Challenge the Yankees Board Game

[The Crimson King]

MM once again coming up with good stuff (word thread) and munched a memory long forgotten. 

Challenge the Yankees … OMG does that bring back summer days on the front lawn trying to roll a twelve. Also popular at ole' Eastern Academy Day Camp.

There were two teams, the Yankees and one consisting 25 other players with each of the other franchises represented (remember only 20 teams then). IIRC the Met was Duke Snider. Apparently that was the '64 set because the '65 set had Joe Christopher 

Other than us two nuts does anyone else remember this game? It was before we all discovered Strat-o-Matic and APBA and completely forgot about this one. Very simple cards for batting and no consideration of the pitchers, who just had batting on their cards. 

Made me look this up. The game was only produced in '64 and 65 by Hasbro. I guess by the latter year it was no longer a "challenge" to play the Yankees anymore.

Here's the Wikipedia page for MM to check out the rosters:

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Challenge_The_Yankees

So you can dig and are feeling nostalgic? Check this out:

https://www.ebay.com/sch/i.html?_from=R40&_nkw=challenge+the+yankees+game&_sacat=0&_sop=16

Got $7,500 handy?

[munchmemory]

24 minutes ago, The Crimson King said:

MM once again coming up with good stuff (word thread) and munched a memory long forgotten. 

Challenge the Yankees … OMG does that bring back summer days on the front lawn trying to roll a twelve. Also popular at ole' Eastern Academy Day Camp.

There were two teams, the Yankees and one consisting 25 other players with each of the other franchises represented (remember only 20 teams then). IIRC the Met was Duke Snider. Apparently that was the '64 set because the '65 set had Joe Christopher 

Other than us two nuts does anyone else remember this game? It was before we all discovered Strat-o-Matic and APBA and completely forgot about this one. Very simple cards for batting and no consideration of the pitchers, who just had batting on their cards. 

Made me look this up. The game was only produced in '64 and 65 by Hasbro. I guess by the latter year it was no longer a "challenge" to play the Yankees anymore.

Here's the Wikipedia page for MM to check out the rosters:

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Challenge_The_Yankees

So you can dig and are feeling nostalgic? Check this out:

https://www.ebay.com/sch/i.html?_from=R40&_nkw=challenge+the+yankees+game&_sacat=0&_sop=16

Got $7,500 handy?

Wow, great post, CK.  Reading this, and without looking at that link, these names jumped to mind: Aaron, Harmon Killebrew, Pete Ward, McCovey, Ron Santo, Marichal and Eddie Matthews from the non-Yanks.  The Yankees I recall are Mick, Maris, Yogi, Pepi, Whitey, Bouton, Boyer, Ralph Terry and Hal Reniff (why? lol), Linz, Blanchard...  

My friends and I played that game all the time.  Loved the cards with their image and all the stats.  Mind f*ck is you mentioning Strat-O-Matic.  That became an obsession with my friends, too.  Had a league and we did batting averages, etc.  Should have been called Nerd-O-Matic.

[munchmemory]

Almost made me cry seeing this:

[munchmemory]

[munchmemory]

[The Crimson King]

yeesh … I even remember those pictures

BTW: Now SOM comes in computer form that keeps the stats for you and you can even manipulate the rosters and players. My best friend LOST our '65 stats about 130 games into it. He actually brought that up recently. 

 

[munchmemory]

5 minutes ago, The Crimson King said:

yeesh … I even remember those pictures

BTW: Now SOM comes in computer form that keeps the stats for you and you can even manipulate the rosters and players. My best friend LOST our '65 stats about 130 games into it. He actually brought that up recently. 

 

Losing those stats had to be rough.  

[The Crimson King]

9 minutes ago, munchmemory said:

Losing those stats had to be rough.  

also the same summer the park pool open and we started to see girls in bikinis. "Ah ha!", We said to ourselves, "There might be something more interesting than baseball !". Of course, in the end they both produced equal amounts of heartache  

So what do you think the odds are that at least one other person here remembers this stuff (CTY or SOM, not girls in bikinis)

[southparkcpa]

I’m a real A hole Yankee fan.  I see kids wearing Yankee  stuff in bars and I ask them if they are big fans. they say yes,  I ask them to name the top 5 Yankees of all time. I then tell them All were in their prime before 1962.   
 

They just look at me like I’m nuts.  
 

[Matt39]

4 minutes ago, southparkcpa said:

I’m a real A hole Yankee fan.  I see kids wearing Yankee  stuff in bars and I ask them if they are big fans. they say yes,  I ask them to name the top 5 Yankees of all time. I then tell them All were in their prime before 1962.   
 

They just look at me like I’m nuts.  
 

Ruth, Gehrig, Dimaggio, Arod, Mantle?

[southparkcpa]

39 minutes ago, Matt39 said:

Ruth, Gehrig, Dimaggio, Arod, Mantle?

