For the record, Hal Steinbrenner authorized Yankees general manager Brian Cashman to go into public attack mode against Derek Jeter after the shortstop’s agent referred to the negotiations as “baffling.”
The Yankees owner also encouraged Cashman to offer his reasons for not recommending the signing of Rafael Soriano at the very press conference that officially announced the signing of the right-handed reliever.
Look, next month is 22 years at The Post for me, so I like a juicy rogue general manager story as much as the next tabloid nut. I just wish the facts — not appearances — corroborated the story du jour that goes like this: Cashman has gone off the pinstriped reservation because he wants to get himself fired or to end up as a small-market GM to prove he can win big without a huge payroll.
Cashman insisted to me he does not want out. His friends insisted to me that he does not want out. A few weeks back, this guy rappelled down the side of a building for his kids. So if the conspiracy theories are now to be believed, that same guy now is willing to pull his kids from school in Connecticut — and his wife away from her beloved twin sister — all in the name of having, what, the Pittsburgh Pirates’ payroll?
Sure Cashman has focused on the draft and player development, and has fears of signing older players in a way associated with small-market franchises. But his model was the Red Sox, not the Reds. And let us remember, even if it foils the sexier storyline, Cashman favors checkbook baseball when he thinks it makes sense. He did, after all, push and push until Steinbrenner finally relented after the 2008 season and guaranteed Mark Teixeira $180 million.
Heck, during the 2009 season, Cashman worked out a trade for Mike Cameron in fear the team could not win it all with Melky Cabrera and Brett Gardner in center, but Steinbrenner, pointing in particular to Teixeira, told the GM he already had enough expensive toys. So, yes, there have been plenty of times previously when Steinbrenner has not done what Cashman recommended.
Cashman also is savvy enough to know that smaller market does not mean less meddling by ownership. He can, for example, ask Joe Girardi just how involved Florida owner Jeff Loria is in running the Marlins. There are plenty of whispers in the game that Brewers GM Doug Melvin was not quite as gung-ho to surrender four youngsters from a shallow system for Zack Greinke as was his aggressive owner, Mark Attanasio.
In reality, Cashman gets his way in baseball operations more than most GMs. And as one of his best friends in the game told me, “it is not like the old days when Brian was overruled by whim.” Indeed, before being vested with more substantial powers in 2005 (coinciding with George Steinbrenner’s fade), Cashman could be the last to know, for example, that the club had signed a Tony Womack or Jaret Wright.
Regardless of how strenuously Cashman may have objected to Soriano, he does feel that he received a full hearing from Hal Steinbrenner. That three-year, $35 million signing nevertheless re-triggered the “Cashman wants out” storylines. So it is worth further investigating how such a decision was made.
It is important to recognize the Yankees are far more than a baseball team. They are an entertainment company, a historical entity and a behemoth of sports. Cashman runs the baseball portion of the entity. Team president Randy Levine, to a large extent, is in charge of making sure the Yankees remain a powerhouse in the other areas. It is his job, largely, to make sure those high-priced tickets are bought, that viewers want to tune into the YES network and that the hospitality company the club runs flourishes.
So when, for example, Alex Rodriguez opted out of his contract to become a free agent, Cashman saw the baseball-related disaster of giving a 10-year contract that will take Rodriguez into his forties. But Levine, among others, focused on what it could mean to YES ratings and ticket buying if Rodriguez were to pass historic home run milestones.
So Cashman was overruled. Just as he was that same offseason when he thought going three years with Mariano Rivera and four years with Jorge Posada was too long; just like he was earlier this offseason when he felt going to a fourth year for Jeter was wrong; and just like recently when he felt committing substantial dollars for Soriano to cover the eighth inning was improper.
In a strict baseball sense, Cashman was correct, but the business model of the Yankees pushes the team to keep historic players such as Rivera, Posada and Jeter in pinstripes and to make sure Jeter gets his 3,000th hit as a Yankee. It also means losing seasons that threaten the business model are forbidden.
“We can’t allow to happen here what is happening on the other side of the bridge,” a Yankees executive said of the problems that have beset the Mets’ business after a few losing seasons.
So Hal Steinbrenner finds himself essentially having Cashman and Levine whispering in his ear, at times with different messages. Steinbrenner plays tiebreaker. That is what happened with Soriano when Levine saw $35 million as a worthwhile investment to increase the team’s chances of making the 2011 playoffs. Steinbrenner listened to Levine, but ultimately authorized Cashman to speak his mind publicly about what he had recommended to ownership.
Sure, it would be a better story if Cashman simply was defying his bosses and trying to get canned. It is just not a true story.