IT’S FEBRUARY 18, and the scene Hal Steinbrenner is watching with his brother and father on the TV in George’s office is the same one unfolding a few hundred yards away on Legends Field. Just 20 minutes earlier, Andy Pettitte had been standing in this room, repeatedly telling George, “I’m so sorry, I’m so sorry,” while the Boss kept saying, “Don’t worry, don’t worry.” When George had heard enough, he called the pitcher closer to him. “We love you,” George told him. “You’re part of the family. Give me a hug.”
Now Pettitte is sitting at a table facing reporters and cameras, flanked on either side by manager Joe Girardi and general manager Brian Cashman. The presence of Derek Jeter, Jorge Posada, and Mariano Rivera sitting off to one side is a reminder of just how much Pettitte means to the Yankees. And the presence of Andy’s two high-priced lawyers is a reminder of just how entangled Pettitte is in Roger Clemens’ battle with George Mitchell and Congress.
“I am sorry,” Pettitte tells reporters about the revelations that he has used HGH. “I know in my heart why I did things. I know that God knows that. I’m going to be able to sleep a lot better.”
Andy hadn’t quite listened to the Yankees brain trust last December when they told him to confess all his sins. He said a lot more under oath two weeks ago, telling congressional lawyers that he’d taken HGH a second time, in 2004, when he went on the DL with the Astros. Then came the bombshell: Pettitte testified that Clemens told him in 1999 or 2000 that he used HGH. Andy is now a key witness in the case against his good friend Roger.
Pettitte was excused from yet another hearing called by Congressmen Henry Waxman and Tom Davis, this one starring Clemens and Brian McNamee, the man who claimed he injected both pitchers with steroids. The televised hearing did little to improve the image of Clemens or Congress. Clemens angrily insisted McNamee was lying. He more calmly said his friend Andy “misremembered” their talks. Democrats on the committee called Clemens a liar and a cheat, while the Republicans called McNamee a drug dealer who could not be trusted.
The partisan bickering was laughable, but the outcome for Clemens was not: there will be a perjury investigation into his testimony that will eventually lead to an indictment and a trial.
All this is context for Pettitte today as he finishes his prepared statement and says he’s ready to take questions. Andy’s answers are mostly brief and hollow, his eyes in a fixed stare. He only used drugs to recover from an injury and help his team, he insists, never to gain a competitive advantage. He has no idea how things will work out between him and Roger—who, he says, taught him more about pitching than he could have ever imagined. And all he knows is that McNamee is telling the truth about him.
“I hope the friendship with Roger will still be there,” he says. “I love him like a brother.”
The press conference runs just short of an hour. Pettitte gets up to leave, hugs Jeter, Posada, and Mo, then walks off, saying he has to get back to work. Watching from his father’s office, Hal Steinbrenner has reason to hope that Pettitte’s “Aw, shucks” confession will put this problem behind them and allow the Yankees to concentrate on baseball.
If only he could feel as hopeful about the power-sharing arrangement with his big brother Hank. It was just last fall when George’s two sons agreed that Hank would oversee the baseball end of the family business while Hal watched over the team’s finances. George was pleased that his older son was finally showing an interest in his team, and Hal was happy with an organizational chart listing them as cochairmen.
This can work, Hal kept telling himself. Then came the fight over Johan Santana, who the Twins were offering up for prospects last winter. Cashman and his scouts thought Santana had lost something: their charts showed the left-hander had stopped throwing his slider around midseason. Instead, the GM wanted to rely on the organization’s top pitching prospects—Phil Hughes, Ian Kennedy, and Joba Chamberlain—for the coming season.
Hank wanted to rip a page from his father’s playbook and trade their prospects for the two-time Cy Young Award winner. Sorry, said Hal, Santana didn’t fit into the team’s budget. And yes, the Yankees would now operate on a budget, albeit a large one. Hal is not his father.
Hank is not his father, either, but he’s tried to imitate him, making veiled threats and expressing his displeasure in the media. “If we miss the playoffs by the end of this year, I don’t know how patient I’ll be,” he said in late January when the Yankees passed on Santana. “But it won’t be against the players. It will be a matter of maybe certain people in the organization could have done something else.”
The rhetoric was ratcheted up after the Mets swooped in and dealt for the Twins ace. “It’s a fact that myself and my dad wanted Santana,” Hank said two days before Pettitte’s apology. “Obviously I could have done it if I wanted to.”