LMAO!!!!   It’s Ruth, Gehrig, DiMaggio, Mantle, Berra.   In that order.  I’m ok with 3 to 5 interchanged but I tell these young kids , google BEST baseball player ever and all lists say RUTH so number 1 is not Bernie Williams or Derek Jeter.   

[The Crimson King]

38 minutes ago, southparkcpa said:

LMAO!!!!   It’s Ruth, Gehrig, DiMaggio, Mantle, Berra.   In that order.  I’m ok with 3 to 5 interchanged but I tell these young kids , google BEST baseball player ever and all lists say RUTH so number 1 is not Bernie Williams or Derek Jeter.   

Pretty good order on that list, except none of them can play guitar like Bernie :). Maybe an honorable mention for Ford?

Now as a Mets fan, the top 5 Yankees for us were all AFTER '62:

Horace Clarke because he was not Bobby Richardson

Bob Kammeyer for his 1979 stat line

Jake Gibbs (who was a better QB than a baseball player, but the again so was Galen Cisco)

Ron Woods (although he did get the Yankees one of our top 5 below)

Deion Sanders (never liked him and he absolutely fell on his face in the Bronx)

best Yankees ever? Well those Ruth and Gehrig fellas did OK, but they were just not:

Darryl Strawberry

Dwight Gooden

David Cone

Bobby Ojeda

Ron Swoboda

 

 

 

[southparkcpa]

6 hours ago, The Crimson King said:

Pretty good order on that list, except none of them can play guitar like Bernie :). Maybe an honorable mention for Ford?

Now as a Mets fan, the top 5 Yankees for us were all AFTER '62:

Horace Clarke because he was not Bobby Richardson

Bob Kammeyer for his 1979 stat line

Jake Gibbs (who was a better QB than a baseball player, but the again so was Galen Cisco)

Ron Woods (although he did get the Yankees one of our top 5 below)

Deion Sanders (never liked him and he absolutely fell on his face in the Bronx)

best Yankees ever? Well those Ruth and Gehrig fellas did OK, but they were just not:

Darryl Strawberry

Dwight Gooden

David Cone

Bobby Ojeda

Ron Swoboda

 

 

 

Where's Jerry Kenny on that list? I'm still still pissed they allowed Jeter to wear his number 2.

Greatest Met is Seaver, number 2 is a distance away but it pains me to say it might be Piazza.

The Yankees literally sucked from 83 to 94 so I was working in Manhattan then, would jump the 7 train to see afternoon Mets games.

Saw a TON of games in the heyday of Gooden, Strawberry, Bonilla, Hernandez.  GREAT pitching rotation.

[SAM SAM HE'S OUR MAN]

12 hours ago, Matt39 said:

Ruth, Gehrig, Dimaggio, Arod, Mantle?

AROD ?

[munchmemory]

11 hours ago, The Crimson King said:

Pretty good order on that list, except none of them can play guitar like Bernie :). Maybe an honorable mention for Ford?

Now as a Mets fan, the top 5 Yankees for us were all AFTER '62:

Horace Clarke because he was not Bobby Richardson

Bob Kammeyer for his 1979 stat line

Jake Gibbs (who was a better QB than a baseball player, but the again so was Galen Cisco)

Ron Woods (although he did get the Yankees one of our top 5 below)

Deion Sanders (never liked him and he absolutely fell on his face in the Bronx)

best Yankees ever? Well those Ruth and Gehrig fellas did OK, but they were just not:

Darryl Strawberry

Dwight Gooden

David Cone

Bobby Ojeda

Ron Swoboda

 

 

 

What, no Ron Bloomberg?

5 hours ago, southparkcpa said:

Where's Jerry Kenny on that list? I'm still still pissed they allowed Jeter to wear his number 2.

Greatest Met is Seaver, number 2 is a distance away but it pains me to say it might be Piazza.

The Yankees literally sucked from 83 to 94 so I was working in Manhattan then, would jump the 7 train to see afternoon Mets games.

Saw a TON of games in the heyday of Gooden, Strawberry, Bonilla, Hernandez.  GREAT pitching rotation.

Mid-60s into the 70s Yankee Stadium was a ghost town.  Mickey's 500th homer was in front of a sparse crowd.  Except for maybe Bat Day (got that Summer's bat every year back then) we'd show up for any game and get GA seats.  Then give an usher a buck each and he'd put us in box seats.  

Look at all the empty grandstand seats:

 

[The Crimson King]

29 minutes ago, munchmemory said:

What, no Ron Bloomberg?

Mid-60s into the 70s Yankee Stadium was a ghost town.  Mickey's 500th homer was in front of a sparse crowd.  Except for maybe Bat Day (got that Summer's bat every year back then) we'd show up for any game and get GA seats.  Then give an usher a buck each and he'd put us in box seats.  

Look at all the empty grandstand seats:

 

I remember bat days

Great idea handing out weapons to juvenile deliquents

[section314]

Loved that game. Wow, seeing the box, with the great picture of The Stadium, brought a huge smile to my face. To steal a line from the great Roy Hobbs,   "God, I love baseball."

