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Donald Arthur Mattingly (born April 20, 1961) was a star baseball player (first baseman) for the New York Yankees in the 1980s. He grew up in Evansville, Indiana and was one of the nation's top prospects as a high school player at Reitz Memorial High School in 1979, even earning a brief write-up in Sports Illustrated magazine. However, most Major League Baseball teams were sure he was going to college, and didn't draft him. The Yankees took a chance, and were able to sign Mattingly after selecting him in the 19th round of the 1979 amateur draft. The sweet-swinging lefty immediately proved it was a wise decision, terrorizing pitchers in the Yankee farm system. He batted .349 in 1979, .358 in 1980, .316 in 1981 and made it to the majors late in the 1982 season after batting .315 for Triple-A Columbus. He spent his official rookie season of 1983 as a part-time first baseman and outfielder, waiting for a spot to open up. He played well, hitting .283, but with little power. That part of his game arrived in 1984, when he was an MVP candidate. He beat out teammate Dave Winfield for the batting title on the last day of the season, with a mark of .343, while hitting a league-leading 44 doubles to go with 23 home runs and 110 RBI. He followed that up with a spectacular 1985 season, winning the MVP award in the American League; he batted .324 with 35 home runs and 145 RBI, the most by a major leaguer since the 1950s. He may have been even better in 1986, when he hit .352 with a league-leading 238 hits and 53 doubles. He was beat out in the American League MVP voting by a pitcher named Roger Clemens. Clemens also won the CY Young award that year. This was a big argument whether a pitcher should win both awards. Don Mattingly was certainly the best hitter that year. In 1987, he tied a major league record by hitting home runs in eight consecutive games.
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