On Thursday night, legendary Yankees shortstop Derek Jeter will play in his final game at Yankee Stadium. And though the club already celebrated Jeter’s exceptional career with Derek Jeter Day on Sept. 7, the future Hall of Famer will certainly acknowledge the adoring Bronx crowd in some way one last time before he heads to Boston on Friday for the last series of his career.
Here are five suggestions for how Derek Jeter should leave the field in his last game at Yankee Stadium:
1. Classily
If you’re a gambler, bet on this one: Sometime late in the game, Jeter takes the field to start an inning. Manager Joe Girardi sends out a defensive replacement, and Jeter exits to thunderous applause and 50,000 strong chanting his name. He doffs his cap to the crowd, acknowledges his teammates and coaches, and disappears into the clubhouse. Dramatic photographs of Jeter leaving the infield become posters for a generation of young Yankees fans.
2. Unclassily
(USA TODAY Sports Images)
Definitely a long shot. But there are multiple ways Jeter can play it poorly on purpose if he wants to shock everyone and turn heel in the waning moments of his career. It could be as simple as grabbing a microphone and treating everyone to a long, self-serving and thoroughly unclutch lecture about how awesome it has been to be Derek Jeter and how he doesn’t really care that the Yankees will probably miss the playoffs in 2014 because he still got paid. Stuff like that.
Or — or! — he can go whole hog with it, and say nothing at all: Just moon the crowd and reveal the words “FREE A-ROD” written in Sharpie across his backside.
3. The Arthur Dimmesdale
(COMPOSITE: Screengrab from 1926 film ‘The Scarlet Letter’/USA TODAY Sports Images)
Maybe we’ve got it all wrong. Maybe Derek Jeter isn’t the face of baseball, but baseball is the face of Derek Jeter. And maybe he reprises the climactic scene from Nathaniel Hawthorne’s A Scarlet Letter as he jogs off the field for the final time, collapsing under the weight of the burden he carried for 20 seasons and opening his jersey to reveal the baseball there emblazoned. We finally recognize the full gravity of what being Derek Jeter has done to Derek Jeter, and we all learn important lessons about identity, society and the human condition.
4. Hologram Biggie
(COMPOSITE: YouTube/USA TODAY Sports Images)
At times, Jeter has used an instrumental version of Notorious B.I.G’s Hypnotize as his walk-up music. Perhaps he’ll seize his final appearance in pinstripes as the opportunity to fill us with real millionaire (expletive): Escargot in the post-game spread, and hologram Biggie Smalls on the field playing him off. They’ll probably need to involve Puff Daddy to pull this one off, but that’s totally fine as long as he agrees he will not rap.
5. On Pegasus, flying into a rainbow as the sun sets behind New York City
(Getty Images/Thinkstock, Composite by Rubie Edmondson)
Does it make meteorological sense? Of course not. But Derek Jeter’s probably owed a few miracles at this point, and it’d really leave an impression.
