by Joe Torre
Said Mike Borzello, the bullpen catcher, “Pitching was the problem. After Pettitte, Clemens and Wells left in 2003, we went to an all-righthanded rotation. That was the beginning of the problem. Vazquez, Brown and then Pavano, Wright, Igawa, Farnsworth, Randy Johnson … They just didn't seem to work out. It never felt like we had the upper hand in pitching anymore. Before 2004 we never cared what the matchup was against the other team. We liked our guy against their guy, no matter where it fell in the rotation. But then it never seemed to be in our favor, never a case of ‘We've got so-and-so tomorrow. We'll win.’ “
While the 2004 Yankees marked an abrupt end to the franchise's run of championship-quality starting pitching, the loss of that key strength was exacerbated by what was happening around baseball. Starting pitchers were throwing fewer and fewer innings because of the convergence of several influences on player development, so workhorses such as Pettitte, Clemens and Wells actually were becoming more valuable than ever.
What happened to the workhorse starter? The analytical-minded Red Sox, as they did with most issues, assigned their statistical analysts to try to come up with objective answers to that question. They found that the decline in pitchers’ workloads could be traced to manager Billy Martin's 1980 Oakland Athletics. Martin rode five young starters in their 20s into the ground. Rick Lang-ford, Mike Norris, Matt Keough, Steve McCatty and Brian King-man completed 93 of their 159 starts, a crazy workload. All of them broke down and never were the same. Martin had called so much attention to that staff because of their workload that when those young pitchers broke down, the entire baseball world noticed. No manager or club wanted the notoriety of being arm-killers, so a new conservatism began to grow.
The trend gained momentum at the end of the decade when another Oakland manager, Tony LaRussa, popularized the specialized bullpen, in which he preferred to entrust late-game outs that used to belong to a tiring starting pitcher to a series of lefthanded and righthanded relievers, backed by a closer. Also, by 1990 “pitch counts” began to appear in box scores, the effect being the placement of a sort of governor on managers, who now had to answer to a kind of “pitch count police”—fans and media who would draw a direct line between an arbitrarily high pitch count and a defeat or poor outing. Moreover, advanced research and data in the growing field of sports medicine convinced the medical experts that the greatest risk to a pitcher's arm health came from overuse. With seven-figure bonus payouts to amateur draft picks, the default philosophy became one of increasing conservatism when it came to pitchers’ development and maintenance.
“The young kids, that's what we've conditioned them to do: pitch less,” Torre said. “It's our fault. You have no choice because it's a bone of contention with everybody. A GM will tell you how much we have invested in these guys and we can't hang them out to dry. And even back with how we were using David Cone in 1999, evidently Billy Connors would tell George something about his pitch counts and George would scream at me or the general manager.
“To me, the pitch count is another of those number things that don't tell the whole story by itself. You can watch a guy have no problems throwing 120, 130 pitches, but he can throw 90 pitches with men on base every inning and be worn out. So that's where the number of pitches you throw is not indicative of being tired.”
The workhorse starter was a dying breed in baseball, one of the most significant changes in baseball from the years the Yankees won World Series championships to the years they didn't. During Torre's 12 years as Yankees manager, here are the number of starts in which a pitcher threw at least 120 pitches:
YEAR TOTAL YANKEES
1996 444 20
1997 367 20
1998 458 25
1999 453 29
2000 454 31
2001 231 14
2002 225 12
2003 215 14
2004 183 4
2005 132 9
2006 119 1
2007 80 0
Two significant points emerge from the trend: the decline in 120-pitch games greatly accelerated right after the Yankees won their last world championship, and the decline for the Yankees themselves grew especially steep with that flawed 2004 staff.
Of course, with fewer pitches, starters were providing fewer innings. The number of times in baseball a pitcher worked eight innings, for instance, was cut by more than half in the 10 seasons from 1998 (736) to 2007 (362). Again, the Yankees’ decline accelerated beyond the industry average. Their 1998 staff worked eight innings 42 times. The 2004 staff did so only 17 times, and by 2007 they were down to just 10. Perhaps no one disliked the trend more than an old-school guy like Andy Pettitte, who went from a career high of eleven 120-pitch starts in 2000 to zero in 2007.
