NEW YORK – Hours after the Yankees had won and played all the happy songs, Hank Steinbrenner stood in the cold outside Yankee Stadium early Thursday morning drawing hot breaths through a cigarette.
Hal Steinbrenner (R) shows off the spoils of victory on Wednesday, when the Yankees won their 27th World Series title.
Nearby, town car drivers, many of them shouting in Spanish, hustled for one more fare back to the city, 30 bucks to the Upper East Side, 40 to Midtown. At almost 3 a.m., traffic was still heavy and the sound of car horns was routine.
The Yankees were back after almost a decade.
Steinbrenner leaned on an arm rail, both arms ahead of him and locked at the elbows like he was being frisked. He wore a navy blazer, but nothing to resist the elements. You wonder if he’d gotten around to thinking about what all this meant for him and for his brother Hal.
Their ailing, elderly father, George, had been delivered to and picked up from the ballpark for earlier games in a minivan. The television folks had agreed not to hunt him down with their cameras. Dozens of reporters had been held in stairwells – halfway between the press box and the ground floor – for 15 minutes after Game 2, so George could make his departure privately. Media already in the bottom hall were told to leave, the NYPD officers following orders, one said, to “cleanse the area.” He watched the clincher from his Tampa, Fla., home.
Clearly now this is about Hank and Hal, who’d run off Joe Torre and installed Joe Girardi, who’d missed the playoffs a year ago and responded by throwing more than $400 million at that team’s holes, and who’d opened the new ballpark with another $200 million payroll.
Maybe it was time to think about that, how this championship had been about George, but also about separating themselves from George – if not, of course, his money. If ever these sorts of over-arching thoughts were to settle on a guy, a landing off the back door at Yankee Stadium at 3 in the morning seemed as good a place and time as any.
In October, and now November, baseball makes reputations. You’re there or you’re not. You perform or you don’t. You win or you lose.
Hank, who seems like the tough one, had gotten a little teary talking about his father earlier in the night. Maybe that was the champagne working, but it was probably nice to know the old man felt a little something when they’d won. That he was happy, proud of his sons, who’d learned a thing or two about maintaining the gap between themselves and the have-nots.
Maybe as he looked out and watched New York become a baseball town again, Hank was thinking those very things. Then again, he might have been thinking that if they were going to spend $1.5 billion on a ballpark, they could at least have put a freakin’ smoking area in it.
The World Series is done, but the impact lives. Here’s the impact on some of the reputations involved:
UP
• The Steinbrenner boys. It’s one thing to be handed the keys to the Rolls and a full tank of gas, quite another to bring it back in one piece. After a disastrous first block, they made pops proud.
Yankee fans finally embraced Alex Rodriguez. “I’m so happy with the way they treated me all year,” he said. “They stood behind me.”
• Hideki Matsui(notes). A free-agent-to-be, Matsui, 35, might not be much in the outfield, but can still hit all comers. The Yankees were much better with him in the lineup than not.
• A-Rod. Whatever a true Yankee is, he’s it now.
• CC Sabathia(notes). There are plenty of aces by name and reputation, only a few by deed.
• Charlie Manuel. Did what he could with a pitching staff lucky to get past Colorado and L.A.
• Joe Girardi. That No. 27 on his back weighed more than it looked.
• Pedro Martinez(notes). The last start, when it appeared he had nothing, could have gone better. But the man is pretty cool, and he’ll help someone in ’10.
• Carlos Ruiz(notes). Chooch led the Phillies’ regulars in batting and on-base percentage. The guy shows up every October.
• Jay-Z and Alicia Keys. Their “Empire State of Mind,” the players watching from the top steps of their dugouts, was an inspiration.
• Chase Utley(notes). Rumored to be playing hurt and quelling Knoblauch Syndrome, he was the best player on the field almost every game.
• Cliff Lee(notes). His first postseason: 4-0, 1.56.
• Reggie Jackson. Mr. October was humble and gracious as Utley matched his five World Series home runs.
• Jayson Werth(notes). An underrated player and a great athlete who seems to get better every year.
DOWN
• Yankee Stadium. The place is festive but not the least bit intimidating. Even “Who’s your daddy?” egged on by organ music, seemed thin and tired. It used to be a jungle, now it’s a mall.
Jimmy Rollins picked the Phillies to win in five. Yankees fans were sure to remind him of his boast.
• Ryan Howard(notes). He batted .174 and struck out 13 times in 23 at-bats. If the Phillies were going to struggle on the mound, they were going to need Howard.
• Jimmy Rollins(notes). Predicted the Phils in five or, if they’re nice, six. He batted .217.
• Robinson Cano(notes). The man coasts, which is OK when you’re batting .320, but looks bad when you’re batting .136.
• Cole Hamels(notes). He never did quite get it together. A very important offseason lies ahead.
• Umpires. They rallied some in the World Series, but couldn’t undo the mess from the first two rounds.
• MLB. These airy schedules, late-night games and November dates are killing the game. They should just name Fox the commissioner and be done with it.
• Mark Teixeira(notes). He was saved by a few big hits and other guys hitting around him.
• Short rest. As a World Series theme, it rivaled chatter about DH disparity, instant replay and budding dynasties as the most trite conversation topic.
• Yankees’ setup guys. Maybe it’s time to find a permanent home for Joba Chamberlain(notes) and Phil Hughes(notes).
• Nick Swisher(notes). You’ve got to figure he’s a lot easier to put up with when he’s hitting, right?
