Connect with us

World

Yanks baby recreates ‘81 Post cover with his daughter using same sweatsuit: ‘Brings me back’

Published

on

Yanks baby recreates ‘81 Post cover with his daughter using same sweatsuit: ‘Brings me back’

It’s like déjà vu all over again.

One Yankees fan is celebrating his family’s own pinstripe legacy — as he has recreated an image that ran on the front page of the Post in 1981 of him as an infant posing in a Bronx bomber’s sweatsuit with his mom at that year’s final World Series game against the Dodgers.

Howie Stephens saved the 43-year-old old outfit and dusted it off for the adorable new shot of him with his own daughter Vivienne, 4, whose stuffed bear is wearing the same tiny outfit from four decades ago as the team once again faces off against their rival from Los Angeles.

Kathy Thomas and her newborn Howie Stephens made the Oct. 16, 1981 cover of the New York Post while waiting in line for World Series tickets.

“It was great taking him there in his little warm-up suit. Everybody wanted to see him. He was so cute,” Stephens’ mother, Kathleen Thomas, 76, recalled to The Post about bringing her three-week-old son to the history-making series.

Thomas, her newborn and her husband had sat high up in the nosebleeds at Yankee Stadium to watch the Bronx Bombers take on the Dodgers on Oct. 28, 1981 for the final game of the coast-to-coast series. Unfortunately, the team lost, in what would be their last trip to the series until 1996.

The Post first met the young family in a crowd of thousands who were waiting in line outside the old Yankee Stadium for the World Series tickets, which Thomas scored for an estimated $15 each — a steal compared to the jaw-dropping minimum $1,113 price for the 2024 series.

“Everybody wanted to see” Howie in his sweatsuit, Kathy recalled. Ari Mintz/New York Post
Howie and his daughter Vivienne recreate his 43-year-old cover photo ahead of the 2024 World Series. Courtesy Kathleen Thomas

The air was brisk and the stadium was filled with near-constant boos and groans, but little Stephens, gussied up in a teensy Yankees sweatsuit, mostly slept soundly as the Dodgers slaughtered the Yankees in a fate-deciding 9-2 game.

“We weren’t at a winning game that day and we were in the nose bleeds section, and it didn’t even matter because we were all there together,” Thomas recalled.

Just months after the disappointing game, the family packed up and moved to Dodgers territory — but has remained loyal to the Yankees for the last five decades.

Vivienne as a baby wearing the sweatsuit in 2020. Obtained by the NY Post

The Yankees are more than just a sports team for the Napa resident. The team has grown to represent the five short, but life-changing years she spent living in the Big Apple.

New York is where she met her husband, Matt, got married and started their family of seven. They didn’t have much money at the time, but spent what little they could spare going to Yankee games as often as they could.

Kathleen, Matt and Howie celebrate New Year’s Eve in Times Square in 1981. Courtesy Kathleen Thomas
The family lived in Hell’s Kitchen for five years before moving to California. Courtesy Kathleen Thomas
Thomas said she’s left “a part of my heart” in New York. Courtesy Kathleen Thomas

“It’s just that feel of family when you’re sitting in the stands,” Thomas, a retired state public health nurse, recalled.

“Most of my life wasn’t involved in sports, but those five years were. Now my husband’s died, and so that’s part of my heart. It’s what I left in New York — when we stood up at Yankees and listened to Frank Sinatra singing ‘New York, New York.’ That song comes on the radio, I’m right back there again.”

The 2024 Yankees-Dodgers matchup provided the perfect opportunity for a moment of nostalgia — and Stephens, now all grown up, dusted off the little Yanks sweatsuit to the iconic New York Post cover, this time taking his mother’s place and posing with his now-4-year-old daughter.

Vivienne — 4 years old and too big to fit into the infant sweatsuit — instead adorned a favorite teddy in the Yanks gear for the occasion. She had worn the suit once herself to commemorate two-months-post birth.

Thomas now boasts eight grandchildren and four great-grandchildren. Courtesy Kathleen Thomas
The Yanks fan looks forward to cheering on the Yankees from her California home. Courtesy Kathleen Thomas

“It just brings up that memory of taking the subway out to Yankee Stadium to stand in line and get tickets … It brings back that period of time in which my little guy was little and we were going to a ball game. How many people get to live in New York and experience that?” Thomas said.

Unlike nearly 50 years ago, Thomas plans to cheer on the Yanks for the 2024 World Series in the comfort of her Napa home — with her sprawling family at her side.

While most are California-born, they’ll all be rooting for the Yankees, Thomas assured.

“When they’re together, they’re like little bundles of happiness, so it’ll be fun to have them around in a game. I can’t wait — I’m very excited.”

Continue Reading