A day later, he was back at it. “If Santana could have made the difference for us and the young pitchers aren’t ready, people have to be held accountable,” he told Newsday.
Pettitte’s arrival puts Hank’s headlines on hold, but only for the moment. It’s clear the older Steinbrenner brother has his father’s thirst for the back page. But while George understood how to manipulate the media, it’s the reporters who are manipulating Hank. And before long, they’re mocking him, too. By the time February is out, they’re calling the 51-year-old Steinbrenner Baby Boss—or worse—in their stories. Yet Hank can’t stop answering every call and returning the ones he misses.
The real Boss is all but invisible to the media and the fans until March 27, the final day of camp. That’s when they find George sitting in a golf cart in front of the Yankees dugout before the final exhibition game. Every Yankees player stands on the dugout steps, looking out at the tarp-covered scoreboard in left-center field. Hal and Hank Steinbrenner pull at cords and the tarp falls away, revealing the stadium’s new name: GEORGE M. STEINBRENNER FIELD.
“This is a great thing,” Steinbrenner says to reporters standing nearby before circling the field in his golf cart to a standing ovation. “It makes me proud.”
Steinbrenner’s daughters Jennifer and Jessica also take part in the pregame ceremonies. His wife Joan throws the first pitch as her 77-year-old husband is ushered up to his box, where two guards keep fans and reporters away.
After the game, Hank and Hal meet with the media. Reports swirled in the offseason that the team was on the market, while others had the YES Network, now generating revenues of almost $400 million a year, also up for sale. Both brothers stress there is nothing to either story. “There are no plans to sell,” says Hal. “That’s not going to change.”
As the reporters leave, one hangs back and asks Hank about Jose Canseco’s latest book, Vindicated. The former player has written that Rodriguez has used steroids. “In this age of drug paranoia, everybody’s going to say that everybody hitting the ball over the fence is on ’roids,” Hank says. “There is such a thing as a natural, and Alex is a natural. It’s that simple.”
Rodriguez has a solid start to the season, hitting .308 through the first 20 games, but the team goes 10–10. The trouble: poor pitching, especially from two of the young pitchers Cashman refused to part with for Santana. Hughes is 0–3, allowing 16 earned runs in 16⅓ innings, while Ian Kennedy is 0–2, giving up 15 earned runs in 14 innings. Overall, the starting rotation is 7–9 with a 5.33 ERA.
All of which puts the spotlight on hard-throwing Joba Chamberlain, who is 1–0 with a 1.42 ERA while coming out of the bullpen. Cashman’s plan is to ease the 22-year-old Chamberlain into the starting rotation, but by April 20, Hank Steinbrenner has seen enough. “I want him as a starter, and so does everyone else, and we need him there now,” Steinbrenner tells reporters from Tampa. “You don’t have a guy with a 100 mph fastball and keep him as a setup guy. You have to be an idiot to do that.”
Publicly, the “idiot” behind the decision takes it all in stride. “I think Hank and everybody are all on the same page,” Cashman says. “These are things we discuss internally all the time, and we’ll continue to do so. It’s as simple as that.”
But privately Cashman, who’s enjoyed two seasons of autonomy, is grinding his teeth, much as he did all spring training. And that has the younger Steinbrenner brother concerned. Cashman’s in the final year of his contract, and there’ll be plenty of suitors if he wants to leave. The two men have already talked over a game plan to get the Yankees back to the World Series, and Hal would hate to lose Cashman, especially now. But Brian has already announced he won’t make that decision until the season’s end.
The concern now is that Hank might make that decision an easy one.
The Yankees’ slow start turns into a season of mediocre results, and on August 27 Hank Steinbrenner is huffing and puffing his way across the players’ parking lot, steamed by the loss he just witnessed in only his second visit to Yankee Stadium all year. And this one really hurt. The 11–3 thrashing at the hands of the Red Sox all but ended any lingering hopes the Yankees had of reaching the postseason, leaving them 10½ games behind surprise AL East leader Tampa Bay and seven games out of a wild-card berth.
“They sucked,” Steinbrenner spits out as he searches for his car.
All signs are pointing toward the end of the Yankees’ string of 13 consecutive postseason appearances. As transition seasons go, this one has been all about bumps and bruises, many of them inflicted by the man who’s just passed judgment on his father’s team.
