Yankees Bright All-Star Joe Pepitone Dies at 82

Joe Pepitone, an All-Star and Gold Glove baseman of the 1960s New York Yankees who was famous for his flamboyant personality, hairstyles and penchant for nightlife, has died at the age of 82.

Pepitone lived with his daughter Kara Pepitone at her home in Kansas City, Missouri, and was found dead Monday morning, according to B.J. Pepitone, the former player’s son. The cause of death was not immediately clear, but BJ Pepiton said a heart attack was suspected.

The Yankees said in a statement that “Pepiton’s playful and charismatic personality, as well as his contributions on the field, have made him a favorite of generations of Yankees fans even after his tenure with the team in the 1960s.”

Born in Brooklyn, Pepitone attended Manual High School, signed with the Yankees in 1958, and made his major league debut in 1962. Howard.

Pepitone attracted attention for his behavior off the field. At a time when most players were level-headed and conformist, Pepitone was credited with being the first to bring the hair dryer into the club, an artifact later donated to the Baseball Reliquary and on display at the Burbank Central Library during the 2004: The Times Exposition. They Changed: Baseball in the Age of Aquarius.”

“Of course things were a little different back then,” Pepitone told Rolling Stone in 2015. — When I brought the hair dryer to the club, they thought I was a hairdresser or something; they didn’t know what the hell was going on, you know? I came in a black Nehru jacket, with beads, with my hair combed back; It was funny. I’m thinking about it now and laughing.”

Jim Bouton, in his groundbreaking 1970 book Four Balls, which revealed the inner workings of baseball teams, recounted how “Pepitone started wearing chignons when his hair started thinning at the top of his head. … He carries all kinds of equipment with him in a little blue Pan Am bag.”

Pepitone’s 1975 autobiography “Joe, You Could Make Us Proud” details nightlife with Frank Sinatra, marijuana smoking with Mantle and Whitey Ford, and Pepitone’s incarceration on Rikers Island.

Yankees owner George Steinbrenner brought Pepitone back as a minor league hitting instructor in 1980 and promoted him to a major league team two years later. Pepitone said he would even cut his wigs to fit the Yankees’ exit policy.

“This one,” he told The New York Times, holding one wig, “is my gamer. It has a gray color. The longer one is my way out.”

Pepitone was imprisoned on Rikers Island for approximately four months in 1988 after two drug-related misdemeanor charges and was then re-hired by the Yankees to work with minor leaguers. He was arrested in 1992 at the Catskills resort for a fight that started when a man called him “not washed by anyone” and in 1995 pleaded guilty to drunk driving.

He joined the Yankees at the peak of the team’s history. After winning in 1962, New York continued to take the American League pennants for the next two years, only to lose in the series, and Pepitone became an All-Star three years in a row starting in 1963.

He remained with the Yankees during their decline, and after the 1969 season, he was traded to the Houston for Kurt Blefary.

Pepitone played for the Chicago Cubs from 1970 to 1973 and ended his career with the Atlanta and Jacult Atoms of the Japan Central League in 1973.

BJ Pepitone and Kara are children from Pepitone’s third marriage to Stephanie, who died in 2021. BJ Pepiton said the family has yet to decide on funeral plans.

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