Nobody does it bigger than the New York Yankees. They have the biggest payroll in Major League Baseball, which stood at $228,995,945 entering the 2013 season, the most World Series championships in the history of the game with 27 and the highest luxury tax year-in and year-out.
They also send players out with dazzling celebrations and honors, just like what happened with Mariano Rivera this year.
Known as one of the "Core Four" players for years with the Yankees, paired with shortstop Derek Jeter, pitcher Andy Pettitte and retired catcher Jorge Posada, Rivera and Pettitte decided 2013 would be their last hurrah in the league and would retire at the end of the year.
Rivera leaves the game as the all-time saves leader, notching 652 saves through 19 seasons with the Yankees. But more importantly, he's not just a stuck-up baseball player that lives for the limelight and attention. Instead, Rivera would rather the attention be on everyone else. That wasn't the case Thursday, Sept. 26 in his final appearance at Yankee Stadium.
For years, Metallica's "Enter Sandman" blared over the public address system as the bullpen doors swung open and Rivera emerged. This historic day was no different.
Rivera has been known as one of the most feared closers in the game, so of course he has an entrance song just like Trevor Hoffman, who previously held the saves record, did when he entered to ACDC's "Hells Bells."
As the door swung open Sept. 26, the late-Bob Sheppard's voice boomed over the PA system, as it had been recorded before he passed away in 2010, and "Enter Sandman" started to play.
Whether it's a known thing or not, Rivera walked out of the bullpen the same way every single time. He would walk down the steps, walk a few steps onto the warning track, put his glove in his throwing hand, holding onto the top half with the bottom bouncing with his motions, then take off jogging towards the mound.
Everything Rivera did was masterful a fearful. The jog to the mound was no different. He wasn't just another reliever coming on to take over for an outgoing pitcher. This was Mariano Rivera, and the smooth jog was just as intimidating as the cutters he threw to opposing hitter.
After Rivera was brought on in the eighth inning with the Yankees trailing the Tampa Bay Rays, Rivera got the final two outs of the inning, then got the first two outs of the ninth inning before his career would come to an end.
It wasn't the typical pitching change a manager would make. Usually, Rivera didn't come out and sit on the bench for the final out. He was used to getting the final out and going back into the clubhouse. This time, he watched the final out, but he might have been the only one watching the game.
After getting the two outs, Jeter and Pettitte began the slow walk to the mound. The same walk manager Joe Girardi would make to make a pitching change. But this was special.
As the pair approached the mound, Rivera lost it. As Pettitte took the ball from Rivera, the closer put him arms around Pettitte, buried his head in his shoulder and cried.
The embrace lasted for a little while before he moved to Jeter. All three had come up to the Yankees around the same time in the mid-1990s, which made the gesture that much more special.
As Rivera walked off the mound, the crowd roared. Rivera embraced them. Rivera embraced the Rays, who had come out of the visitor's dugout, lined the fence and clapped to honor the greatest closer the game has ever seen. Rivera embraced everybody, trying to take the attention off himself. The attempt was to no avail.
He was met by Girardi and the Yankees at the top of the dugout steps. Girardi hugged Rivera and even then, Girardi was broken to tears.
What Rivera did for Major League Baseball is more significant than any records he holds, any honors he's collected through the years and any record he'll hold for years to come.
In the steroid-era of Major League Baseball, a time in which the league has been tainted time and time again by performance-enhancing drug users suffering through lengthy suspensions, Rivera offered not a small breath of fresh air, but a giant gulp of it.
Rivera has been an ambassador for the game both on and off the field, and Major League Baseball will forever be in debt. Teams don't just honor visiting players all the time, but that's what the league did for Rivera. Various teams gave him gifts on the Yankees last stop at their stadium for the season. Even hated rival Boston offered gifts on his last night as a player in Fenway Park.
Rivera has been an incredible presence for the game all by staying out of public view and out of tabloids, and the rest of the league should take not. It's not about making the front page of the New York Daily News. It's not about being the talk of the town because of who you were seen out with at the club last night. It's about playing the game the way it is supposed to be played, and Rivera has been the epitome of that for 19 years.
I'm 21 years old and I have been a Yankees fan since I was 4-years old. My first baseball memory: Mariano Rivera pitching in a Yankees game in 1996. I never got to see Rivera pitch in person even though I went to my fair share of games growing up, but he's the reason I wanted to play baseball. He's the reason I pitched. What Rivera offered me was an idol to look up to, and he never failed at being perfect at it. That's why his send-off Sept. 26 in Yankee Stadium was the perfect way to say goodbye.
He's the player kids today will tell their grandkids years and years down the road about. He is the greatest ever to play the game. He is Mariano Rivera. Thank you for being the idol I always looked up to and could cheer. Thank you for being my path to the game of baseball.