The season’s biggest gamble—putting the ball in the hands of the team’s young pitchers—blew up, thanks largely to injuries and incompetence. Kennedy, judged the 26th-best prospect in all of baseball entering this season, was demoted in early May after going 0–2 with an 8.37 ERA. He returned for three mediocre starts later in May, went on the DL for 33 days with a shoulder strain, then joined Triple-A Scranton. He came back for one start in early August, was shelled, then sent back down for good. Hughes was 0–4 with a 6.62 ERA before going on the DL with a fractured rib in late April. Only Chamberlain has thrived, pitching well first as a reliever and then as a starter, but he went down on August 6 with tendinitis.
Injuries ravaged the Yankees, which should not have been a complete surprise, since this team—average age 30.95—is the second oldest in the game. Jorge Posada, who just turned 36, had surgery to repair his right shoulder in late July; he played 51 games. Hideki Matsui (34) played only 93 games, Johnny Damon (34) and Alex Rodriguez (32) both spent weeks at a time on the DL, and No. 1 starter Chien-Ming Wang never returned from an ankle injury he suffered in mid-June.
But Cashman deserves credit for plugging the holes without giving up prospects or busting the budget. And while some pined for Joe Torre, Joe Girardi’s done a fine job keeping a flawed team in contention the entire season. Especially with Hank Steinbrenner’s season-long habit of saying the wrong thing at the worst possible time.
Perhaps Hank’s most egregious stumble came after the Yankees dropped seven of 10 on a crucial road trip earlier this month and he told reporters the team will come back and win it all next year. When the team returned home on August 15, Hal met with Derek Jeter, Cashman, and Girardi in the manager’s office. His message: management has not given up on this season.
But while no one is ready to quit, the only date that really matters anymore is September 21, when the Yankees will take the field for the last time in the House That Ruth Built. And when that day arrives, signaling the end of 85 years at the iconic Stadium, the atmosphere is thick with emotion. The gates open seven hours early so fans—54,610 strong, lifting the season total to a Yankees-record 4.3 million—can enjoy one last walk around the warning track before the pregame festivities get under way.
Soon past Yankees greats take the field at their old positions, with the sons of Mickey Mantle and Roger Maris representing their fathers. Bernie Williams, happily returning to the Yankees fold for the first time since his messy divorce from the team in 2007, jogs out to a standing ovation. Willie Randolph rubs some infield dirt on his uniform, visibly savoring being back in pinstripes three months after being canned by the Mets. The perfect game batteries—Don Larsen and Yogi Berra, David Cone and Girardi, and David Wells and Posada—meet on the mound for the snapshot of a lifetime.
Current Yankees walk around with digital cameras, recording the ceremonies. Highlights of big moments and big stars play on the scoreboard screen. (Noticeably absent: any clips of Roger Clemens.) Babe Ruth’s daughter Julia Ruth Stevens, whose father hit the first home run at the Stadium in 1923, throws out the first pitch, and the final game at the Stadium begins.
Pettitte pitches into the 6th inning, and catcher Jose Molina hits a home run in the 4th inning—the last homer at the Stadium—to put the Yankees ahead for good. Mariano Rivera induces Orioles second baseman Brian Roberts into a ground out to end the game, and when first baseman Cody Ransom hands Rivera the ball, the legendary closer dedicates it to the team’s owner.
“Mr. George, he gave me the opportunity and he gave me the chance,” Rivera tells reporters. “The least I can do is give the ball to him.”
George is back in Tampa, soaking in the many kind words being said about him while at home with his wife Joan and Hank. “He decided a couple of days ago to stay with my mom and watch the game at home, and he’s watching now as we speak,” Hal Steinbrenner says into the TV camera. “Tonight’s about this facility over 85 wonderful years. As excited as I am to go to a new facility, I have mixed emotions. But this was an amazing night.”
The Yankees are officially eliminated from the postseason two nights later, and the season ends as it began—with Hank spouting off. This time it’s all about the Yankees having a better record than Joe Torre’s Dodgers, who will win the NL West to reach the postseason. “The biggest problem is the divisional setup in major league baseball,” he wrote in a piece for the Sporting News. “I didn’t like it in the 1970s, and I hate it now. It isn’t fair.”
The Commissioner of baseball reads Hank Steinbrenner’s Sporting News column with dismay and makes a mental note to mention his displeasure to Randy Levine. He’s on the phone often with the Yankees president, one of the few men he knows George truly trusts, as he watches and waits for the Steinbrenner sons to sort out how to run their father’s team.
