Sorry Joe, This Time You Got It Wrong

I have always liked Joe Torre – admiring his class and his style.And, like most followers of the game, I have never liked George Steinbrenner.But, at his press conference on Oct. 18, Joe got it all wrong.St. Joe did not come across as a martyr to me.He came across as a tired old man who had lost touch with reality.Just for the record, I am older than Joe and a native New Yorker who has followed the game for more than 60 years (and I am not a Yankee fan).

It appears that Joe believed his press clippings and the nonsense that the New York media has been feeding him.He chose to wallow in self-pity as he explained why he turned down a perfectly reasonable (even generous) offer from the Yankees to manage for one more year.To call a five million dollar offer with three million more in incentives (more than any other manager makes) an “insult” is to have lost all perspective and to have forgotten that baseball is a business.

This is not an issue of whether Joe has been “successful” or “not successful” as manager of the Yankees (although there can be two sides to that argument also).Rather it is a case of business economics.

The mistake that the Yankee brass made was when they gave Joe his previous contract.To pay any manager more than twice as much as any other manager is absolutely ridiculous.For Joe Torre to have received seven and a half million in 2007 was crazy.For Joe Torre to believe that he was “worth” that much money was self–delusion.

If Joe Torre did not want to manage the Yankees in 2008 for any reason, he should have said so and taken his shots and walked away with his head held high.That would have shown the class for which he has become famous.But to suggest that the Yankee offer was an “insult” is a classic example of ingratitude and of “biting the hand that feeds you.”

I still like Joe Torre.And I wish him well.But he definitely made a mistake this time .