Just when it looked like the Yankees were starting to win the PR battle in their contract battle with Derek Jeter, some reporter had to reach out to Hank Steinbrenner for a quote. And, as expected, Hank said something stupid. Shocker, I know.
Hank, the Steinbrenner responsible for giving Alex Rodriguez that ridiculous 10-year, $275+ million deal, told the Associated Press last night:
“As much as we want to keep everybody, we’ve already made these guys very, very rich, and I don’t feel we owe anybody anything monetarily,” the Yankees co-chairman said Tuesday. “Some of these players are wealthier than their bosses.”
The first part is technically true — no star player has given the Yankees any hometown discounts — but a little inartfully said. The last part is just silly. Even the richest player is a pauper compared to a baseball owner. Sure, Yankee star players may have a better cash flow than Hank probably does these days. But he’s 1/4 owner of the richest franchise in sports. And it’s not like he got that money on his own merits; he happened to be born into the Steinbrenner family. Bless his heart, but please, spare us the poor-mouthing.
Look, I’m on the Yankees’ side here, but what Hank said isn’t helpful. If he had to say anything, I wish he had done something funny, more along the lines of when he wondered if A-Rod wanted to go into the Hall of Fame as a Yankee or as a Toledo Mud Hen.
Blogger Dan Hanzus chastised the Yanks for not putting Hank in a panic room or something to prevent this from happening:
Unfortunately, Yankee officials were playing checkers when they needed to be playing chess, and that’s how a reporter from the Associated Press managed to get through to Hal’s loquacious brother, Hank, on Tuesday.
Heh!
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