“He would get real angry at the pitch count thing,” Torre said. “We laughed at him. It wasn't a matter of how he would do for the next 10 or 15 or 20 pitches in that game, but how he would come out of it for the next time.
“Even in 2007, on the last Monday of the season, we took him out after six innings and 96 pitches. He was losing, 4-1. I said, ‘Andy, it doesn't make sense for you to pitch anymore because we may need you again Saturday if we still need to clinch. I don't want you throwing a hundred-some pitches. I don't need you throwing another 15 pitches.’
“He said, ‘Well, let me throw 12 more next inning.’ “
Torre didn't budge.
“Eight more?” Pettitte pleaded.
“Get the hell out of here, will you please?” Torre said, laughing.
Said Torre, “He starts screaming at himself going up the runway. It was hysterical.”
The 2004 Yankees could have used an old-fashioned workhorse like Pettitte, who was able and willing to go deep into games. Instead, Yankee starters that year obtained 371 fewer outs than did the 2003 rotation, the equivalent of nearly 14 full games less coverage.
The aged, overly righthanded pitching staff turned out to be as fragile as it appeared it was going to be. For only the second time since the franchise began in Baltimore in 1901, not a single pitcher threw 200 innings, won 15 games or qualified for the ERA title with a mark below 4.00. (The only other such team devoid of such a modest milestone were the 1988 Yankees, whose staff ranked 12th in a 14-team league.)
In the spring training camp of 2004, however, George Steinbrenner did not see those problems coming with his pitching staff. He was too busy patrolling the clubhouse area with his chest out and shoulders back. Steinbrenner was head over heels happy that spring about getting Rodriguez—especially after the Yankees got him only after the Red Sox blew their chance, when the players association would not allow Boston to renegotiate downward the value of his contract. Steinbrenner was walking around as flush as the high school boy who asks the prettiest girl in class to the prom and she said yes. The warning signs of his disjointed roster went unseen. So giddy was Steinbrenner that one day that spring training he walked into Torre's office and said, “What do you want to do next year?”
Torre was pleasantly stunned. It was an open invitation to a contract extension. Torre was working on the last year of his contract, and even though his Yankees had won four world championships and had come within three wins of owning six titles in nine years, they had not won the World Series in the relative eon of three whole years, and Steinbrenner hadn't breathed a word to Torre about an extension that winter after the Yankees lost the 2003 World Series in six games to Florida. Torre was heading into a lame-duck season with no idea about his future with the Yankees until that day when a starry-eyed Steinbrenner virtually invited him to remain with the team.
Steinbrenner then put his son-in-law, Steve Swindal, in charge of the negotiations of Torre's extension. It was a major assignment for Swindal, his first high-profile task in the crosshairs of the New York media. The assignment in part was designed to prepare Swindal for eventually running the team as Steinbrenner's successor.
“I certainly saw it as a great responsibility,” Swindal said. “I didn't connect it to years later, that
I am the heir apparent. That didn't cross my mind. I felt enormous responsibility to the fans. It was also important that Mr. Steinbrenner knew Joe and I had a very good relationship, built on mutual respect and trust.
“We were working on a two-year deal. At the last minute Joe said, ‘What about an extra year?’ I personally supported a third year. I said, ‘I'll see what The Boss said.’ He was supportive of it.
“Then we talked about a personal services contract added to it. Joe felt he wasn't going to manage after the three years, that he would retire. His thinking in this was that it would be his last contract. So we thought we could be creative and structure it in a way that it had added value. I used the quote, ‘retire as a Yankee.’ I thought it would be something that would be historical and appealing to him.”
The Yankees announced on April 10 that they had signed Torre to a three-year, $19.2 million contract extension that carried him through 2007, with six additional years in which he would be paid $600,000 per year as a consultant. But the two sides never could agree on that postmanagerial portion of the contract.
