Athletes - George Brett

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	Athletes - George Brett

George Howard Brett (born May 15, 1953 in Glen Dale, West Virginia) is a former American baseball player. He is one of the greatest third basemen in Major League Baseball history and the only man to ever win batting titles in three different decades.

Brett was the second youngest child of a sports-minded family which included his older brother Ken, a major-league pitcher. His family moved to the midwest and later to Southern California when he was a boy, and Brett grew up hoping to follow in his brother's footsteps as a big-league baseball player. He was drafted by the fledgling Kansas City Royals in the second round of the 1971 baseball draft.

Brett began his professional career as a shortstop, but had trouble going to his right defensively and was soon shifted to third base. As a third baseman, his powerful arm remained an asset, and he remained at that spot for 15 years. The Royals promoted him to the major leagues on August 2, 1973.

He won the starting third-base job a year later, but struggled with the bat until he asked for help from Charlie Lau, the Royals' hitting instructor. Spending the 1974 All-Star break working together, Lau taught Brett how to protect the entire plate and cover up some holes in his swing that experienced big-league pitchers were taking advantage of. Armed with this knowledge, Brett developed rapidly as a hitter.

He topped the .300 mark for the first time in 1975 with a .308 mark, then won his first batting title in 1976 with a .333 average. The four candidates for the batting title that year were Brett and Royals teammate Hal McRae, and Minnesota Twins teammates Rod Carew and Lyman Bostock. In dramatic fashion, Brett went 2 for 4 in the final game of the season against the Twins, beating out his three rivals, all playing in the same game. His lead over second-place McRae was less than .001.

That year, the Royals won the first of three straight West Division titles, beginning a great rivalry with the New York Yankees -- whom they faced in the American League Championship Series each of those three years. In the fifth and final game of the 1976 ALCS, Brett hit a three-run homer in the top of the eighth inning to tie the score at six -- only to see the Yankees' Chris Chambliss launch a solo shot in the bottom of the ninth to give the Royals' rivals a 7-6 win..

A year later, Brett emerged as a power hitter with 22 home runs helping the Royals to another American League Championship Series, 1977, and proceeded to have an incredible 1979 season in which he was an MVP candidate. He became the first player in league history to have at least 20 doubles, triples and homers all in one season (42-20-23) and led the league in hits, doubles and triples while batting .329. All these impressive statistics were just a prelude to 1980, when Brett nearly matched Ted Williams' feat of batting .400. He was at or above .400 as late in the season as September 19 before settling at .390, the modern record for the highest average ever by a third baseman. This time, there was no doubt Brett was the league MVP.

In the 1980 postseason, Brett led the Royals to their first pennant, sweeping the playoffs in three games from the rival New York Yankees who had beaten K.C. in the 1976, 1977 and 1978 playoffs. In Game 3, Brett hit a ball into the third deck of Yankee Stadium off superstar closer Goose Gossage, a longtime rival. Long-time announcer Howard Cosell commented on the broadcast "...it looked like Gossage let up on that pitch that Brett hit out, and Brett made him pay for it." A few seconds later the ABC radar gun showed the pitch's speed at 98 mph, Gossage's fastest pitch of the game by 2 mph. Brett then hit .375 in the 1980 World Series, but the Royals lost in six games to the Philadelphia Phillies. During the 1980 World Series, Brett made headlines for reasons other than his play on the field. After Game 2, Brett had to have surgery to remove hemorrhoids. In Game 3, a fully recovered Brett hit a home run as his Royals wound up winning in 10 innings by the score of 4-3.

Brett had injuries on-and-off for the next four years, during which his most noteworthy achievement was the notorious "Pine Tar Incident." On July 24, 1983, the Royals were playing the Yankees at Yankee Stadium. In the top of the ninth inning, Brett came up to bat against Goose Gossage, his old rival. Brett hit a two-run homer, putting the Royals up 5-4. After Brett rounded the bases, Yankees manager Billy Martin (at the suggestion of his third baseman Graig Nettles) came out of the dugout and used home plate to measure the amount of pine tar on Brett's bat, citing an obscure rule that stated the pine tar on a bat could extend no further than 18 inches. Brett's pine tar extended about 24 inches.

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Athletes - George Brett

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