Damn, he misses George. He misses the healthy George Steinbrenner, not the man he last saw at the All-Star Game at Yankee Stadium in mid-July. Selig clapped along with the rest of the crowd during the pregame ceremony when George—flanked by Hal, Jennifer, and son-in-law Felix Lopez—rode around the outfield in a golf cart, at times waving to the fans. But it was clear to everyone watching that the person hidden behind the large sunglasses was not the Boss they remembered, the man who ran roughshod over managers, players, and the rest of baseball for so many years. No, it didn’t take an old friend to realize that George was disoriented and uncomfortable.
At ride’s end, the golf cart pulled up to the pitcher’s mound, where Yogi Berra, Goose Gossage, and Reggie Jackson walked one at a time over to George. All three had legendary battles with their boss, but each kissed him on the cheek as tears slid down from behind Steinbrenner’s dark glasses.
It’s a moment Selig will never forget. Just four years younger than his ailing friend, the Commissioner knows he has much to be thankful for. Especially this 2008 season, when so many other things have gone right.
Selig is still reaping rewards from the Mitchell Report, which—despite its obvious flaws—continues to be widely praised. Back on April 12, Selig signed off on yet another new drug testing program with the union, agreeing not to punish any players Mitchell exposed as cheats in exchange for incorporating most of the Senator’s 20 recommendations. The key provisions: doubling the number of offseason tests and putting operation of the program into the hands of an independent administrator.
Selig had already implemented recommendations that did not require union approval. He was especially eager to establish an investigative unit, which now allows him to ferret out suspected users who don’t fail their tests. He hails the new drug testing program as the toughest in all of sports, confident he’ll now be remembered as the man who cleaned up baseball.
Selig was relieved that he no longer had to answer questions about Barry Bonds. Barry can still hit—probably better than half the DHs in the American League—but no team was interested in signing the 43-year-old home run king, even after his agent lowered the asking price to the game’s $390,000 minimum. The union is looking into filing collusion charges, but it’s going to be hard to make a good case for a player who’s currently facing charges of lying to a grand jury about his alleged use of steroids.
There are only two questions about Bonds left to be answered: Can his lawyers keep him out of jail? And will the baseball writers vote him into the Hall of Fame when he appears on the ballot in five years? Bonds is far from the only superstar of his generation left wondering if his road to Cooperstown is now blocked.
Selig’s delighted to see the team in Tampa finally come of age. The Rays, behind strong pitching and rookie sensation Evan Longoria, are this season’s surprise team, clinching the AL East on September 26 and finishing with 97 wins. It’s the first winning record in the franchise’s 11-year history.
It’s been a noteworthy season for the Commissioner’s former team, too. The Brewers have played winning baseball since May, and despite an early September slump that cost manager Ned Yost his job, the team is poised to overtake the Mets for the NL wild-card berth in the final game of the season on September 28.
There’s little mystery to why the Brewers are in this position: it’s the pitching of CC Sabathia, the six-foot-seven power pitcher GM Doug Melvin grabbed at July’s trade deadline—a move Bud could only have dreamed about making when he owned this team. Sure, Milwaukee finally has an offense to be reckoned with—the power tandem of Ryan Braun (36 homers) and Prince Fielder (34) is one of the game’s best—and they’re surrounded by a bevy of quality role players. But it’s Sabathia—a free agent at season’s end—who’s carried this team. The big left-hander has won 10 of 12 decisions for Milwaukee, including six complete games, and heads into today’s crucial finale against the Cubs with a minuscule 1.78 ERA.
Sabathia is pitching on three days’ rest for the third straight start, and he’s locked in a 1–1 duel in the bottom of the 8th when Braun slugs a two-run homer for a 3–1 Brewers lead. Sabathia finishes what he starts again, getting a double-play grounder to close out the game. Miller Park stays full for another 30 minutes, all eyes glued to the out-of-town scoreboard in left field to see if the Marlins can beat the Mets and send the Brewers to the postseason for the first time since 1982.
The Marlins take a 4–2 lead in the 8th on a pair of solo homers. The Mets threaten but don’t score in the bottom of the 8th, then go down quietly in the 9th. And when Ryan Church flies out to end the Mets season, Miller Park erupts into tearful celebration. Streamers and confetti pour down from the rafters, fireworks shoot up from behind the outfield walls, and Sabathia stands atop the Brewers dugout spraying fans with Champagne.
The Brewers drop Game 1 of the division series against the Phillies, and Sabathia has little left for Game 2, leaving in the 4th inning of a 5–2 loss. But nobody in baseball is happier than Selig when the series shifts to Milwaukee. The man who dedicated several years of his life to securing taxpayer funding for the $414 million ballpark will finally see a playoff game at Miller Park. The Commissioner’s enthusiasm spills over as he does a victory lap through the spacious press box before Game 3.
