THIS was at the Giants’ team hotel on Saturday night, 24 hours before the Super Bowl. Ernie Accorsi, the team’s former GM, was explaining a philosophical decision to two interested parties.
One was his successor, Jerry Reese. The other was a friend by the name of Brian Cashman.
Accorsi recalled the slew of offers he had received for April 2007 draft picks, especially for the first- and second-round slots. But Accorsi also knew 2006 would be his final season and felt it would be unfair not to leave a full complement of picks to the next man in his chair.
Reese honored that act by going 8-for-8 on draft day, each member of his first class making the team. A day after this conversation so many members of that class – Aaron Ross and Steve Smith, Kevin Boss and Jay Alford, Ahmad Bradshaw and Zak DeOssie – contributed to a Super Bowl upset.
The conversation on Saturday and result on Sunday only cemented Cashman’s belief that the protect-the-kids course he has set for the Yankees is proper. It is the Mets, after all, who have a press conference today to introduce Johan Santana, a joyous day in Flushing made feasible by Cashman’s refusal to deal Phil Hughes to the Twins.
It is possible, and Cashman knows this, that he might be rebuilding a farm system for another man, that he will play Accorsi and hand off something ready to blossom to his successor. He insists he is fine with that prospect, recalling how fortunate he was to be gifted a championship roster from his predecessor Bob Watson, saying he owes it to that memory and to professionalism and to Yankees fans to guarantee his baton pass is as fruitful.
“You want to make sure it is sustainable for the next person,” Cashman said.
Cashman has just one year left on his contract. No one would be surprised if he returned again, that his love for the job and his long history with the Steinbrenner family produce another contract. But no one around the Yankees – or really around baseball – would be surprised either if VP of scouting Damon Oppenheimer, like Reese, graduates from heading a draft room to directing the big room. Oppenheimer’s outstanding recent drafts have provided much of the backbone to support Cashman’s vision of restoring youth and financial sanity to the Yankees roster.
But youth usually takes time. Eli Manning, after all, needed most of his four seasons to navigate from promise to promised land. Cashman is savvy enough to know that no general lessons are going to be learned from that journey. It isn’t like New York fans and the New York media will find a collective patience with Hughes or Joba Chamberlain or Ian Kennedy in memory of how, just a month ago, most of the tri-state region had rendered a final, merciless report on the bust that was Eli Manning.
“There is going to be growing pains,” Cashman said.
The Yankees know from the recent past how it can go both ways. Derek Jeter, Andy Pettitte and Mariano Rivera came to the majors almost fully formed as stars. Their ability to swat away an apprenticeship period was as central to a dynasty as anything. But Bernie Williams was Eli, mixing hints of greatness and infuriating gaffes in his nascent years. Only former GM Gene Michael’s refusal to bend to bad reviews and George Steinbrenner’s fury protected Williams, who became a champion center fielder in the reigns of Watson and Cashman.
And Cashman was in Arizona on Sunday to see it go both ways in the Super Bowl. Sitting behind the Giants bench, the former roommate of Tom Coughlin’s son Tim cheered mightily as Manning’s maturity was fully realized and as a draft class supported it. He returned on a red-eye that night, back in the office Monday and was watching a parade down the Canyon of Heroes on TV yesterday, wondering if he will ever get back.
“You want it, but there is a road you have to take the get there,” Cashman said.
He has no doubt he has moved the Yankees to the right road. But there are no guarantees you get to drive the whole way.