Derek Jeter revealed that he once wore a “gold thong” during a baseball game in an effort to get out of a slump.
The former athlete, who spent 20 years playing for the Yankees, opened up about the incident during a recent appearance on The Tonight Show with Jimmy Fallon. During a segment on the show, host Jimmy Fallon gave Rita Ora and Jeter two envelopes each, one containing a true confession about the celebrity and another that was a lie.
When it was the 48-year-old’s turn, Ora and Fallon interrogated him about the experience before he confirmed that he did once wear “a thong in public in front of thousands of people”. Jeter went on to share details about the clothing item and how it belonged to one of his former teammates.
“I had a new teammate that I played with in 2002, and he always had a gold thong in his locker,” he explained. “And he told me: ‘Anytime you struggle, you wear the gold thong and you’re guaranteed to get a hit.’”
Jeter said that while he initially thought his teammate’s idea was “crazy,” he had a change of heart.
“In 2004, I went through the worst offensive stretch in my career,” he said. “Every day I’d walk in and he’d point at the thong. So finally, I wore the thong.”
He then explained how things changed on the field once he put on the thong.
“It wasn’t thong to skin, I had shorts on underneath, so I put the thong on over the shorts,” he continued. “First pitch, home run.”
Jeter’s story prompted applause from the audience and praise from his peers, as Fallon noted that he “couldn’t believe that was real” and Ora said it “was amazing”.
Although the former MLB player didn’t say who gave him the clothing item, his former teammate Jason Giambi previously shared that he owned the golden thong and was the one who lent it to Jeter.
“You know, Derek Jeter’s a gold thong-wearer. He wore it one time,” he said, during a 2015 appearance on The Dan Le Batard Show, via NJ.com. “The golden thong is legendary. It’s never not gotten a hit. Well, it was just, you know, it was his first slump. I don’t think the guy’s ever slumped in his career. He’s unbelievable. You know, the gold thong, he had to get out of it.”
Giambi also said that while he “never gave it to” any of his teammates, he did “sometimes put it in their locker”.
“I would sometimes start mentioning I’m going to give a gold thong if you don’t get out of this slump. Sometimes I would break it out because they didn’t want to wear the gold thong,” he added. “And most of the time it just ended up in their locker. And anybody who’s worn it has gotten a hit.”
