So argues Rick Carpiniello at The LoHud Journal:
If Torre’s out, who’s in?
By now we’ve all heard the speculative names, and oh boy, is it a murderers’ row of managers.
Don Mattingly and his zero hours of managerial experience and one year as a bench coach? Walking into the situation to be the next guy after a legend is a job that, across the history of sports, usually results in disaster. And does anybody really want Donnie Baseball to fall flat on that Monument Park chin and to be fired like all the rest?
Joe Girardi, who won manager of the year and got fired in Florida, because he had a decent season with a team with no expectations? Hey, he might turn out to be a great manager. We sure don’t know that he will.
Tony La Russa? First of all, he’d have to cut his 1970s ‘do to fit into the team hair guidelines. Then imagine him and his overmanaging, signalling for Kyle Farnsworth to get out Manny Ramirez in a big situation. Then imagine him trying to explain it to the New York media and blowing his top. More likely, he’d turn into a modern-day Dallas Green or Jeff Torborg, unable to cut it in the big city with the Boss breathing down his neck and 8 million to 10 million baseball experts breaking down every move.
Maybe, if the Yankees go in-house with Mattingly or Girardi - or, who knows, Larry Bowa or Tony Pena - maybe then there will be a semblance of Torre’s legacy that will permeate the clubhouse.
Otherwise here’s what you’re going to get from the mega-buck, mega-ego superstars who remain: Back-stabbing, anonymous clubhouse snitching, all that great stuff that defined the pre-Torre era, all the bad-karma garbage that ended the 1996 day Clueless Joe and Derek Jeter took over a ball team that had won zippo since 1981 under Steinbrenner’s impetuous watch. Or 1978, if you define winning by Steinbrenner’s standards.
Ah yes, the good old days…..for George at least. The rest of us Yankee fans ? It’s time to batten down the hatches and prepare for what could be a long, hard winter.
