After decades of 'watching somebody else eat a hot fudge sundae,' Mattingly gets a taste at last

The long wait is finally over.

After 5,231 games over 36 seasons as a player, coach and manager, Donnie Baseball is going to his first World Series.

“Obviously it feels great to get there, and I feel like we’re gonna play well too,” Don Mattingly, Toronto’s bench coach, told MLB.com on Tuesday, about 12 hours after the Blue Jays clinched the American League pennant.

“Paul O’Neill told me once you get to the World Series, it’s almost like this is the fun part,” Mattingly said. “The feeling of fighting to get there is so tense. So, yes I’m going to enjoy it. It’s been really fun.”

His voice sounded a bit tired after a night of celebrating, but it also reflected the emotion of finally getting to the place that eluded him for so long, and sometimes in cruel and ironic fashion.

Mattingly, a former Yankees captain, is arguably the greatest player in franchise history to never play in a World Series. He was drafted by the team in 1979, one year after they won their 22nd world championship, made his debut for them in 1982, one year after they lost in the World Series to the Dodgers, and then retired after the 1995 season, one year before they collected four more trophies in a five-year span. In his 14-year career with the Yankees they made the playoffs just once, in 1995, when they bowed out in the ALDS.

He returned to coaching in 2004, the year the Yankees led Boston three games to none in the ALCS before losing four in a row. The first thing Yankees manager Joe Torre expressed to his team after losing Game 7 was his disappointment for Mattingly.

But that’s part of what makes this run to his first Fall Classic so magical. The Blue Jays’ path through October has been an obstacle course of Mattingly’s own triumphs and heartaches.

First, they edged out the Yankees to win the AL East, then beat them in the Division Series three games to one, winning the clincher in the Bronx, where Mattingly is still revered.

Then it was on to the ALCS against the Mariners, who beat Mattingly’s 1995 Yankees in an epic ALDS Game 5 in Seattle.

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Now it’s on to the World Series to face the Dodgers, who Mattingly coached and managed for a decade before being replaced by Dave Roberts, whose legendary stolen base ignited that Red Sox comeback in 2004.

“Wow,” Mattingly laughed. “I didn’t think about that last part until you said it.”

Torre, who shared a dugout with him for seven years, knows the joy Mattingly is now feeling. Torre had to wait 4,284 games himself to experience his first World Series in 1996.

“I always said it was like watching somebody else eat a hot fudge sundae,” Torre said. “I’m thrilled that he can get a taste of this thing. Donnie has made such great contributions to this game. As a coach he’s always been such a great teacher, and it shows.”

So while this October gives Mattingly the potential to shed all kinds of ghosts, the best part has been sharing the ride with his family.

It was love of family that persuaded Mattingly to end his playing career in 1995. Sure, a back injury had sapped much of the power from his once majestic left-handed swing, but it was his desire to go home that overcame his desire to keep playing and perhaps get that elusive ring, with maybe even a chance at the Hall of Fame.

“If I could have played three more years, or four more years, and been a part of a world championship team or whatever. … I would trade it for my boys,” Mattingly said about Preston, Taylor, and Jordon, his three sons with his first wife Kim, during a 2022 MLB Network documentary about his life. “I didn’t want the boys growing up without their dad. It’s a hard decision, but it’s really not.”

Those boys are all grown now, and they have been watching from afar and sending Mattingly texts every step of the way. But he gets to share something different with Louie, his 10-year-old son with his second wife Lori. Seeing this whole ride through Louie’s eyes is what excites the 64-year-old Mattingly the most.

“It’s been really nice,” Mattingly said. “He took one of the losses really hard. It was the Yankees game where we had the lead and lost. He was upset, it hurt him. Then you get a chance to teach that it’s like life. You want something bad and you fight and you don’t get it. It hurts, but then you get up, you go again.”

In the ALCS, the Blue Jays won Games 3 and 4 in Seattle to tie up the series, but lost the pivotal Game 5.

“When I came out and saw him after that game, he gave me this little look,” Mattingly said laughing. “You know that six-seven thing?”

The parent or teacher of every elementary school child knows what Mattingly is referring to.

“He gives me a six-seven,” Mattingly recalled. “‘We’re gonna win in seven, Dad, six-seven!’

“And we won Game 6, I was walking towards the family room, he was sitting on the side by himself. As soon as he saw me, he came running. And that was a cool little thought about how invested he is, how your family is invested in this.”

Mattingly is one of the most popular and beloved figures in baseball, so it seems almost everyone has been rooting for him.

When Blue Jays manager John Schneider was young, he had the famous Mattingly “Hit Man” poster hanging on his wall.

“A small part of me growing up in New Jersey would think it’s pretty cool to be in a World Series with Donnie,” Schneider said.

Mattingly has enjoyed seeing this Blue Jays team gel at the right time, developing chemistry and moving on to the biggest stage.

“They’re just a fun group,” Mattingly said. “It’s almost like watching ‘The Sandlot.’ You know it’s serious, but you can also tell they’re having fun doing it. You can’t quantify it, but when everybody is locked in together, it’s different. It just is. And when you’re in it, you can feel it.”

Facing the Dodgers now in the World Series starting on Friday, Mattingly gets a chance to exorcise the final demon from his baseball past. Though he’d prefer not to think of it that way.

“I left L.A. on great terms, so I don’t feel anything going back there other than I enjoyed my time there. But now that you say that, it would be nice, right? It would be nice.”