“So I streamlined it, and making it cleaner I just told Steve Swindal, ‘I'll split it with you. One-point-eight you put into my contract and you keep 1.8.’ And that's what happened.”
“I reported to George and George was pleased,” said Swindal. “When we did the deal it made him the highest-paid manager in the history of the game. But I personally felt that Joe was a part of the Yankee magic and aura and had shown his success on the field and how he handles himself with the media. He had a part in our attendance rise and our success. All of that. I think he has a calming effect, through injuries, losing streaks … that calming influence. We've had teams of superstars and he had the ability to make everybody feel like one team rather than a collection of individuals. He had the ability to make the team feel as a team. That's his best attribute. He was always calm in rough moments.”
The collection of egos and ailments that were the 2004 Yankees would test Torre like no other Yankees team. Once the season began, the off-season moves looked no better on the field than they did on paper. Lofton, almost predictably, would have been better put to use making good on his offhand offer to park cars for the Yankees. He broke down with leg injuries, complained about his spot in the batting order (Torre sometimes batted him ninth) and complained about not being the everyday center fielder (surprise!). Williams earned the bulk of the playing time in center field, and even while fighting wear-and-tear injuries to his knees and shoulders he posted better on-base and slugging percentages than Lofton, the man who was brought in to replace him.
As Giambi's body continued to break down, journeyman Tony Clark, 32, was Torre's most-used first baseman. Another journey-man, Miguel Cairo, 30, played second base and yet another, Ruben Sierra, 38, saw most of the time at designated hitter.
Alex Rodriguez struggled through what would have been a fine season for most players, but one that for him was his worst since 1997, when he was 21 years old. He introduced himself to Yankees fans by hitting .248 with runners in scoring position, including .206 with two outs in those spots, the kind of trouble in clutch spots that would become their knee-jerk association with him. There was no honeymoon for Steinbrenner's prize acquisition.
Worst of all, the pitching staff, with its 4.69 ERA, was pedestrian, clocking in slightly worse than the league average of 4.63. The Yankees put up numbers that equated to an 89-win team, according to the Pythagorean formula developed by James, the statistics guru. Torre, however, like a pilot landing a jet on a bobbing aircraft carrier in stormy seas in the dark of night, somehow delivered the Yankees to a second straight 101-win season, keeping them three games ahead of the Red Sox, who repeated as the American League wild-card entrant.
The best player on the team turned out to be Sheffield, whom Steinbrenner wanted instead of Vladimir Guerrero, against the preference of Cashman. Sheffield, 35, was eight years older than Guerrero, whose free agency was complicated by a back injury during the 2003 season, though Guerrero had returned to terrorizing pitchers at his normal rate when he rejoined the Montreal Expos lineup after that injury. Steinbrenner dealt with Sheffield directly giving rise to the notion that he wanted to do well for a fellow longtime resident of Tampa.
“I know Cash wanted Guerrero, which is fine,” Torre said. “My feeling was that I knew for sure that Sheffield wasn't going to be bothered by New York. Guerrero was coming from Montreal. If it was short term I wanted Sheffield. If it was long term I wanted Guerrero.”
The Yankees signed Sheffield to a three-year, $39 million contract, with an option for a fourth year. The Angels signed Guerrero to a five-year, $70 million deal, with an option for a sixth year. The word that reached Sheffield after his signing was that Torre preferred Guerrero instead of him. The thought gnawed at Sheffield, even two months into the season. By May 26 a sullen Sheffield was hitting only .265 with just three home runs. The Yankees were playing in Baltimore that night. Sheffield walked into Torre's office at Oriole Park at Camden Yards.
“I just have to know something,” Sheffield told Torre. “Who wanted Guerrero and who wanted me?”
