When Yankees fans of a certain era remembered Joe DiMaggio, they did so with reverence and respect, with hushed recollections of booming home runs and graceful catches and the elegant élan of an innocent time. They never talked about what a pariah he nearly became as a young player when he would hold out every year, when his owner called him “a greedy and ungrateful young man,” when many of those fans filled Yankee Stadium with boos.
When Yankees fans of a certain age remember Mickey Mantle, it’s with a perpetual childlike awe thanks to the 536 home runs and the larger-than-life boost of a prime played in the Eisenhower ’50s and Kennedy ’60s. You never hear much of the (hundreds, if not thousands of) times he snarled at autograph-seeking kids, sometimes signing with his specialized, signature touch: “Bleep you. Mickey Mantle.”
In memory, Billy Martin is forever a fiery winner, not a drunken blowhard. Reggie Jackson is three home runs on three swings against the Dodgers, not the egomaniacal creep whose mere presence nearly blew to pieces a pennant-winning clubhouse. Andy Pettitte is the big-game specialist and not the admitted PED user. Even Babe Ruth is remembered for all of his out-sized Ruthian accomplishments and hardly ever for his outer-sized appetites, vices and predilections.
So, no: Jorge Posada won’t have to worry about his legacy as a Yankee being defined by one bad decision. In a month, six months, a year — assuming he’s put his petulance away for good — the fans who now are angry with him for bailing on the Yankees Saturday night almost assuredly will remember instead the burning, passionate gamer who was a significant piece of the Yankees’ most dominant stretch since the early 1960s.
csprtContainer();
“Everybody has a bad day,” Posada said yesterday, a few hours before the Yankees would try to prevent the Red Sox from completing a three-game sweep at the Stadium. “I think I just had one [Saturday]. I’m trying to move on. I want to do that, I keep saying it, and I hope everyone else understands, too.”
He will get the benefit of the doubt from Yankees fans, if not this morning then soon. There isn’t a large enough pedestal for all the rogues and rascals who have doubled as forever Yankees. It’s far more rare to be Lou Gehrig or Don Mattingly or Yogi Berra or even Bernie Williams, terrific Yankees for whom there were almost no black marks against their names. Even Derek Jeter’s fine run as a star and a gentleman soured in some eyes with his contract headaches this past winter.
But Jeter isn’t about to be remembered in the year 2525 as a malcontent.
And Posada won’t be remembered for a Scottie Pippen brain-cramp moment, especially after he went to such great pains to try to make things right yesterday. He sought out Joe Girardi, apologized for his behavior — even if neither man was quite prepared to use the word “insubordination.” He talked to Jeter, who in turn spoke of Posada as “my brother” — even if Jeter grew visibly uncomfortable when Posada’s issues slowly morphed into “our issues” after a few minutes of questioning at his locker.
Maybe these weren’t ideal acts of contrition, but they spoke of a player who realized that he had made a substantial error in judgment when he asked out of the lineup Saturday. If it will be hard for some fans to have sympathy for a $13 million ballplayer’s anger at being dropped in the batting order, there are plenty of others who believe Girardi — so reluctant to even ponder the possibility of doing the same to Jeter during his struggles — would so casually disrespect Posada that way.
Both sides of the debate are correct, in truth. And all will agree to something else: They will remember selectively. Most don’t remember David Wells the moody boor, only the pitching anchor of a team that won 125 games. Most don’t remember Mickey Rivers mailing in games or caring too much about slow horses, just that he was a bat-spinning sparkplug of two champions. Posada will be afforded every such courtesy.
DiMaggio always did thank the Good Lord for making him a Yankee. Now we know one of the reasons why.