Relieved

Ryne Duren, the only Yankee reliever to have a Hall of Fame second baseman named after him, has died at the age of 81. Between his Coke bottle glasses, drunken escapades and 98-mile per-hour warm-up pitches bouncing off backstops, he kept hitters on edge en route to notching 630 strikeouts in 589 innings, to go along with 392 walks. He led the AL in 1958 with 20 saves for the Yankees, but his drinking precluded any extended success. In 1965 with the Senators, he got rocked while pitching with a hangover, then got drunk again after the game. While driving home, he pulled over, climbed a bridge, and started shouting. After his manager talked him down, he was released and finished in baseball.