Yes I disappeared. That’s what happens when you end up with 2 rounds of bronchitis that knocks you out, and bookends a weekend away for a wedding out of state. Anyway, being sick gave me lots of time to read, so my most recently finished book was in fact “The Yankee Years” by Joe Torre & Tim Verducci. In honor of this weekend’s upcoming Subway Series, I present my review.
This book can be summed up in one short sentence: It is a love-fest to Derek Jeter.
Seriously.
When I was reading it I did not count how many times there was something wonderful to say about “Jeet”, as he is oft referred to in the book, but when I was a bit of a ways into it, I should have started counting. Unreal. As much of a love-fest it is for Jeet, it is that much of an opposite feeling towards Mr. “A-Fraud”. I don’t think there was one nice thing said about him in the book. While I do not care for Stray-Rod, A-Roid, A-Fraud, whatever you want to call him, I do know at least that he can be super-nice when he wants to and not even for any kind of gain (at least no gain that I would be able to think of). I used to play volleyball with a girl who fell into working for the Yankees for a few years because her company was contracted out to provide their service for the team (yes I am being deliberately vague). After awhile she left that job with her company because she got tired of the antics of the players and hated to travel by plane (she would go on most every road trip). In her new position she worked with special needs children. One in particular always wanted to go play on the field at Yankee Stadium but because of his problems with his immune system, he couldn’t be around dirt, etc. Well she makes a phone call (not to A-Rod, someone else), gets a phone call back saying be here this day, this time and they arrive with the boy to find all the dirt covered up with tarps with Jeet and A-Rod waiting to play baseball with this boy. Needless to say, the only teensy tiny soft spot in my heart for A-Rod is because of this. Otherwise, forget about it.
This book could also be divided up into a “Volume 1″ and “Volume 2″ of sorts. Volume 1 would be the glory days during the years of winning all those World Series. Volume 2 would be everything after that. While most of the love is reserved for Jeet, there was a lot of love going around for all the other players during Volume 1. The “oh he’s such a great player” and “oh he was so focused” and “Oh he was a student of the game”. That all turns around in Volume 2 where basically everyone (except Jeet!) gets thrown under the bus.
Two more things I find particularly interesting involve Bernie Williams and David Wells. Bernie, of course, lives in Volume 1 and thereby gets the love. Well he may have been a good baseball player and idolized by many, but that’s not exactly what I heard. One of my Yankee-Kool-Aid drinking friends didn’t even want to hear about it! And as far as Wells goes, back in the day he wrote a book fairly critical of the Yankee organization among other things and Torre was on Wells’ Punishing Bandwagon for sacrilege to the organization. Now, some years later, Torre is doing the same thing and being critical and throwing the Yankee organization under the bus. Hypocritical? You decide.
I realize this is Torre’s book, but I was surprised that he doesn’t take any responsibility for any part of the “downfall” in Volume 2. There’s the occasional “I fought for this player” or “I wanted that player”, but he really shirks any and all responsibility. He’s quick to put the blame on a lot of guys for not having the mindset of those guys from Volume 1, he’s quick to blame the Managing By Committee that was put in place as George’s health declined, he’s quick to blame Cashman, and he’s quick to blame everyone else. Yeah, maybe all those things had some contribution to the Yankees not winning a World Series since 2000, but what about him? I’m not saying he deserves ALL of the blame, but he was the manager, he was there, he definitely shoulders some of the blame as well.
In the end, if you care to read about the love-fest of Jeet, this book is for you. If you relish in the idea of the Yankees being thrown under the bus so to speak, this book is for you. And I guess if you are a baseball fan, you’ll find it interesting as well.
Coming soon (drum roll please): A review of what I’m currently reading – Selena Roberts book on A-Rod. Also next week sometime (hopefully) a post on what it’s like to watch half a game at the new Al-Yankzeera Stadium. I say half a game because this weekend I’ll be sitting in the dreaded obstructed bleacher section 239 where you can’t see half the outfield. What fun. (If I knew before today that’s where the seats were, I would’ve never said yes to going to the game. I would rather have just watched it on tv since that is what I’m going to be doing anyway!)
