Considering how toxic Yankee fans can sometimes be, it's incredible how the Yankee fans loved him so much! He was def my favorite player. I still remember going to the 2009 world series as a kid with my dad, and watching him earn that MVP!

31 comments

  1. Tino Martinez received a similar reaction when he first came back to Yankee Stadium as a Cardinal in 2003. And in the third game of that weekend series Tino hit 2 HRs in the game and the fans wanted a curtain call.

  2. i don’t think even the most toxic yankee fan could possibly boo matsui. the dude was god in a world series we won.

    plus that dvd collection 🤤

  6. He’s definitely among the most beloved Yankees, but any player would get a standing ovation right after winning a WS MVP for the team.

  7. It would have been funny if Pettite hit him with the pitch immediately after stepping off the mound so Hideki could get his props

  8. Matsui left on good terms and he had one of the greatest World Series performances in franchise history. No hard feelings whatsoever.

  9. Brings a tear to my otherwise jaded eyes, this stuff always gets me. And pettitte stepping off, good guy. I miss those teams

  10. It would take a ton of video research for me to back this up, but my feeling after watching five decades of games is that Yankee fans are generally warm toward former players when they return in other uniforms — see Gleyber last week — and that Sawx fans are not, even when they player in question was kicked out of Boston against his will. This is a point I bring up whenever a debate is on about which fan base is classless.

  11. One of my top 3 favorite Yankees. I went to the first game he played at old Yankees Stadium. It was bases loaded and I told my dad he would hit a grand slam. And then he did. It was amazing.

  12. This isn’t that rare of a feat or great of an honor. Gleyber got the same treatment this year. He was well liked, but not a super fan favorite or anything

  14. Hideki will always get love from us Yankees fans but especially that series since it was the home opener in 2010

  15. A true Yankee. It hurts me to not see him in pinstripes.

    May he spend the rest of his days with Ichiro hitting home runs off of high school players (if anyone hasn’t watched these clips, please go do yourself a favor).

  17. We all remember how great he was in ’09, but he was one of the few highlights of the ’03 WS. When the stakes were highest, he didn’t wilt under the bright lights.

  18. I wish we could’ve kept him for a couple more years 😢 But baseball is a business and nothing lasts forever.

  26. Nothing will ever surpass Eddie Giacomin coming back to play against the Rangers now playing for the Red Wings the day after the Rangers waived him. The crowd at MSG basically became a hostile Red Wings crowd and practically booed the Rangers off the ice

  30. The bleacher creatures roll-called him when he came back to the stadium – probably influenced on coming to work for the Yanks after retired.

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