Steve Yeager

Yeager was born in Huntington, West Virginia. He attended Meadowdale High School in Dayton, Ohio. Los Angeles Mayor Tom Bradley was the best man at his wedding to local rock musician Gloria Giaone. He later moved to Granada Hills, California. ==Minor league career==

The Los Angeles Dodgers selected Yeager in the fourth round of the 1967 Major League Baseball draft. After one game with the rookie level Ogden Spikers of the Pioneer League, Yeager was sent to the Dodgers' Single-A affiliate, the Dubuque Packers of the Midwest League. The following season, in 1968, Yeager played 59 games for the Single-A Daytona Beach Dodgers of the Florida State League. In 1969, he played 22 games for the Bakersfield Dodgers, the Dodgers' Single-A affiliate in the California League, where he threw out 26 runners from behind the plate. That season he suffered a fractured leg in a first-inning collision with a runner at home plate, but was not aware how bad his injury was, and finished the game. Yeager was promoted to Double-A before the end of the 1969 season, playing in one game for the Albuquerque Dodgers of the Texas League. He spent the next two-and-2/3 seasons with the Double-A franchise. In 162 games played over the 1970 and 1971 seasons, he hit .276, with 77 RBIs in 490 at bats. He threw out 84 runners, second in the league that year, and was named to the Texas League All-Star team as a catcher in 1971. In spring training in 1972 he won the Dodgers writers' Dearie Mulvey Memorial Trophy as the best rookie. With the Dukes becoming the new Pacific Coast League Triple-A affiliate for the Dodgers in 1972, Yeager was promoted while remaining in Albuquerque for another season. “You won't beat that arm of his,” Tommy Lasorda said that season. With the Triple-A Dukes, he played 82 games, batting .280 with 45 RBIs and a slugging percentage of .502, in 257 at bats. ==Major league career==

Los Angeles Dodgers (1972–1985) Yeager made his Major League debut with the Dodgers on August 2, 1972, and went on to play 15 seasons in the major leagues. Yeager injured his knee in 1982 and broke his wrist the next year, which severely limited his playing time. Seattle Mariners (1986) He was traded from the Dodgers to the Seattle Mariners for Ed Vande Berg on December 11, 1985. He retired after hitting .208 in 130 at bats in 1986. ==Minor league coaching career==

In 1999, Yeager was the hitting coach for the Dodgers' Single-A San Bernardino Stampede, which won the California League championship. He managed the Long Beach Breakers in the independent (now-defunct) Western Baseball League in 2001. The team won the league championship in their inaugural season that year, beating the Chico Heat 3 games to 2. He was the Jacksonville Suns hitting coach in 2004, when the team won the championship, and in 2005-06 he was the hitting instructor/coach for the Dodgers AAA farm club, the Las Vegas 51s. He later joined the A Dodgers affiliate Inland Empire 66'ers and became the hitting coach in 2007. Yeager was instrumental in the conversion of Russell Martin from third base to behind the plate. In 2007, he became the manager for the Long Beach Armada of the independent Golden Baseball League. ==Personal life==

In September 1979, he and his family appeared on an episode of Family Feud. They played for a total of 6 days. In 1982, Yeager posed semi-nude in Playgirl magazine. He was sued for the same scheme in November of that year in Illinois and in 1997 in California. By 1997, Yeager had been divorced three times. Yeager is a co-owner of a Jersey Mike's Subs franchise. ==References==