“I keep telling people I’m neutral, and I’m supposed to be, but I was thrilled when I walked in here,” Bud says. “It’s a wonderful day for Milwaukee, for Wisconsin, and a very emotional day for a lot of people.”
The Brewers win Game 3, giving Selig a chance to take center stage the next day before the home crowd. The last note of the national anthem is still echoing when the Miller Park PA announcer calls out Selig for the ceremonial first pitch. The Milwaukee crowd is on its feet, the clapping and cheering magnified by the banging of thousands of Thunderstix as the 74-year-old Commissioner walks to the base of the pitcher’s mound.
Dressed in dark slacks and a blue sweater under a shiny white MLB jacket, Selig settles into his stance. His throw makes it over the plate, and he thrusts his hands over his head as the applause crescendos again. He high-fives Brewers owner Mark Attanasio, walks off the field, and disappears into the home dugout.
The Brewers season ends three hours later when they fall 6–2 to the Phillies, who go on to beat the Rays in a World Series overshadowed by a historic presidential election and a full-blown economic collapse. Selig braces for a tough offseason, with teams already worried about selling season tickets, luxury boxes, and advertising when 500,000 Americans have lost their jobs over the last two months. Several teams have told him they plan to cut back their payrolls, but Attanasio has made it clear he plans on offering big money to sign Sabathia.
Unfortunately for the Brewers owner, the Yankees have made the same decision.
Hal Steinbrenner climbs into his black Cadillac SUV and drives slowly down the driveway of his parents’ South Tampa mansion. It’s been a long day at the end of a long November week for George Steinbrenner’s younger son. He’s been talking about this day with Randy Levine for the last few months—the day he would get his father’s blessing to assume George’s role as the managing general partner of the New York Yankees.
And today was that day. The power-sharing arrangement with Hank, an attempt to keep his older brother involved, was creating confusion about the present and uncertainty about the future. One day it was a bondholder wondering who was in charge, the next day one of their bankers was asking the same question. Some of the team’s limited partners—the ones who did not know Hal well or didn’t know him at all—were puzzled over who made the big decisions, too.
The New York media was doing its part, making sure the question about who’s in charge was asked on a regular basis. It’s been 20 months since Hal took control of his father’s team, and he’d been more than content to do his job and remain quietly in the background. But even longtime employees were concerned about what the future held.
Hal quieted the concerns of one of those employees two months ago. “Things are going to calm down soon,” he told Brian Cashman. The general manager’s contract was up at the end of October, and Seattle and Washington were among several teams sure to take a run at him. Hank talked of resurrecting his father’s Tampa front office to “advise” Cashman in mid-September, an idea Hal killed immediately.
“I’d like you to stay,” Hal told Cashman. Yes, Hank and the rest of the family will all be involved, but everyone’s role will soon be clear. “And I think you’ll be happy with the results. I think we can do great things together.” Cashman bought in, signing a three-year contract for $6 million on October 1.
Yes, the time has come to make perfectly clear—to everyone—just who is running the Yankees. That’s what Hal and Randy decided the team’s president would tell his parents. “Everybody is a little concerned right now,” Levine told George and Joan earlier this week. “It’s not like it was 10 years ago. We have banks, we have bondholders on the Stadium, we have rating agencies, and these people are a little nervous, and it’s beginning to hurt the business.
“I really feel this is the time we need to make this change so everybody can see that things are under control.”
George agreed. Then Levine sat down with each of Hal’s siblings, explaining what all this meant. Baseball requires one control person for each team, and their father was now ready to relinquish that position. Hal has been attending league meetings for the past two years, participating in baseball matters, looking out for the Yankees’ interests. That’s a big part of this job.
But it’s more than that—much more. This isn’t the business their father once ran, Levine told them. It’s the one he envisioned years ago. Today’s Yankees are the centerpiece of a growing entertainment company, one with its own lucrative cable network, sponsorships, and Legends Hospitality, a concessions and merchandising partnership with the Dallas Cowboys and Goldman Sachs. Announced just a few weeks ago on October 20, Legends will supply concessions—high-end and standard fare—for both the Yankees and Cowboys, with an eye toward expanding to other teams in every major sport.
