Mr. 600

A couple of years ago, the last game I would see at the Old Yankee Stadium,was a 2-1 snoozefest between the Yanks and Blue Jays, where the players could probably hear the yawning of a child in the nosebleeds.  All of a sudden it changed.  As soon as that first note of Enter Sandman blared from the Yankee Stadium speakers, the crowd erupted, because there was not a single person that didn't know who was entering the game.  Seeing him for the first time in person gave me chills, because this man was a legend.  There was one person in the world who could have brought that crowd to life.  That man is Mariano Rivera. 

Mariano Rivera could tell you when he is going to throw his cutter, where in the zone it will end up, and how fast it will come in, and the best a hitter will be able to do is hit a broken bat pop-up.  Mariano has one pitch, which, over time, has become the second largest killer of trees behind the paper industry.  He lives and dies by his cutter, and despite the fact that hitters know exactly what's coming, they are utterly helpless when it comes to hitting it.  Just under an hour ago, Mariano Rivera became the second man in history to reach 600 saves, a mark only achieved previously by Trevor Hoffman.  In only a matter of days, Rivera will pass Hoffman for the all time record of career saves, and the greatest closer of all time will statistically become just that.  Going along with his record of 42 playoff saves, a mere 24 ahead of his nearest competitor, Rivera has established a legacy as one of the most dominant pitchers to ever play the game. 

As great of a player as Rivera has been over the years, it's hard to believe that he could be an even better person, but he truly is the role model that parents should tell their kids to follow.  He married his elementary school sweetheart.  He has never once been involved in an off-field controversy in a sport that has had everything from steroids to perjury to wife-beating.  Rivera is an enormous philanthropist who contributes large sums of money in both the United States and his native Panama.  After the Yankees lost the 2001 World Series in Game 7, a game in which Rivera blew a save in the 9th inning, teammate Enrique Wilson narrowly avoided flying home on a a plane that went down, killing all of its passengers.  Rivera never dwelled on the loss, simply saying,   "I am glad we lost the World Series, because it means that I still have a friend."  That's just the kind of guy Mariano is, and is just one of the many reasons that the 600 save mark couldn't happen to a better person. 

As far as I'm concerned, Mariano Rivera can pitch for as long as he wants.  Honestly, a 60 year old Rivera will still be better than Scott Proctor, who is for some reason a Yankee again.  Simply put, Rivera will call it quits whenever he wants to.  But until he does, hitters will quiver as The Sandman takes the mound, and Yankee fans will smile, knowing that they're on route to a victory