During a 22-year baseball career, he played for the Minnesota Twins (1967–1969), Cleveland Indians (1970–1972), New York Yankees (1973–1983), San Diego Padres (1984–1986), Atlanta Braves (1987), and Montreal Expos (1988).

[6] Nettles played his first full major league season with the Twins in 1969, and batted .222 with seven home runs and 26 RBI in 96 games.

[7][8] On December 10, 1969, the Twins traded Nettles with Dean Chance, Ted Uhlaender, and a player to be named later (PTBNL) to the Cleveland Indians for Luis Tiant and Stan Williams.

[14] On September 14, 1974, Nettles and his brother Jim homered in the same game, joining a select club that includes Bret and Aaron Boone, José and Héctor Cruz, Felipe and César Crespo, Al and Tony Cuccinello, Joe and Dom DiMaggio, and Rick and Wes Ferrell.

[7] Nettles enjoyed his best season in 1977, when he picked up his first of two Gold Glove Awards, and batted .255 while setting career-highs with 37 homers and 107 RBI in 158 games, helping lead the Yankees to a World Series victory over the Los Angeles Dodgers.

[7] The following season, Nettles earned his second Gold Glove to help the Yankees bring back-to-back World Series championships to the Bronx.

[22] In the fall of 1982, George Steinbrenner, the Yankees owner, stated that Nettles "is in the twilight of his career, and if he never plays another game for me, he has earned more than what I have paid him.

[23] The dissatisfaction continued when the Yankees acquired Toby Harrah in February 1984, intending to platoon him with Nettles at third base.

[24] In response, Nettles arrived at the Yankees' spring training camp in Florida at the very deadline for players to report.

[25] Nettles had wanted to play closer to his San Diego home, and his approval of the trade was required given his years of service.

[26][27] Nettles famously described his career with the Yankees by stating, "[w]hen I was a little boy, I wanted to be a baseball player and join the circus.

Nettles missed and then was thrown to the ground by Braves first baseman (and former longtime Yankee teammate) Chris Chambliss who then sat on him.

In 1985, after teammate Eric Show surrendered Pete Rose's record-breaking 4,192nd hit, Nettles declared, "The Birch Society is going to expel Eric for making a Red famous,"[29] in reference to Show's association with the John Birch Society, a notorious anti-Communist organization.

"[22] Nettles wrote a controversial book, Balls, a memoir of his baseball career written in collaboration with Peter Golenbock.

[23] When the book's advance promotion came to Steinbrenner's attention in March 1984, Nettles was summarily traded to his hometown San Diego Padres.

[43] As of 2010, Nettles holds the single-season major league record for assists by a third baseman, and is tied with Brooks Robinson for second-most all-time.

At the end of the video, Springsteen's character, a pitcher, tells a teen that he lost an imaginary game playing against the San Diego Padres because "Nettles got me, bottom of the ninth.