From the New York Post’s Kevin Kernan:
TAMPA – Don’t mess with the New York Yankees
That was Hank Steinbrenner’s no-nonsense message yesterday. Steinbrenner made it clear that he is firmly in Joe Girardi’s corner in the battle of aggressiveness with the Rays and that the 2008 Yankees will continue to play hard throughout the season and protect their players.
“Girardi has his players’ back and I have his back and that’s never going to change,” Steinbrenner told the Post in the wake of suspensions and fines of Shelley Duncan and Melky Cabrera, and fines of Girardi and coaches Bobby Meacham and Kevin Long for the Shelley Spike Slide into second base Wednesday against the Rays and ensuing brawl.
Girardi’s fiery style of managing and bringing the players’ together is exactly what management wanted, and all this comes with the territory. No pain, no gain.
“There are going to be problems, especially if they go after our stars,” Steinbrenner said. “It’s not going to be tolerated. We never have done it to them. It’s just not going to happen anymore.”
It’s good to hear this type of attitude from Hank. We’ve all been critical about his remarks, whether he’s saying too much, or saying the wrong things. But, these comments definitely seem appropriate during this situation.
To hear Hank say, “It’s not going to happen anymore,” you have to wonder whether he thinks that this sort of action against the Yankees was tolerated under Torre’s reign. Could that be true?
Steinbrenner said he does not want to interfere in Girardi’s handling of such matters.
“All that is up to Joe,” Steinbrenner said. “All I can tell you is that I will support everything he does, and that will never change. Because this is the manager I wanted, and that’s not anything against Joe Torre. That’s the manager we wanted at that time. Times change.”
Okay, so he’s not necessarily bashing Torre, although I still think this is a slight jab in his direction. We all know Torre was a people person and was constantly worried about doing the “right” thing, all the time. Retaliation just wasn’t his game. In fact, if Torre was the manager, assuming Cervelli broke his wrist, would the Rays-Yanks feud even be where it is now? I doubt he would have said anything about that slide being inappropriate during a ST game.
Check out what else Hank had to say about the Rays:
“I don’t want these teams in general to forget who subsidizes a lot of them, and it’s the New York Yankees 
, the Red Sox, Dodgers, New York Mets ,” he said. “I would prefer if teams want to target the Yankees that they at least start giving some of that revenue sharing and luxury tax money back. From an owners point of view, that’s my point.”
Talk about being the economic bully of baseball. At least he’s simply embracing the moniker. He makes a good point too, even if it is a problematic one.
Hank also hit Papelbon (of the Red Sox) with some comments, after Papelbon had criticized Hank for his recent “Red Sox Nation” remarks. Here’s a bit of that text from the Hartford Courant:
FORT MYERS, Fla. – Yankees general partner Hank Steinbrenner took a belated shot at Red Sox closer Jonathan Papelbon in Saturday’s New York Post, continuing what had been a good-natured feud between the two rivals.
Responding to a comment Papelbon made about Steinbrenner that appeared in the Courant March 2, Steinbrenner told the Post. “Being insulted by Papelbon is like being attacked by a mouse.”
In the wake of Steinbrenner’s “Red Sox Nation? What a bunch of [expletive] that is,” comment to the New York Times, Papelbon told the Courant: “I don’t know if he’s trying to stir things up or not. I sure as hell don’t care, because he sure as hell hasn’t stepped foot on a baseball field. He needs to just stick to pencil-pushing, I guess.”
The article continues with:
But Papelbon’s comment rubbed the Yankees new boss the wrong way.
“John Henry and I traded a couple of jabs good-naturedly,” Steinbrenner told the Post. “So now, all of a sudden, this player, this 20-something kid who really doesn’t know his way in the world, comes out with a personal insult. There’s no excuse for that.
“It was nothing personal against John [Henry], nothing personal against Larry [Lucchino], nothing personal against [Terry] Francona, nothing personal against the team or the fans. It was just a general comment that is the truth. I respect the Red Sox and their fans, but the Yankees are the most popular team in American sports. Ask Jerry Jones in Dallas, he’ll tell you that. That’s why they want to do business with us. So it’s just a fact.”
Papelbon responded to Steinbrenner’s comments Saturday morning to the Boston Globe.
“Whatever, dude,” Papelbon said. “Obviously by that comment he’s trying to start something. I’m not gonna get into it back and forth. I mean, I said that because I honestly believe it. People nowadays, whether it be reporters, ESPN analysts, guys that don’t play the game, don’t understand what it’s about. What the grind is about, what the clubhouse is like.
“I don’t know why he would take it that way. I’m saying, guys that have never been on the field don’t have the right to speak their mind about things that they don’t know about. I’m not insulted by what he said.”
All is well for Yankee fans. We have some competitive rivalries heating up in our division, and we have a crazy, arrogant, say-anything type of boss who’s bound to keep up us on our toes for many years to come. Life is good.
