runs (111), doubles (32), triples (5) and total bases (302) in postseason history. Jeter is also in top five in home runs (20, 3rd) and runs batted in (61, 4th).

In 19 seasons, Jeter managed to do everything the right way, the Yankee way. He commanded respect on and off the field by his piers and baseball fans across the country in the biggest, where the lights shine brightest. For the last two decades, Jeter has been the face of baseball and the game couldn't have asked for a better ambassador.

He taught us how to win.

How to be a leader.

How anything is possible, even an improbable childhood dream.

And he'll teach us how a captain sails in his final voyage.

Farwell Captain.