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 GEORGE STEINBRENNER ...brought Yankees back to glory |
Hating 'em is easy, but
you have to give 'em credit
of TheColumnists.com
The Yankees closed
out another decade last month with their 40th pennant and 27th
World Series title. How frustrating, America.
The baseball world is divided among Yankee fans and Others. I
belong to the Others.
As a kid in Brooklyn, I rooted against them and cried each fall.
When the Brooklyn Dodgers finally won one in 1955, I happened
to be some 10,000 miles away in Tokyo, Japan. The Army sent me
there. It took a little steam out of my baseball joy.
I had finally walked away from my daily newspaper chores in 2000
when the Yankees won their fourth title in five seasons under
Joe Torre. It wasn’t the same as the five Series in a row
they won from 1949-1953 or the five pennants in a row from 1960-1964
when I was there to record that.
Still, Torre Time was pretty damn good.
The 2000 Series hurt because the Yankees beat the Mets. We’re
supposed to be impartial observers in the press box but my heart
tingled a little for the Mets after that 1969 win over Baltimore.
Me and Earl Weaver have never gotten over that one
George Steinbrenner bought the team with mostly other people’s
money in 1973. The Yankees were almost out of business by then,
a tenth place team in 1966 and a struggling franchise, rumored
on their way to New Jersey or New Orleans or any place that might
build them a new stadium.
Well, Steinbrenner figured out quickly it was easy to win if
the team spent money for the newly created free agents and Catfish
Hunter, Reggie Jackson, Goose Gossage and friends changed into
pinstripes.
The other owners screamed. Did they spend as much money as George
on quality players? Hell, no.
Chalk up some more titles for the Yankees.
The Yankees actually didn’t win a World Series for 18 years
from 1978 until 1996 under Torre. It just seemed that they did
as Steinbrenner helped the American economy. He didn’t put
most of that money he was earning from his team into his pocket.
He put it into the pockets of talented players.
After some desperate down years it all changed in 1996 with the
title and then the great run, triggered by Derek Jeter, Mariano
Rivera, Jorge Posada and Andy Pettitte, the Fabulous Four, still
as vital to a Yankee title in 2009 as they were 13 years earlier
in 1996.
It is easy to hate the Yankees. That’s why the “I Hate-the-Yankees”
hankies are such big sellers in Cleveland and Minnesota, in Anaheim
and Kansas City, in Boston, of course, and last month in Philadelphia.
The Yankees deposited another 26 million dollars in Alex Rodriguez’s
bank account this year and they provided a magnificent financial
future for free agents C.C. Sabathia, A. J. Burnett and Mark
Teixeira, all of whom delivered the goods, as they approached
the new season.
This was a year that had to pay off. There was that new Yankee
Stadium, a one billion dollar edifice, give or take a few million
from the city and state, and a team that failed to make the playoffs
the year before. Put or shut up, Yankees.
Of course, they put up.
It all started with ARod being exposed as a steroids user and
then coming down with hip problems that kept him out of the lineup
for the first six weeks of the season. No matter. He came back
with a productive year and his first successful post-season.
Chalk up another for Yankee staying power.
Sabathia struggled early on, as most Yankee free agents do, and
then managed to win 19 games and star in the post-season.
Burnett lightened the image with his idiotic pie-in-the-face
routine and Teixeira proved that a fine fielding first baseman
is as important as a slugging first baseman, both of which he
clearly was for the Yankees.
Hideki Matsui and Johnny Damon, both considered finished at the
start of 2009 and free agents in demand afterwards, performance
splendidly in the new ballpark.
Mariano Rivera was, well, Mariano Rivera, just the best relief
pitcher the game has ever seen. He is 40 years old now and there
isn’t a team in baseball that wouldn’t break its bank
to have him save for them. Forget about it. Just bet he won’t
be pitching for the Yankees at 50.
The Yankees closed out the decade in the Steinbrenner era as
they closed out the other three decades in the 1970s, 1980s and
1990s, the most hated team in the country outside New York and
the most successful.
Steinbrenner will be 80 July 4, 2010. He isn’t the blustering
Boss of old with his two sons, two daughters and a son-in-law
really running the Yankee show now.
Still, he deserves all the credit for bringing the legendary
franchise back to its former glory and establishing a tradition
of success in sports that may never be duplicated.
The Celtics and the Lakers have won big in basketball and the
Packers and the Steelers have done it in football and Tiger Woods
has done it in golf and Roger Federer has done it in tennis.
No team or talent has done it in American sports the way the
Yankees have. Hate them all you want, just as I do. But damn,
they are good.
©2009 by Maury Allen. The Maury Allen caricature is ©2001 by Jim Hummel. The George Steinbrenner photo is courtesy of ESPN. This column first posted Dec. 7, 2009.
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