In short, of all of the Yankee stars of 1980, only two -- Ron Guidry and Willie Randolph -- would last longer than three more years with the team. Of all of the changes in 1981, only two of that year's additions, Dave Righetti and Dave Winfield, would last beyond 1983. It was chaos, and it sentenced the Yankees to a dark age that lasted until Don Mattingly's final season as a player in 1995.
Baseball's history is riddled with owner petulance that has ranged from throwing the baby out with the bath water, to Steinbrennerian self-destructions. The mild-mannered Connie Mack was so unhinged by the World Series sweep against his fabled 1914 Philadelphia A's, and so threatened by rising salaries, that he sold or traded off five future Hall of Famers. The A's went from first place in an eight-team league in 1914, to 58-1/2 games out in 1915, to 40 games out of next-to-last in 1916. Their next pennant came in 1929.
Even today, the San Francisco Giants, despite their victory over Atlanta in the opening round of the playoffs, could open next season with a new manager and a new general manager because of the whims of owner Peter Magowan, who has just enough Steinbrenner in him to make you want to avoid him during full moons.
Back in the Bronx, an on-field purge is inevitable. Roger Clemens, Mike Stanton, Orlando Hernandez, Robin Ventura, and Ramiro Mendoza are all free agents. The club has an option on Andy Pettitte. Raul Mondesi was a washout, Nick Johnson a promising disappointment, Rondell White a cipher, Shane Spencer a corrosive. Some will return; others will not. If the Yankees can trade White and Mondesi -- even if it means paying parts of their 2003 salaries -- they will, and will spend the remainder on our friend Godzilla, the Japanese slugger Hideki Matsui. The defection of another Cuban would-be émigré, pitcher José Contreras, is of great interest in the Bronx.
But who'll do all the paperwork? Within management, the easiest target would be Cashman, the general manager. Steinbrenner grows ever older; Cashman is 35 and still looks 24. Steinbrenner had to buy his way into New York's respect; Cashman sprang fully grown from the ground as an intern in the Yankees' minor league department 16 years ago; Steinbrenner signed David Wells over the protestations of his "baseball people" (read: Cashman); Cashman traded for Jeff Weaver, whose first inning as a Yankee was so horrific that Steinbrenner shouted, in my presence, "Jesus Christ Almighty!" Since the loss to Anaheim, Steinbrenner has repeatedly referred to Cashman's "promise" that this Yankees' team would win the World Series.
It seems improbable that Cashman would be fired outright; he has two years to go on his contract and would instantly be knee-high in offers from other clubs. But the Steinbrenner history books show entry after entry for vice presidents who suddenly discovered they were working for new executive vice presidents. Somebody could be brought in as Cashman's boss, or built-in nemesis.
Simply firing Torre, this season, would probably be too much of a public relations disaster even for George, at his angriest, to be unable to anticipate it. Then again, that didn't stop the Showalter exodus at the height of his success and popularity. Steinbrenner twice fired the similarly popular and avuncular Bob Lemon. In the 1974-1988 epoch, he didn't seem to worry that he had divided time into two parts and two parts only: those days when Billy Martin was about to be fired as manager of the Yankees, and those days when Billy Martin was about to be hired as manager of the Yankees.
Still, the likeliest threat to Torre is a slow on-field start in 2003 (Steinbrenner used that excuse on Lemon in 1982, then promised never to do it again, then did it again to Yogi Berra in 1985), or the hypothetical sudden interest in the job by yet another ex-Yankee skipper like Lou Piniella, or a Bronx folk hero like Mattingly or better still Paul O'Neill. However, were Cashman to be fired or superseded by an extremely dominant baseball figure who were to have Steinbrenner's ear, he could make things intolerable for not just Cashman but also Torre.
And that takes us back to the mid-winter meeting in 1995-96 when Steinbrenner offered Buck Showalter his old job back, even though Torre had already been signed to take it. Showalter, now two years removed from the palace coup that toppled him in Arizona, is once again one of the hottest managerial candidates as a remarkably fluid off-season begins. Six jobs are already open and as many as 10 more could become so, and Showalter's already been mentioned in Boston, Milwaukee, Tampa Bay and Texas, for the Cubs' job in Chicago, and, most ominously for Torre and Cashman -- he was interviewed Tuesday for the manager's job with the Mets.
Serious interest in Showalter from his hated cross-town rivals could be the nudge that pushes George to revisit his Robespierre days. Imagine your sexy ex suddenly dating your lifelong rival, or worse, your nerdy cousin. Whether it would be logical or suicidal, serious or fleeting, you might think of upping the ante and immediately proposing marriage. Remember, at all times, that George Steinbrenner is not the kind of man to sit around and act rationally when a situation calls for panic. He's the one in a million of us who wouldn't just think it; he'd pick up the phone and book the cathedral.
How does William Nathaniel "Buck" Showalter III -- executive vice president and/or field manager of the 2003 New York Yankees -- sound to you?
About the writer
Salon columnist Keith Olbermann hosts the ABC Radio Network's "Speaking of Sports ... Speaking of Everything."
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