If anyone has an objection to Hal’s becoming the control person, Levine told Hank, Jenny, and Jessica, this is the time to speak up. No objections, they all told him. We support our younger brother. Joan felt the same way, and George could not have been more pleased when Levine reported back. Hal was his choice as well, he told the Yankees president, but he wanted to hear from everyone first. “Help him the same way you’ve helped me,” the Boss told Levine.
All this is swirling in Hal’s mind as he winds his way home. George still comes to the office a couple of days each week, and Hal keeps him abreast of major developments and seeks his advice on big decisions. But there is no question that this team is Hal’s responsibility now. And the youngest member of the Steinbrenner family already has some big plans.
“Are you going to spend money chasing free agents the way your father did?”
That’s the only real question put to Hal Steinbrenner in his short meeting with baseball’s ownership committee at MLB’s quarterly meeting in New York City on November 19.
“I’m here to be a good partner,” Steinbrenner says. “I respect what my father has done, but I’m a different person. The Yankees are going to be a good partner in the industry, and we hope to grow the industry along with everyone else. I’m looking forward to participating.”
A day later, the owners unanimously approve Steinbrenner as the Yankees’ new general managing partner. “I realize it’s a great responsibility,” Steinbrenner tells reporters when the meeting adjourns. “My dad is a tough act to follow. But he’s been slowing down for the last couple of years. I have been intimately involved with all aspects of the company. My duties aren’t really going to change, and my work isn’t really going to change much.”
That same day, Mike Mussina announces his retirement. With Jason Giambi, Carl Pavano, and Bobby Abreu already gone, the Yankees have now shaved $88.5 million off last season’s $209 million payroll. But not for long.
Despite an economy in free fall—533,000 Americans lose their jobs this month, the most since 1974, and everyone understands this is just the beginning of a very bad run—the Yankees are ready to start spending. Hal Steinbrenner may differ in style from his father, but he understands he needs a playoff team to fill his new stadium and hold his TV audience. And he also knows there might not be all that much time left for his father to see another World Series flag raised at Yankee Stadium.
CC Sabathia is the Yankees’ top priority, and they already offered the left-hander $140 million for six years on November 14, the first day teams were allowed to negotiate with free agents. But Sabathia has reservations: he’s heard the team’s clubhouse chemistry is terrible. “That’s one of the reasons we’re ready to write you a big check,” Cashman tells him. “People gravitate to your personality. We want you to help fix that.”
Jeter is one of several Yankees who call Sabathia to allay his fears, and on December 11, the big man signs a seven-year, $161 million deal, a record high for a pitcher. The Brewers, who offered $100 million for five years, didn’t have a chance. Two days later the Yankees add A. J. Burnett, signing the 31-year-old right-hander to a five-year, $82.5 million contract. The hard-throwing but injury-prone Burnett went 18–10 for Toronto last season, setting career highs in strikeouts (231) and innings (221). A big plus: A.J. is 20–5 with a 3.29 ERA in the tough AL East.
“I’m not going to say money wasn’t an issue—of course it was,” says Burnett, whose two young children bring pinstriped teddy bears to his introductory media conference. “But I have a chance to win five years in a row. Whether you admit you love them or hate them, everybody wants to be a Yankee.”
Cashman wants to make one more move: signing switch-hitting, Gold Glove first baseman Mark Teixeira, who hit .308 with 33 homers and 121 RBI last season with the Braves and Angels. But both Hal and Hank keep telling him no, even though their chief rival—the two-time World Champion Red Sox—are the favorites to land the 28-year-old power hitter. Cashman keeps asking, and when a deal between Teixeira and Boston falls apart in late December, he pushes to use the money set aside to re-sign Andy Pettitte to help make the numbers work.
The GM’s persistence pays off, and on December 23, Cashman announces he’s signed Teixeira for $180 million over eight years.
The signing brings the team’s spending spree to $423.5 million. The Yankees now have the four highest contracts in baseball—A-Rod, Jeter, Sabathia, and Teixeira—at a cost of slightly more than $800 million.
Teixeira’s deal comes just one day after the Yankees receive a $26.9 million luxury tax bill, underscoring the obvious: this tax isn’t going to stop the Steinbrenners from spending whatever it takes to win. “At the rate the Yankees are going, I’m not sure anyone can compete with them,” Brewers owner Mark Attanasio tells Bloomberg News. “Frankly, the sport might need a salary cap.”
And once again, history repeats itself. The Yankees sign the game’s top free agents. The owner in Milwaukee calls for a salary cap. Some things just never change, no matter who is in charge.