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Worrying peek into those damn Yankees
By Toure |
July 26, 2009, Sunday
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Print Edition
Print Edition
WHY do Yankee fans still love the Yanks? The team has embarrassed its supporters by leading the league in steroid scandals -- thanks, Jason Giambi, Andy Pettitte, Roger Clemens and Alex Rodriguez. It's also made them cringe by strong-arming New York City into giving the team public funds to subsidize its new US$1.5 billion stadium while also flexing its herculean financial muscles to grab expensive free agents like a spoiled heir stockpiling rare sports cars.
Last off-season, the Yanks allocated US$423 million for three players while getting more than US$1 billion in tax-exempt bonds from the city, costing taxpayers millions in revenues. It can be thrilling to see the Bombers win free-agent battles year after year -- and why shouldn't they, if they can make more money than other teams by selling lots of tickets at high prices and draw even more fans to YES, their multi-billion-dollar television network? But then why does the richest team in American sports need taxpayer help?
This is the side of the Yanks embodied in Rodriguez, with his steroid-stained resume and the biggest contract in baseball despite no postseason success. A-Rod sometimes seems preceded in Yankee history by Reggie Jackson and Babe Ruth, with their home run swings, household brand names, outsize personalities and knack for controversy, but -- critical difference -- Mr October and the Bambino shone in the big moments. Rodriguez consistently fails in the clutch in the regular season. That doesn't move the turnstiles.
Bronx Bombers
What makes fans proud of the pinstripes is the Yankees' Jeterian side. Derek Jeter, with his four World Series rings and the respect of everyone in baseball for being a stand-up guy and playing the game the right way, is the latest in a long string of Bronx Bombers with dignity, character and class. These men are why New Yorkers feel the Yanks are the sporting extension of the ego of a city that sees itself filled with winners who are tough under pressure.
Three books give an unsettling peek inside the team: "A-Rod," by Selena Roberts, a senior writer for Sports Illustrated; "The Yankee Years," by Joe Torre and Tom Verducci; and "American Icon," which focuses on Roger Clemens, by Teri Thompson, Nathaniel Vinton, Michael O'Keeffe and Christian Red. Because so many of the players discussed are still Yanks, the books have an almost magazine-like immediacy as they reveal a diseased team that doesn't seem to have the chemistry needed to win.
Johnny Damon has struggled with existential crises that make him uncertain whether he really wants to play baseball. Robinson Cano has lapses in concentration and has to be prodded into doing the work it takes to be a good major leaguer. And things have gotten so bad between Rodriguez and Jeter that everyone feels the frost, forcing players and management to choose sides. Management sides with Rodriguez, the clubhouse with Jeter. "The city welcomed him," Roberts writes of Rodriguez. "The team, though, rejected him. They did not like his haute couture flair, his high maintenance needs and his manicured quotes for the media. They also knew that he was a hypocrite, playing the Boy Scout by day and the Bad Boy at night." The Bronx Zoo is back.
Attention addict
We learn many of Rodriguez's secrets in Roberts' meticulously reported psychological profile, which will give fans no comfort about the man who's contracted to be a Yankee through the 2017 season. She finds Rodriguez an extremely insecure, ultra-vain, self-absorbed, gullible attention addict who's emotionally stunted, has no sense of self, is constantly in need of validation and has no real friends. At one point in his book, Torre implores several players to help with Rodriguez.
"I remember calling in Sheff, Jeter, Giambi, Georgie and just saying, 'He's got to feel important'." But he can never be just one of the guys and is weirdly fixated on Jeter. Rodriguez is superior in every possible baseball metric (except clutch hitting), but Jeter is more loved, respected and revered by fans and players. "Jeet knows who he is," Giambi tells Roberts. "He doesn't blow his own horn ... He doesn't do something and then tell the media, 'Hey, look at me lead,' to be validated."
The Jeter issue drives Rodriguez crazy. Even away from the park, Roberts says, when he's in nightclubs hitting on women who don't know baseball, he remains obsessive, asking them, "who's hotter, me or Derek Jeter?" Roberts finds him rather pathetic with women in general. He picks up his future wife, Cynthia, by pretending to have run out of gas. And after his daughter Natasha is born, Rodriguez feels pushed aside: "Alex adored Natasha but was also taken aback at how much of Cynthia's attention was funneled to their newborn, not to him. Alex knew it was wrong to feel that way."
Torre's book explains that Rodriguez is a crucial example of why the Yanks have fallen from their dynastic high to a team that's struggled to get out of the division series, despite adding a slew of high-priced players. The expensive imports -- Giambi, Randy Johnson, Jose Contreras, Kevin Brown, Carl Pavano and others -- are like off-season Pyrrhic victories, because the new guys tend to erode team chemistry.
