30 With Murti

Mariano Rivera received 100% of the votes in January in being elected to the Hall of Fame by the Baseball Writers Association of America. He will be inducted this weekend in Cooperstown, New York.  

But even Mariano wasn’t successful 100% of the time. Ever wonder what it was like to face him, and even beat the greatest closer of all-time? 

This special edition of “30 With Murti” features Sandy Alomar Jr., Luis Gonzalez, David Wright and others, including the only man to ever hit a walk-off grand slam against Rivera, former Cleveland Indians infielder Bill Selby.  

He is simply the greatest closer of all-time. Yankees legend Mariano Rivera will be inducted into the Baseball Hall of Fame this weekend. Rivera sat down with our Sweeny Murti for a look back at his life and career in this special edition of the "30 With Murti" podcast. 

Mike Mussina was always one of the most forward thinking players in the game, but some of his thoughts on today’s game might surprise you. For more on his Hall of Fame career and the game today, here is part two of “30 With Murti” featuring Mike Mussina.

Former Yankees and Orioles pitcher Mike Mussina enters the Baseball Hall of Fame next weekend. This week Sweeny sits down with Mussina in a special two-part look at his career and outlook on the game. Here is part one of “30 With Murti” with Mike Mussina.

Derek Jeter will highlight the Hall of Fame Class of 2020, but he has obvious deep ties to members of this years class as well.

In this episode of “30 With Murti,” WFAN's Sweeny Murti talks to the former Yankees captain about his long career playing with Mariano Rivera, the ups and downs of the early part of their journey and their rise to the championship years.

Jeter, now the CEO of the Miami Marlins, also talks about other members of this year’s Hall of Fame class.

On Mike Mussina: "Moose was a great teammate because Moose went out, did his job, did his job very well. ... You didn’t have to sit and wonder if he was going to be prepared to do his job.”

On Roy Halladay: "Roy Halladay was by far the toughest pitcher for me to face. I just couldn’t figure him out.”

On Edgar Martinez: “I would get on Mo. ... He just owned Mo.”

And on his own Hall of Fame chances next year: “I try not to think a lot about it. I mean, I have my hands full down here in Miami right now.”

In 2009 the Yankees felt the weight of going almost a decade since their last World Series Championship.  After missing the playoffs the year before, the Yankees branded their annual goal very specifically.  “Mission 27” they called it, the drive for the franchise’s 27th World Series championship.

That is also the title of  the new book from veteran beat writers Mark Feinsand and Bryan Hoch, “Mission 27: A New Boss, A New Ballpark, and One Last Ring for the Yankees Core Four,” available  now from Triumph Books.

This episode of 30 With Murti is a roundtable discussion with the authors about that championship season, and a dive into the book that brings new life and behind the scenes detail to the Yankees last championship run.

Next month marks the 80th anniversary of one of the most famous speeches in American history—Lou Gehrig’s “luckies man on the face of the earth” speech, delivered at Yankee Stadium on July 4, 1939.

In this episode of “30 With Murt” Sweeny discusses the speech and its impact with two people who have had a great part of their lives impacted by Gehrig in different ways.

Jonathan Eig is the author of “Luckiest Man:  The Life And Death of Lou Gehrig,” the definitive biography of The Iron Horse.

Matt Dahlgren is the grandson of Babe Dahlgren, the man who replaced Gehrig in the Yankees lineup on May 2, 1939, the day Gehrig’s streak of 2,130 consecutive games came to an end.

Eig and Dahlgren share their stories and perspectives as Sweeny talks to them about the most famous moment in history of Yankee Stadium. 

David Cone’s life and career have had plenty of highlights. There have been some lowlights, too, and Cone shares both with great detail and insight in the book “Full Count: The Education of a Pitcher,” co-written with Jack Curry.

In this episode of “30 With Murti,” Sweeny Murti chats with both Cone and Curry about the book, available now from Grand Central Publishing.  

Dave Twardzik spent his life in professional basketball, an eight-year career in the ABA and NBA highlighted as the point guard on the 1977 world champion Portland Trail Blazers. 

But before he teamed up with Hall of Famer Bill Walton, he wore the blue and gold of the Middletown Blue Raiders from Middletown, Pennsylvania, which also happens to be the hometown of our very own Sweeny Murti.

In this edition of "30 With Murti," Sweeny takes a stroll down memory lane with Twardzik about Middletown’s run to the 1968 Pennsylvania state basketball championship, a small-town run to the title straight out of the movie “Hoosiers.”

Listen here as Twardzik recounts his high school glory days as well as his days in the ABA playing alongside none other than Dr. J, Julius Erving himself. A must-listen for basketball fans in this episode of "30 With Murti."

Pat Williams knew the luck of the lottery back in 1992 when his Orlando Magic found the pingpong ball that landed them Shaquille O’Neal. Williams, the 79-year-old co-founder and senior vice president of the Magic these days announced his retirement last month.  

But that’s just an excuse for Pat to be out on the circuit telling more stories about his entertaining life in sports, which began with a love of baseball and a brief career as a minor league catcher in the early 1960s.

In this episode of "30 With Murti," Williams tells us about his baseball roots as a young boy in Philadelphia and how it eventually led him to becoming one of the top executives in the history of the NBA. But all the while, baseball is still in Pat’s heart, and you’ll hear about all his wonderful connections to the game, including one to a Hall of Fame pitcher and another to the current manager of the Yankees.