Brian Dayett

Brian Kelly Dayett (January 22, 1957 – September 7, 2025) was an American Major League Baseball (MLB) outfielder who played five seasons between 1983 and 1987 for the New York Yankees and Chicago Cubs. He also spent some time in Japan, playing for the Nippon-Ham Fighters of Nippon Professional Baseball (NPB) from 1988 until 1991.

Brian Kelly Dayett was born in New London, Connecticut, on January 22, 1957. He was raised in Deep River, Connecticut. Deep River has since named their Little League Baseball program for him. After graduating from Valley Regional High School, he played baseball for two seasons for Saint Leo College, batting .311 as a sophomore and .381 as a junior. In 2019, Dayett was inducted into the Saint Leo University Athletic Hall of Fame.

Dayett was drafted by the New York Yankees in the 16th round (416th overall) in the 1978 amateur entry draft. He began his first season in professional baseball that summer with the Oneonta Yankees of the Class A-Short Season New York–Penn League. Batting .309, he hit 11 home runs and co-led the league with 20 doubles in 68 games. He hit .256 for the Double-A West Haven Yankees of the Eastern League in 1979. He began the 1980 season at Double-A for the Nashville Sounds in the Southern League. After being hit by a pitch in the face, he spent the rest of the season between the Class A Alexandria Dukes, a co-op team in the Carolina League, and the Yankees' Class A affiliate in the Florida State League, the Fort Lauderdale Yankees. Across all three teams, he batted .264.

Dayett returned to Double-A Nashville in 1981, batting .269 with 18 home runs. Again with the Sounds in 1982, he led the league with a .532 slugging percentage while he hit .280 with 34 home runs. He propelled Nashville to win the Southern League championship with a two-out, bottom-of-the-thirteenth-inning walk-off home run scoring Buck Showalter. That season, he was selected for the Southern League All-Star Game, named to the postseason All-Star team, and won the league MVP award.

In 1983, he led the International League with 35 home runs and 108 runs batted in for the Triple-A Columbus Clippers. He was called up to the Yankees after the season.

Dayett made his major league debut at Yankee Stadium on September 11, 1983, at the age of 26, appearing as a pinch hitter for Omar Moreno. He collected a hit in his first at-bat off of the Baltimore Orioles' Mike Flanagan. He ended up hitting .207 in 11 games that year. He began the 1984 season in Columbus, where he hit .304, but was called up to New York in June, hitting .244 with the Yankees.

Dayett was traded along with Ray Fontenot from the Yankees to the Chicago Cubs for Henry Cotto, Ron Hassey, Rich Bordi, and Porfi Altamirano at the Winter Meetings on December 4, 1984. Dayett was pleased with the trade, because he had not been playing everyday with the Yankees, but he wound up being used as a platoon player in Chicago, as well. He split the 1985 season between the Cubs and the Triple-A Iowa Cubs in the Pacific Coast League. He hit .378 in 17 games with Iowa and .231 in 22 games with Chicago. He spent the majority of the 1986 season at Triple-A, where he batted .281 with 19 home runs in 121 games. In 24 games with the big league club, Dayett batted .269. He looked to be slated to be the Cubs' starting right fielder for the 1987 season, but Andre Dawson, signed by the Cubs as a free agent, filled that position instead.

On October 28, 1987, Dayett's contract was purchased by the Nippon Ham Fighters of the Japan Pacific League. He played four seasons with the club, mostly in a reserve role. With the exception of the 1989 season, in which he played 89 games, he never made more than two dozen appearances in a season. At 35 years old, Dayett retired after the 1991 campaign.