Longtime Yankees clubhouse assistant will compete at
The Meadowlands Racetrack Friday, March 20
EAST RUTHERFORD, NJ (March
18, 2015) – For more than 20 seasons,
New York Yankees clubhouse assistant Joe Lee has had the best seat in the house
for some of baseball’s greatest moments. Friday night (March 20), Lee will take
the best seat at the racetrack when he drives the trotter Free Rollin in Race
12 at the Meadowlands Racetrack in East Rutherford, NJ in the GSY Amateur
Series.
“Baseball is in my blood for
sure,” said the Bronx-native Lee, who started working for the Yankees as a
16-year-old batboy. “But it is such a rush to drive a horse. If there was a
race in Alaska and an owner gave me the opportunity to drive their horse, I’d
be there in a heartbeat.”
Lee, 35, grew up around
horses: his parents owned racehorses and regularly took their son to the races
at the Meadowlands, Yonkers, Freehold, and Roosevelt.
“When I was a teenager and
first started working for the Yankees, I saw [Hall of Fame driver] John
Campbell outside George Steinbrenner’s private box when he was driving for him,
it was like meeting Mickey Mantle,” explained Lee, “John Campbell was my idol.”
Lee also rode horses as a
child, but always had the itch to sit behind one of the powerful trotters he
watched race in the evenings.
“Sandy Goldfarb put me in
touch with trainer Buzzy Sholty who invited me down to his stable and gave me
my first chance to jog a horse,” explained Lee. “I started going to help him
every Saturday and eventually worked my way to getting my harness driver’s
license.”
Amateur harness racing allows
men and women to compete in actual races with the same horses that are driven
by professional drivers. The amateurs come from all walks of life and have day
jobs that range from attorneys, insurance agents, and financial planners.
“No matter how much I
practice, I could never be the starting shortstop for the Yankees,” said Lee.
“But now that I have my harness license, I can compete on the same ‘field of
play’ as the pros. I won’t ever drive 2,000 horses in a year like Tim Tetrick,
but on one day and in one race, I have the chance to beat the best. There’s no
other sport like harness racing where a guy like me can compete with the pros.”
Besides Lee, the Yankees and
harness racing have other connections. General Manager Brian Cashman’s late
father, John, is in harness racing’s Hall of Fame. George Steinbrenner was a
very active and successful Standardbred horse owner and Whitey Ford was a
frequent visitor to Pompano Park in Florida.
Friday’s 13-race card at the
Meadowlands begins at 7:15 p.m. The program includes two divisions of the GSY
Amateur Series and the second leg of the Shiaway St. Pat for trotters.
For more information about
amateur harness racing, visit http://www.amateurharnessracing.com/
Here is a video replay of Joe
Lee’s win in the 2014 Hambletonian Amateur Drivers race at the Meadowlands http://bit.ly/1xyoCOS
