GEORGE Steinbrenner hovered over the Yankees yesterday. His presence, words and actions reinforcing what everyone in the clubhouse tried to deny. Just how much trouble his team suddenly is in.
Wearing his usual blue blazer and white turtleneck, Steinbrenner sat in the owners box high over the Stadium for nearly 40 minutes yesterday, a solitary figure glaring down at the field from 4:30 p.m. to 5:07 p.m. as his $200 million collection of talent stretched and then took batting practice.
He broke this Patton act long enough to have a flunky phone one of his many on-field security henchmen to complain about the media’s presence on the grass, an area the media is every day. This is an old Steinbrenner act about not wanting his players distracted from the work at hand. Except all The Boss did in the pregame was distract his team.
First by his presence, which players slowly became aware of with nudges to one another. And then with more of what he believes are motivational tactics, but instead probably have a reverse impact.
On the side scoreboards in color and written out on the main scoreboard were the saying, “When the goin’ gets tough, the tough get goin’.” Those sayings stayed plastered throughout batting practice, which rather than serving as inspiration were more a Manchurian Candidate-like subliminal message to remind that ‘you better get goin’ or else you will see just how tough I can get.”
On the marquee outside the Stadium, which usually contains the opposition and start time, the saying, “Winners never quit and quitters never win” welcomed players to their day’s work.
Steinbrenner liked it so much he used the clichi as part of yet another press release statement in which he proclaimed his club would not wilt in the aftermath of the most lopsided loss in organization history, 22-0 Tuesday to the Indians.
Except anybody who has dealt with Steinbrenner over the years knows these releases are camouflage for his true feelings. He always is convinced the worse will beset his club, which in this instance means it will blow all of its 101/2-game lead to the Red Sox.
“It was probably more a show of support,” Derek Jeter said about the overt presence, in words and body, of The Boss.
It is the kind of thing a team captain says. But Jeter has been around long enough to know what all the mechanisms mean. And Jeter has been around long enough to know that all of Steinbrenner’s blather will not negatively affect him. But as more and more of the championship Yankees have departed, it is more difficult to gauge how this group will cope with the twin threats of The Boss and the Bosox.
Jeter said he “thinks” this Yankee team will persevere and prosper, “but we’ll have to find out.”
In years past, Joe Torre knew his clubhouse was replete with true believers that trusted in the group, that gained confidence from each other to weather these kinds of storms. But as the herd has thinned, as the David Cones, Chili Davises, Joe Girardis, Paul O’Neills, Tino Martinezes, Scott Brosiuses and Andy Pettittes have moved on, the group has generally grown more talented, and yet less self-confident.
The shared experience is not as strong. What Jeter, Torre, Bernie Williams, Jorge Posada and Mariano Rivera have to sell might not be as readily absorbed.
With the Yanks 3½ games ahead going into last night, Jeter said he wanted to see how the club responded to 0-22 before deciding whether to share his thoughts in a team meeting. However, he did say in some fashion he would “relay the message” that the 1996 Yanks nearly lost all of a 12-game lead and the 2000 Yanks lost 15 out of 18 to close a season and got outscored by 148-59.
Both staggers brought a sky-is-falling feeling around the team and both were ultimately met with a championship ending.
But those were tough-minded teams that could block out the media, the negative atmosphere and The Boss to do great things. Will this group be able to do the same?