“I'll tell you exactly what I said,” Torre told him. “If it's short term, I want you. If it's long term, I want him, because he's younger. But I've always respected you. As the opposing manager you scare me when you get to the plate. So if I feel that way, then I want you on my side. I'm telling you exactly what the conversation was. Whether you choose to believe it or not is up to you.”
“Okay,” Sheffield said. “I'm committed.”
Sheffield instantly became a different player. That same night he whacked four hits, including a home run, and drove in six runs. The outburst started a 17-game stretch in which Sheffield hit .406 with seven home runs and 24 RBIs. It was classic Sheffield. His mood and his production could turn in an instant.
“It happened that night,” Torre said. “It was like he turned it on. And he told me, ‘Don't worry. I'll deal with everything.’ Because if you notice, he never charges the mound or anything like that. He takes it out on you on the field. But that night in Baltimore, all of a sudden he started becoming a player and a ferocious hitter and a gamer. He played hurt, did all that stuff.”
Sheffield was the fulcrum of a punishing offense that led the league in home runs and walks and finished second—to the Red Sox—in runs. By the end of the season Torre had stacked the top of his lineup with a devastating run of All-Star hitters: in order, Jeter, Rodriguez, Sheffield, Matsui and Posada. Giambi sometimes cracked the lineup, though he was a shell of himself, having missed half the season largely due to a benign pituitary tumor.
The Red Sox, however, could match the Yankees’ thunder, and then some. They outscored the Yankees by 53 runs over the course of the season. Their biggest advantage, though, came from pitching. Boston's staff was the third best in the American League. New York's staff ranked sixth.
For a second straight year, the Red Sox and Yankees were on a collision course to meet in the American League Championship Series. The Yankees dismissed the Twins in the Division Series in four games. The Red Sox flicked aside the Angels even more handily taking three straight from them. The New York-Boston rivalry was the epicenter of October baseball yet again, just as it had in 2003, although this time it would be as much about the previous November and December as anything else. The Yankees would try to beat Boston without a single lefthander in their rotation, or anyone in their rotation with pure strikeout stuff against a power-packed lineup. The Red Sox were fortified by Schilling, one of the best big-game pitchers in baseball, who was the grand prize for having outflanked the Yankees in November. Schilling had been everything the Red Sox had hoped, winning 21 games for them and fronting a remarkably strong and durable rotation. Schilling, Martinez, Lowe, Wakefield and Arroyo did not miss a turn, taking all but five of Boston's 162 starts.
The Yankees once commanded postseason series because they were so deep in starting pitching. By the 2004 ALCS, t
hose days were over. The Red Sox had flipped the table on the Yankees. They had the superior pitching. The rivalry was about to take a turn of legendary proportions.
10
End of the Curse
The Yankees-Red Sox rivalry may have been the best thing to happen to baseball, but both managers came to loathe it. Each time the Yankees and Red Sox would play one another, even in April—hell, even in spring training—there was an Armageddon quality to the proceedings. Baseball never was designed to be like this, not until October, anyway. The sport took great pride in the sheer volume of the season; “a marathon,” as the players proudly liked to call it. But every game between the Yankees and Red Sox brought an NFL-like urgency to every game, every inning, every pitch. It ran counter to everything Joe Torre and Terry Francona tried to impress upon their clubs, knowing the wisdom of keeping their team on an even emotional footing. After just about every time the Yankees and Red Sox were done with one of these series, either Torre would call Francona or Francona would call Torre.
Are you sick of this yet?” Torre would say.
“I'm glad it's over,” Francona would say.
“You and me both, pal,” Torre would reply. “See you in about six weeks.”
Torre and Francona shared not only a unique vantage point to the rivalry, but an honest friendship. Torre had played with Francona's father, former big leaguer Tito Francona, and had recommended Francona for his first managing job with the Phillies to Philadelphia general manager Lee Thomas.
“I played with Terry's dad so I felt a closeness to him for that reason,” Torre said. “I can still think of him as a kid. And I remember recommending him to Lee Thomas. Terry knew baseball, he was cerebral, and he wasn't showy. He was just a basic, good baseball person.”