The staid New York Times devoted more ink to his death than that which usually accompanies a head of state. Its editorial page, however, damned him with their patented faint praise ("He's not the owner we would have chosen. Whether he's the owner we deserved is another question."). While editorials are not expected to be objective, there is something a bit disingenuous about a New York paper that has an ownership interest in the Boston Red Sox (as Casey used to say, "you could look it up") positioning itself so high above the people who provide its main source of readership. Does Boston, for example "deserve" the Red Sox? Does the District of Columbia "deserve" the Nationals. And, with pain that continues 'lo these more than fifty years, didn't Brooklyn deserve the Dodgers, and Manhattan the Giants? What I found interesting about the Times's line is how the editors separated themselves from the rest of New York--while they would not have chosen him, New Yorkers (presumably due to their not measuring up to the standards of the country's "newspaper of record") got what we (the great unwashed) deserved.
While Mr. Steinbrenner had a number of questionable traits (yes, he could be a bully, and yes, firing Yankee legend Yogi Berra after only a few games into the season as manager, and having Dave Winfield tailed the way he did were but a few of his less than exemplary activities), what, indeed does New York deserve in a team? Taking the period within my recall (as a "man of a certain age"), we New Yorkers have come to expect a World Championship team--maybe not every year-- but often enough to be disappointed when it doesn't happen for, say, a few years. If no other city could reasonably harbor such expectations, there is--let's face it--no other city that quite compares to New York. When Steinbrenner took over the Yankees in 1973, the team had been suffering from an unusually long (for them) drought. In what were, perhaps unfairly, called the "Horace Clark years," the Yankees had won their last world championship in 1963, their last pennant in 1964. Within three years, the American League pennant proudly flew over Yankee Stadium, and for the following two years, the world championship flag. Not bad for a ship-builder from Cleveland, eh?
One of my closest friends (a devoted Yankee fan) hated "the Boss," and was once photographed on the cover of the New York Daily News (with me, seated next to him smiling beatifically under my Yankees' cap) standing proudly in a t-shirt featuring a circle with a diagonal line crossing the name "George." I think this was in recognition of the Yogi firing, but he did ultimately apologize to Berra. My friend--a charitable sort--has since forgiven Steinbrenner his shortcomings. When "the Boss" took some heat for criticizing the beloved Yankee captain, Derek Jeter, for spending "too many nights on the town," his response was to participate in a TV commercial recreating the criticism, only to be followed by the two of them joined in a conga-line. Ridiculous as his multiple hirings and firings of Billy Martin were, he did allow them to be parodied in a beer commercial with Martin. And no, I don't think he needed the money. He also gave (initially grudging) permission to being represented in an on-going "role" on Seinfeld, in which the Steinbrenner character was repeatedly featured harassing a beleagured George Costanza. So yes, the man took himself seriously, but not so seriously as to not invite a laugh or two at his own expense. Would that the New York Times could find occasion to poke fun of itself in such a way. One lives in hope.
I will not dwell on his charitable activities, other than to say they were many, and not all were publicized.
I was fortunate to have met Mr. Steinbrenner on several occasions. The first was purely social, a day on which we each had sons entering the freshman class at Williams College. In a few minutes of one-on-one discussion, I found him to be friendly, charming and gracious. In addition, he possessed an
open and engaging sense of humor. The ensuing times were all business. I was a lawyer for an investment bank representing the Yankees in their desire to improve (or move to a new ) Yankee Stadium. It was 1996, and he was still very much the hands-on "boss" of legend. While respectful to us, he tended to bully his hapless CFO, and was clearly not someone who ruled by consensus. That said, he was keenly interested in preserving the Yankee tradition, and wanted to stay in New York. Those of us working on the project were treated to seats in the Yankee box for one each of the '96 ALDS, ALCS, and World Series games. Sitting next to Mr. October (Reggie Jackson) was quite a treat for an aging New York kid whose last (and only) World Series game was forty years before!
Looking back on those negotiations (which were then in their infancy), Mr. Steinbrenner's concerns about the future of the South Bronx and the old Stadium were not unfair. That he lived to see the Yankees stay at their cherished address on 161st Street and River Avenue and win the World Series in their first year in the new Stadium (and its first since 9/11) was a crowning achievement that he and, yes, New York very much deserved.
