Derek Jeter will begin the second half of his final season with the Yankees five games behind Baltimore in the AL East and 3 ½ games outside the second wild-card spot.
Joe Torre hopes that changes.
“The only way for his career to end is in the postseason,” Torre said Thursday. “We’ll have to wait and see.”
It won’t be easy, especially given their injury issues, the likes of which Torre never had to deal with when he managed in The Bronx.
“Joe [Girardi] has done a remarkable job just trying to patch this thing up,” Torre said of the depleted roster that is without, among other things, 80 percent of its Opening Day rotation. “They keep losing one guy after another. It’s tough.”
Still, Torre said he believes Jeter and Girardi can get back to October, despite the odds.
“Nobody’s running away with that thing in the East,” Torre said while hosting a fund-raiser for his Safe at Home Foundation at Sleepy Hollow Country Club. “The Yankees, I still think there’s a mystique connected with them that if they’re close, something happens that will get them over the hump.”
Something like a trade, which wouldn’t surprise David Cone.
“There’s a lot of pressure on [general manager Brian] Cashman at this point,” Cone said, pointing to Phillies’ veterans Cliff Lee and Cole Hamels. “You can see them giving it a run, but it’s hard to know the price tag. They’re the Yankees. They’re always in on these things. If it’s close enough, they always find a way to make it happen and I’d be surprised if something like that doesn’t happen.”
Especially with Masahiro Tanaka out likely at least until September as he tries to come back from a small tear in his elbow ligament that could end up requiring Tommy John surgery.
“They’re real fortunate to be at .500,” Cone said. “I don’t know how you overcome [losing] Tanaka. They really need him back.”
If that doesn’t happen, Jeter may join former teammates Mariano Rivera and Andy Pettitte, who saw their careers end with the regular season a year ago.
“He only has one thought,” Torre said of Jeter. “He’s playing to go to the playoffs.
Torre’s Hall of Fame induction ceremony in Cooperstown is less than two weeks away, but Torre said he’s “not ready to do it yet.”
“I’ve been writing, but I have no idea what I’m gonna say,” he said. “I’ve never been one to read something. I’ve always wanted to speak what was in my heard and in my mind.”
And he said he already is looking forward to Jeter’s induction.
“I have to count my years,” Torre said. “I want to make sure I’m still mobile when he gets up there. That’s the thing that [ticks] me off about these guys not retiring soon enough.”
Torre joined Rivera, Pettitte, Jorge Posada and Tino Martinez in Nike’s “Respect” commercial for Jeter. They filmed the scene in a restaurant in downtown Manhattan over several hours.
Though Torre and Martinez enjoyed the finished product, they were surprised by some aspects.
“We were far away,” Torre said.
“I think it took three hours to film a five-second clip,” Martinez said.