Seafaring wisdom holds that a captain goes down with his ship. Monuments were erected for the brave fishermen of Gloucester who sank with their vessels, Captain Smith of the Red Star Line’s tragic demise was immortalized in the film “Titanic” (though he was summarily overshadowed by Rose and Jack’s vehicular hokey-pokey) and on Monday night, Joe Torre likely bid adieu to his tenure as Yankees manager as his team sank yet again into the vast expanse that is playoff-less October.
Already, commentators have begun their analysis of what went wrong in Torre’s clubhouse: poor pitching decisions and overconfidence in overpaid, over-the-hill players—after an era of dominance, it seems that the Yankees are finally getting a taste of the turmoil that is rather routine in organizations that don’t boast payrolls of $200 million.
As much as I would like to revel in the failure of the team America loves to hate (at the hands of my hometown heroes, no less), my glee has been transformed into pangs of sympathy every time I see a picture of the forlorn (dare I say Lincoln-esque?) features of Mr. Joe Torre. Throughout the series, TBS television cameras trained their lenses on that ever-stoic, magnetically ugly mug. Torre reeked of silent dignity from his perch in the Yankee dugout, an impassive foil to Indians manager Eric Wedge, a gum-chewing, wild-eyed pirate look-alike. The best shots from the televised series (better even than the close-ups of Lake Erie gnats devouring Yankee pitchers) came when the screen flashed from Torre to Wedge, from the bedraggled champion to the eager upstart. Run after run, wild pitch after wild pitch, the weight of the doomed series seemed to sink into Torre’s visage, to belabor his stride as he made his way to the mound.
Sure, the Yankees deserve a little heartbreak like the rest of us baseball fans, but seeing Torre take it on the chin was too much. Listening to his post-game press conference on Monday night was akin to hearing a man’s eulogy at his best friend’s funeral. Torre’s voice broke when he spoke about his years with the Yankees and the players he has come to love. The man’s sister is a nun, for goodness sake. Yankee or not, God is on his side.
I am not naïve enough to condemn baseball for becoming a crass commercialized industry, which has sunk so low as to offer television commercials featuring the bizarre tagteam Bon Jovi and Dane Cook. Baseball is a business, and like it or not, George Steinbrenner is a hell of a businessman. The Yankees are indeed the evil empire, but man, do they know how to market their product. Even Lebron James, savior of Cleveland, sported a Yankees hat during the series, much to the chagrin of the crowd at Jacobs Field. With an absurdly bloated payroll and an aggressively vocal fan base, Steinbrenner has the prerogative to expect results from his team, and as Billy Martin would bitterly tell you, the Boss thinks results start with the manager
And so, according to the logic of the addled billionaire, Joe must go. Any true fan will tell you the preposterousness of the catchphrase “its only a game,” but it might do us all well to remember that Torre is only one man. He lost his job and he almost cried in front of millions of people.We can all find a little space in our Yankee-hating hearts to feel bad for him.
