I’VE been saying for more than a year that Joe Torre is a Paris Hilton-style whiner. But now, the former Yankee manager has transformed into someone far less appealing.
VACCARO: YOU’VE MANAGED TO RUIN A LEGACY
Torre has turned into a paranoid, troubled twin of Richard Nixon – finding enemies and conspirators behind every corner of the dugout. He’s blaming everyone for his losses and failures as the highest-paid manager in baseball history. Everyone, that is, except himself.
Torre should share the psychiatrist’s couch with slugger Alex Rodriguez. Instead, the Madonna-obsessed slugger is a prime target in Torre’s curious tome, “The Yankee Years.” It’s part memoir, part get-even diatribe. And it’s 100 percent embarrassing.
What will the Dodgers, who gave Torre a job, think of this shocking kiss-and-tell?
Torre described A-Rod as having a “Single White Female”-like fixation on shortstop Derek Jeter. But what Torre revealed was his own, creepy fixation on the hitter. Really, Joe, what are you trying to say about A-Rod?
Rather than get angry at being the prime target in Torre’s midlife crisis, a source close to A-Rod yesterday said Rodriguez laughed out loud when met with the revelations.
“Alex is high-profile. If you target someone with this kind of commentary, you’ll sell books,” said the source.
“Maybe he’d be better off being obsessed with his present teammates. It’s his last grasp at trying to capitalize on a diminishing profile.”
Torre’s problem seems too familiar to any consumer of chick lit. He loved too much. He got hurt. Well guess what? They were just not that into you, Joe.
Torre revealed in an interview that he tried to be something of a father to A-Rod, not a manager.
In a too-much-information revelation given before he quit, Torre prattled on about the player’s father-abandonment issues, with which Torre could relate. Let’s all have a hug.
But despite his whining, Joe did not get fired. The Yankees actually offered him a pay raise – if he would just deliver a winning team. Joe called it an insult and stormed off.
But when it comes time to selling books, Torre proved he’d throw his “son,” as well as former players and bosses, under a bus.
Torre wanted to leave behind a sterling legacy for his time managing a formerly great baseball franchise. Instead, he just wrote his epitaph.
He goes down in bitterness. How very sad.