I agree 100%. What a whiny response. Hey Joe, you have a $200 million ballclub out there and you haven’t sniffed the World Series for 7 years. Your previous contract’s $7 million annual salary has been better than double what ANY other manager is baseball is getting, and is generally about 3-4 times what most of the established guys get. Give it a rest. There are a number of guys who would do just as well, if not better with that talent and in that ‘fearsome’ media market. And 4 times a year, the mean old owner gets mad and says a few things in the press if things aren’t going very well. Wow, what a burden to deal with each year for that $5-7 million, while getting to fill out a lineup card of nothing but current and ex-All Stars. Take a hike.
All sports salaries should be based on performance. The days of the multi-million dollar multi-year sight unseen contract needs to go. ( Matt Leinert comes to mind )
All rookies should make a league set salary until the end of their second season then they can negotiate. Veterans keep playing well or face reductions or even retirement.
I don’t know - the Yankees were 14 games down in June and they MADE THE PLAYOFFS - seems to me Torre didn’t do such a bad job, but Steinbrenner is a complete A%^&. Joe will land on his feet - is Don Mattingly going to be the next fall guy, er, manager for the Yanks?
Another example of why I could give a rat’s arse about professional sports . It’s ALL about money these days . Take me back to the “ old days “ when THE GAME came first .
Not entirely true .... came to within one out of winning the WS in 2001, appeared in it in 2003, and came to within one out of getting there in 2004. I'd reckon thats a bit of a 'sniff' :)
(Full disclosure: I am a Yankees fan). I don’t view it as a whiny response. I watched his press conference today and he clearly stated $5 million is a heck of a lot of money and certainly more money than he will make this year. Torre viewed it as an insult to offer only a one year contract with a reduced salary and incentives. The incentives themselves were insulting, he said, because he viewed management as saying he needed extra money to be motivated, when that clearly wasn’t the case.
I like Joe; he’s a class act. This wasn’t a Patrick Ewing type quote (i.e. he wasn’t saying anything to the effect of he couldn’t feed his family on such a paltry salary). He was mainly stating a fact that for all he did for the Yankees organization (playoffs every year he was there, ten AL East titles, 6 World Series appearances and 4 World Series championships vs. only 1 playoff appearance and no World Series appearances in the 10 years prior to his arrival) they weren’t willing to work with him at all on the terms of his contract. And yes, it does appear insulting to think the manager who brought so much to the team needs extra incentives to be motivated after all he had done for the organization.
In any case, this isn’t Torre being greedy or saying that $5 million itself is insulting. I’m pretty sure from his comments today that he doesn’t feel that way at all. He mainly just viewed the overall terms as insulting, and I frankly have to agree. He did a great deal to turn that franchise around and successfully managed an entire team of egos; he didn’t deserve to be treated this way, but it’s par for the course for Steinbrenner.
All the fans and media types who were bitching and moaning about Joe Torre's "failures" in recent years are going to wish they could turn back the clock in the not-too-distant future when the team starts to miss out on the playoffs on a regular basis.
Wow, what a burden to deal with each year for that $5-7 million, while getting to fill out a lineup card of nothing but current and ex-All Stars. Take a hike.
Right -- but that cuts both ways. Wow -- what a burden for the Yankees organization to deal with . . . 12 consecutive years in which they only made the playoffs 12 times, they only went to the World Series 6 times, and they only got 4 World Series championships along the way.
Baseball fans in any other city would love to have "problems" like this.
>> Hey Joe, you have a $200 million ballclub out there and you haven’t sniffed the World Series for 7 years. Your previous contract’s $7 million annual salary has been better than double what ANY other manager is baseball is getting,
Torre has done the best he could’ve done with the hand he was dealt. Brian Cashman, not Torre, is responsible for acquisitions ... and he’s done a poor job constructing at $200M team.
The Yankees have spent $200M on overpriced hitters and has-been pitching. They have no young talent ... but, instead, are overpaying players who were good 4 or 5 years ago (usually for other teams).
The Yankees have an ultimately flawed method of building a team, and responsibility was pushed on Joe Torre to take this flawed team all the way.
Baseball is about fundamentals, pitching, and youth. The Yankees system of overpaying for players who are past their prime simply won’t work ... and Torre’s not to blame.
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I don’t see it as whiny at all. An employee is told to take a pay cut after he brings success and riches to his employer. He says, “No.” Why would he say anything else? The Yankees prior to Torre hardly enjoyed the ticket sales and revenue that came during the last twelve years. They typically finished in the middle of the league for ticket sales and the Mets usually had higher attendance.
Torre can’t be blamed for the makeup of the team. The team he got in 1996 had a good mix of youth and experience, as well as World Series success with Cone, Gooden, O’Neal, and a few others. It also had some very dedicated players who cared as much about winning as they did about salary. The team now is an assemblage of big names and expensive contracts, with the idea of winning a game seemingly secondary to the big ‘get.’ I blame Steinbrenner for that. He was not able to influence the selection of players for the Yankees during most of the 1990s and it showed.
I will always remember Joe Torre as a gentleman who knew how to run a baseball team.