[munchmemory]

2 hours ago, section314 said:

Loved that game. Wow, seeing the box, with the great picture of The Stadium, brought a huge smile to my face. To steal a line from the great Roy Hobbs,   "God, I love baseball."

Have been thinking about that game a lot since Crimson created the thread last night.  It was really the first game I can recall where all my friends (yes, all Yankee nuts) and I obsessed on.  Everyone had one (got mine for Xmas) and we played it almost every day.  Loved the larger-than-baseball-cards size with all the stats.  What a great era to be a kid.

[southparkcpa]

5 hours ago, munchmemory said:

What, no Ron Bloomberg?

Mid-60s into the 70s Yankee Stadium was a ghost town.  Mickey's 500th homer was in front of a sparse crowd.  Except for maybe Bat Day (got that Summer's bat every year back then) we'd show up for any game and get GA seats.  Then give an usher a buck each and he'd put us in box seats.  

Look at all the empty grandstand seats:

 

74-75 Yankees played in Shea Stadium and yes, pretty weak crowds.   Until Billy Martin came along, the team was a solid 3-4 place team.

[southparkcpa]

4 hours ago, The Crimson King said:

I remember bat days

Great idea handing out weapons to juvenile deliquents

 

[munchmemory]

1 minute ago, southparkcpa said:

74-75 Yankees played in Shea Stadium and yes, pretty weak crowds.   Until Billy Martin came along, the team was a solid 3-4 place team.

I despised being in Shea.  And once I saw what we got in the "new" stadium?  Hated that the old, classic ballpark was gone.  Yeah, we all hated those columns.  But the new place had none of the history or character.

[southparkcpa]

Just now, munchmemory said:

I despised being in Shea.  And once I saw what we got in the "new" stadium?  Hated that the old, classic ballpark was gone.  Yeah, we all hated those columns.  But the new place had none of the history or character.

So my neighbor was a garbage man in the Bronx.   He had one of the entrance signs from the OLD stadium in his garage. As a kid I just was in awe of it.  Well..went away to college, he retired and moved around 82 or so.  I came home and my mom said."Mr Ramirez left you something. He asked that you take care of it."   I have it to this day.  I'll find a young Yankee fan to give it to in a few years.

 

 

[munchmemory]

1 minute ago, southparkcpa said:

So my neighbor was a garbage man in the Bronx.   He had one of the entrance signs from the OLD stadium in his garage. As a kid I just was in awe of it.  Well..went away to college, he retired and moved around 82 or so.  I came home and my mom said."Mr Ramirez left you something. He asked that you take care of it."   I have it to this day.  I'll find a young Yankee fan to give it to in a few years.

 

 

(Said slowly) W...o...w.  I literally just let out an audible slow exhale seeing that sign. That is friggin' incredible.  Seriously.  What an awesome person to leave you that sign.  Kudos to you for keeping it all these years.

P.S.  Going back to Yankee games at Shea: Even though I was a Jet fan and had gone to games there, it just seemed like sacrilege for the Yanks to be playing home games there.  Felt weird.

[southparkcpa]

1 hour ago, munchmemory said:

(Said slowly) W...o...w.  I literally just let out an audible slow exhale seeing that sign. That is friggin' incredible.  Seriously.  What an awesome person to leave you that sign.  Kudos to you for keeping it all these years.

P.S.  Going back to Yankee games at Shea: Even though I was a Jet fan and had gone to games there, it just seemed like sacrilege for the Yanks to be playing home games there.  Felt weird.

Agreed. It was convenient for me on Long Island but yes, it was we were in a rented house. 

[section314]

17 hours ago, munchmemory said:

Have been thinking about that game a lot since Crimson created the thread last night.  It was really the first game I can recall where all my friends (yes, all Yankee nuts) and I obsessed on.  Everyone had one (got mine for Xmas) and we played it almost every day.  Loved the larger-than-baseball-cards size with all the stats.  What a great era to be a kid.

It sure was.

[section314]

15 hours ago, southparkcpa said:

So my neighbor was a garbage man in the Bronx.   He had one of the entrance signs from the OLD stadium in his garage. As a kid I just was in awe of it.  Well..went away to college, he retired and moved around 82 or so.  I came home and my mom said."Mr Ramirez left you something. He asked that you take care of it."   I have it to this day.  I'll find a young Yankee fan to give it to in a few years.

 

 

Good for you!  That's how this stuff stays alive, pass it on to the young, and let them know how special it is. As Terrence Mann said in that great  speech towards the end of Field of Dreams, "the one thing that is constant throughout the years is baseball."

[SAM SAM HE'S OUR MAN]

16 hours ago, munchmemory said:

(Said slowly) W...o...w.  I literally just let out an audible slow exhale seeing that sign. That is friggin' incredible.  Seriously.  What an awesome person to leave you that sign.  Kudos to you for keeping it all these years.

P.S.  Going back to Yankee games at Shea: Even though I was a Jet fan and had gone to games there, it just seemed like sacrilege for the Yanks to be playing home games there.  Felt weird.