"American Icon" mostly covers ground that serious baseball fans already know, but it may answer some lingering Yankee questions. Why did Chuck Knoblauch, second baseman during the dynasty, suddenly and mysteriously lose the ability to throw to first base? Possibly because he was using G.H.B., the dieter's drug (also known as a date rape drug), which goes into the central nervous system and can lead to convulsions or twitching or the yips. Also, what really happened to Clemens in that bizarre moment during the 2000 World Series when he grabbed half of Mike Piazza's shattered bat and flung it toward him? Most likely, roid rage.
Last off-season, the Yanks allocated US$423 million for three players while getting more than US$1 billion in tax-exempt bonds from the city, costing taxpayers millions in revenues. It can be thrilling to see the Bombers win free-agent battles year after year -- and why shouldn't they, if they can make more money than other teams by selling lots of tickets at high prices and draw even more fans to YES, their multi-billion-dollar television network? But then why does the richest team in American sports need taxpayer help?
This is the side of the Yanks embodied in Rodriguez, with his steroid-stained resume and the biggest contract in baseball despite no postseason success. A-Rod sometimes seems preceded in Yankee history by Reggie Jackson and Babe Ruth, with their home run swings, household brand names, outsize personalities and knack for controversy, but -- critical difference -- Mr October and the Bambino shone in the big moments. Rodriguez consistently fails in the clutch in the regular season. That doesn't move the turnstiles.
Bronx Bombers
What makes fans proud of the pinstripes is the Yankees' Jeterian side. Derek Jeter, with his four World Series rings and the respect of everyone in baseball for being a stand-up guy and playing the game the right way, is the latest in a long string of Bronx Bombers with dignity, character and class. These men are why New Yorkers feel the Yanks are the sporting extension of the ego of a city that sees itself filled with winners who are tough under pressure.
Three books give an unsettling peek inside the team: "A-Rod," by Selena Roberts, a senior writer for Sports Illustrated; "The Yankee Years," by Joe Torre and Tom Verducci; and "American Icon," which focuses on Roger Clemens, by Teri Thompson, Nathaniel Vinton, Michael O'Keeffe and Christian Red. Because so many of the players discussed are still Yanks, the books have an almost magazine-like immediacy as they reveal a diseased team that doesn't seem to have the chemistry needed to win.
Johnny Damon has struggled with existential crises that make him uncertain whether he really wants to play baseball. Robinson Cano has lapses in concentration and has to be prodded into doing the work it takes to be a good major leaguer. And things have gotten so bad between Rodriguez and Jeter that everyone feels the frost, forcing players and management to choose sides. Management sides with Rodriguez, the clubhouse with Jeter. "The city welcomed him," Roberts writes of Rodriguez. "The team, though, rejected him. They did not like his haute couture flair, his high maintenance needs and his manicured quotes for the media. They also knew that he was a hypocrite, playing the Boy Scout by day and the Bad Boy at night." The Bronx Zoo is back.
Attention addict
We learn many of Rodriguez's secrets in Roberts' meticulously reported psychological profile, which will give fans no comfort about the man who's contracted to be a Yankee through the 2017 season. She finds Rodriguez an extremely insecure, ultra-vain, self-absorbed, gullible attention addict who's emotionally stunted, has no sense of self, is constantly in need of validation and has no real friends. At one point in his book, Torre implores several players to help with Rodriguez.
"I remember calling in Sheff, Jeter, Giambi, Georgie and just saying, 'He's got to feel important'." But he can never be just one of the guys and is weirdly fixated on Jeter. Rodriguez is superior in every possible baseball metric (except clutch hitting), but Jeter is more loved, respected and revered by fans and players. "Jeet knows who he is," Giambi tells Roberts. "He doesn't blow his own horn ... He doesn't do something and then tell the media, 'Hey, look at me lead,' to be validated."
The Jeter issue drives Rodriguez crazy. Even away from the park, Roberts says, when he's in nightclubs hitting on women who don't know baseball, he remains obsessive, asking them, "who's hotter, me or Derek Jeter?" Roberts finds him rather pathetic with women in general. He picks up his future wife, Cynthia, by pretending to have run out of gas. And after his daughter Natasha is born, Rodriguez feels pushed aside: "Alex adored Natasha but was also taken aback at how much of Cynthia's attention was funneled to their newborn, not to him. Alex knew it was wrong to feel that way."
Torre's book explains that Rodriguez is a crucial example of why the Yanks have fallen from their dynastic high to a team that's struggled to get out of the division series, despite adding a slew of high-priced players. The expensive imports -- Giambi, Randy Johnson, Jose Contreras, Kevin Brown, Carl Pavano and others -- are like off-season Pyrrhic victories, because the new guys tend to erode team chemistry.
"American Icon" mostly covers ground that serious baseball fans already know, but it may answer some lingering Yankee questions. Why did Chuck Knoblauch, second baseman during the dynasty, suddenly and mysteriously lose the ability to throw to first base? Possibly because he was using G.H.B., the dieter's drug (also known as a date rape drug), which goes into the central nervous system and can lead to convulsions or twitching or the yips. Also, what really happened to Clemens in that bizarre moment during the 2000 World Series when he grabbed half of Mike Piazza's shattered bat and flung it toward him? Most likely, roid rage.
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