The best and most significant quote of the day here Monday as the Yankees gathered for their workout before the American League playoffs came from manager Joe Torre. It was in response to a question about juggling his lineup, and forcing several of his everyday players to the bench.
“How did they take it? Torre was asked.
“I didn’t anticipate them to be happy,” Torre said. “I know I wouldn’t be happy. And I wouldn’t want them to be happy. I had guys in the past who sat on the bench and went in and got drinks for everybody. They were the happiest people in the world. I want guys who want to play. That’s why I’ve never tried to muzzle anybody.”
Torre is correct. When a disgruntled player pops off because he’s not in the lineup it’s not a big deal and should be taken in stride and not interpreted as a major rhubarb. All good competitors want to play. But it’s the manager’s decision who plays and who doesn’t. The manager’s job is to win, not to please the troops.
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If and when Terry Bevington gets the ax, the most likely successor as White Sox manager should be Chris Chambliss, who is finishing his sixth season as the Yankees’ batting coach. Chambliss had a 15-year playing career, and also managed four years in the minors, including three years in Triple A.
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A baseball lifer, he has touched all the bases except one. During the last five or six years, Chambliss has been interviewed for a big-league managerial assignment, without success, six times–by Florida, Kansas City, Oakland, Anaheim, Baltimore and the White Sox, immediately after Gene Lamont was fired.
“Sure, I’d like to manage the White Sox,” Chambliss said.
Chambliss has been in uniform as a coach or player on six championship teams and is best known for hitting a ninth-inning home run that won the 1976 pennant for the Yankees. It’s time he got a chance.
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Hall of Famer Bob Feller, baseball’s onetime strikeout king, on Hideki Irabu, the Yankees’ pudgy pitcher, who has been dropped from the roster and won’t be eligible for the first round of the AL playoffs.
Said Feller, who never hedges:
“He looks like a fat tub–just like I do. He needs two weeks in a 130-degree sauna.
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Bud Shaw, sports columnist for the Cleveland Plain Dealer, was asked if he missed Albert Belle.
“Every day,” Shaw replied, laughing.
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Yankee outfielder Paul O’Neill, who hit .324 this season, doesn’t appreciate those critics who assert that the Yankees, who won the AL wild-card berth, are in the playoffs on a pass because they didn’t win a division championship.
“Once you get to the playoffs it doesn’t matter,” O’Neill said. “From then on you have to beat the best teams in baseball. And I think we’re deserving. We’ve had a very good year. If you win 96 games and don’t get into the playoffs, something’s wrong.”
Last year the Yankees won 92 games during the regular season and went on to win the World Series.
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Joe Girardi, known in Evanston as “Northwestern Joe,” says he is indebted to Yankee coach Don Zimmer.
“I’ve been with Zim at every stop,” Girardi said. “With the Cubs, with Colorado and now here. What I’m afraid of is when he retires, he might want to take me with him.”
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Andy Pettitte, who will make the second-game start for the Yankees, was told he looks like Kenny Holtzman, the onetime Cub pitcher. Like Holtzman, who pitched two no-hitters and had a 90 m.p.h. fastball, Pettitte is a hard-throwing left-hander with a smooth delivery.
“Kenny Holtzman? Never heard of him,” Pettitte said.
Pettitte should be so good.
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Rey Sanchez, the former Cub whom the Yankees acquired in a midseason trade, said, “Being here is lots of fun. It’s like being born again.”
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Sanchez had nothing bad to say about Cub management.
“I appreciate everything they did for me,” he said. “But it was best for me to move on.”