[新聞] Blood on their hands (SI.com)

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Blood on their hands
Yanks look disorganized, cowardly after Torre's exit
Posted: Thursday October 18, 2007 7:01PM;
Updated: Thursday October 18, 2007 7:27PM

CLEVELAND -- When he was robust and running the New York Yankees, George
Steinbrenner never minded a little blood on his hands. He swung his firing
axe decisively and often. I was there in Chicago at old Comiskey Park when
Dale Berra cried into his dirty sanitary sock when Steinbrenner fired his
father, Yogi, only 16 games into the 1985 season. Steinbrenner was rash,
but he took the heat for it.

Cruel? Maybe. But on Thursday, the New York Yankees, with Steinbrenner's
health rendering him little more than a figurehead, descended into a far
darker and disrespectful place. Under the leadership of president Randy
Levine, who commandered the news conference yesterday as if general manager
Brian Cashman and Steinbrenner's two sons, Hank and Hal, didn't exist, the
Yankees let corporate cowardice be their guide. This is a peek of life after
George.

Levine's Yankees are proud of themselves today because they think they ran
Joe Torre out of New York without getting blood on their hands. They think
you are dumb enough to believe that Torre was not fired, that they really,
really wanted him back, but that, golly gee, Torre turned down their offer.

But there is blood everywhere on Levine and the boys, remnants of a
sloppiness and covertness the Boss never knew. They spent three days crafting
a contract offer they thought would strike just the right balance: just good
enough for public relations purposes, but insulting enough that no man of
Torre's pride and accomplishments would ever accept. Torre is the most
successful manager in modern baseball history. He has delivered the Yankees
to 12 consecutive postseasons. The next longest active streak by a franchise?
That would be one. His Yankees crashed out of the first round of the
postseason this year because a swarm of bugs attacked a rookie pitcher and
the winningest pitcher of the past two seasons threw a total of 5 2/3 innings
in two starts in the American League Division Series. Such episodes defined
the unpredictable nature of postseason play.

So here is how Levine & Co. treated the Hall of Fame bound manager: they
offered to cut his pay by 23 percent -- so insulting that the players'
association has rules against such a huge cut for its members -- to bring him
back only for one year (which keeps their sniping of a lame-duck manager in
play) and to throw in "performance bonuses" (which are unprecedented even for
the least accomplished managers) based on a postseason model any baseball
observer with the least bit of sense understands is more random than
controllable.

One year? Goodness, Charlie Manuel, Joe Maddon and Ozzie Guillen were given
multiyear contract extensions! No manager of Torre's resume or dignity would
have accepted those conditions and Levine, who wanted Torre out for years,
knew it. It was not the money; Torre doesn't need it. It was knowing that
your employers don't want you, knowing that if another season began 21-29,
as this season did, the snipers and leakers would be firing away with
impunity. How could he ask respect from his players when his bosses did not
respect him?

Torre spent hardly an hour in Tampa yesterday with the Yankee brass. Does
anybody regard that as real negotiating, a good-faith effort to bring him
back? And Torre came to Tampa on his own accord, implying that the Yankees
were prepared to low-ball him by telephone. Classy. And did Cashman, as he
told reporters, really share a plane ride with Torre from New York and Tampa
and, despite all the time and success they shared, not warn him of the ambush
waiting for him at Legends Field with specifics of the contract?

If the Yankees wanted to fire Torre, they should have just fired him after
the ALDS, laying responsibility on him for a "failure" to get to the World
 Series seven straight years. It was the way of George. It was certainly
their right. You could argue Torre didn't deserve it, but you had to respect
the dictatorial right of Steinbrenner, even as the Yankees cling to this
 "World-Series-or-bust" mentality that has long been rendered obsolete in
this revenue-sharing age. Instead, under Levine, they took the cowardly way
out and think they are slick enough that you won't notice.

It was interesting to hear Levine assume command on the conference call.
Hank, except for a lame football analogy ("I'm sure if you asked Vince
Lombardi ...,'' he said), and Hal, who briefly showed an ability to
decisively say nothing, were eclipsed by Levine's bluster. Were the sons not
taking command from their father? Is this not their inheritance, their
responsibility? And wasn't this the first major policy decision in which
they were supposedly taking daily control? So, too, was Cashman
diminished. As one veteran GM told me last week, "If Brian has it written
into his contract that he has authority on all baseball operations decisions,
where has he been? Why hasn't he said anything about Torre?" It's apparent
now that in his heart Cashman didn't really want Torre back, a sea change
from where he was in May, when as the heat grew on Torre from that slow
start, Cashman told Steinbrenner, "It's not Joe's fault. If you want to fire
anybody, fire me!"

Cashman has fancied himself a Billy Beane-Theo Epstein wanna-be, an
intellectual GM known for running an efficient system, especially when it
comes to player development, rather than just a guy who writes checks. He
has traded veterans for prospects, embraced sabermetrics and surrounded
himself with young number-crunchers who get jazzed about PlayStation
tournaments. The more he has put his self-worth in the image of
cutting-edge GM the less Torre and his old-school ways became relevant.

"There may be some surprising names that show up," Cashman said about the
search for Torre's successor. Sure, Cashman would love to go all
cutting-edge on the Yankees and get somebody young and unknown like
Trey Hillman, the former Yankees minor league manager who is now in
Japan. But would the Steinbrenners and Levine dare let Cashman replace
Torre with a no-name? And if they thrust Don Mattingly, who is a nice
guy and "true Yankee" but hardly sabermetric-friendly, on Cashman, how
much further is Cashman diminished? We've already heard Hank tell us that he
personally insists that Joba Chamberlain start next season. Are these
Cashman's baseball operations any more?

Whatever happens, Mariano Rivera and Jorge Posada just earned themselves a
boatload more money. Do you really think Levine's Yankees are going to let
Rivera and Posada leave town, too? They need to sign them more than ever.
This day is the official end of an era for the Yankees. The Torre era -- four
world championships and six pennants in 12 years -- is over, with Torre
taking with him the same dignity he brought to the job and the franchise.
He didn't want the job under these conditions. What does that say about these
Yankees?

http://tinyurl.com/23p793

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