The game of baseball has countless sounds associated with it, like the crack of the bat, the pop of the mitt, Take Me Out To The Ball Game, and if you’re in the Bronx, “Enter Sandman” as well. Mariano Rivera has been storming out of the bullpen to the song for more than a decade now, but how did a quiet guy from Panama end up with Metallica as his entrance music? As Bryan Hoch explains, is was largely due to Trevor Hoffman.
Some Yankees higher-ups saw Hoffman’s theatrical entrance with “Hell’s Bells” during the 1998 World Series (and, more importantly, they saw how the fans reacted), and decided they needed something like that for Mo. I don’t remember this at all, but apparently Rivera came out to “Welcome to the Jungle” and “Paradise City” by Guns n’ Roses in 1999, but neither stuck while “Enter Sandman” did. Something about Mo warming up to Axl Rose makes me want to stick a pen in my ear. Anyway, make sure you check out the article, it’s a pretty neat story.
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