Torre turns down Yankees

[Veovis]

Joe Torre is out as manager of the New York Yankees, rejecting a substantial pay cut after the team failed to make it past the first round of the playoffs for the third straight year.

Torre turned down a $5 million, one-year contract Thursday that still would have made him the highest paid manager in baseball.

I know a thread has already been started on this, but it was a bit... unfitting, I think, considering it reported the opposite, so here we are.

Well, this is a sad day. The end of an era I suppose. That isn't to say we are doomed now... just that the face of the team is going to change now.

The NY news was all over this strategy of forcing Torre to quit by making him take a pay cut. I guess if the deal was not offered in good faith like that, than this was a sad attempt by the organization to keep face.

Well, so long Joe. You shall be missed!

[Pronk48]

This way just a move made by managment so they can say that they tried to sign him to a contract and he turned them down.

[brewersfan19]

Smart man. The offer was a joke.

[Lance324]

That offer was more of a slap in the face than no offer. George should have just stuck to what he said originally and not even made an offer.

[brewersfan19]

amen!!

[Hammer]

im glad he felt it was so disrespectful to him. 1.5 mil more than the 2nd highest paid manager, and potentially 4.5 mil more than the 2nd highest paid manager would piss me off too. he can go get 3.5-4 mil tops from another team now, instead of just taking the 5 and sticking with the team he loved to manage, and the only team he ever looked competent managing, considering he was like 150 games under .500 before he came to the yankees.

[Fishercat]

It was still a 37% paycut and a one-year deal for a manager whose team hasn't failed to get to the playoffs in any of his years, hasn't won less than 87 games (and that year was a WS victory).

It's still insulting, even if he would still be the highest paid coach.

[Hammer]

any manager in the league couldve gotten this team to the playoffs every year of his tenure. that dont impress me. hes a dummy on field manager, hes just great in the clubhouse... i dont underrate what that means, but fact remains his personality rubbed off on the team far too often, and they were just complacent and showed no fire the last couple years. time for a change. unfortunately that change is mattingly, and hes got the exact same personality, so im torn either way. dont whine at 5 mil and tell me youre so upset by it, and dont tell me youre upset by the 1 year when the last 3 years youve been saying youre done at the end of your contract anyway. peace out joe.

[nyjunc]

any manager in the league couldve gotten this team to the playoffs every year of his tenure. that dont impress me. hes a dummy on field manager, hes just great in the clubhouse... i dont underrate what that means, but fact remains his personality rubbed off on the team far too often, and they were just complacent and showed no fire the last couple years. time for a change. unfortunately that change is mattingly, and hes got the exact same personality, so im torn either way. dont whine at 5 mil and tell me youre so upset by it, and dont tell me youre upset by the 1 year when the last 3 years youve been saying youre done at the end of your contract anyway. peace out joe.

They were able to show fire friom '96-'0 but not the last few years b/c of Joe? The problem w/ the yankees has been the players, th high priced FAs who care more about stats and money than winning. guys who put up great #s April-Sept then when october rolls around they can't perform. Joe has been way down on the list of problems w/ this team.

[Lance324]

This whole situation is about respect, not money. Expecting him to take a paycut after 12 straight postseasons is a slap, irregardless of the $ amounts involved. Joe Torre has never overly impressed me, I, like you, feel most managers could have led that team to the postseason most of those years, but I don't feel replacing him is going to help the Yankees situation any. Their problem is pitching and age plain and simple, changing managers will not change their pitching or their age.

[GiantsFanatic]

NEW YORK (TICKER) -- Showing some of his father's fire, Hank Steinbrenner shot back at former manager Joe Torre's comment about the New York Yankees' contract offer being an "insult."
"Where was Joe's career in '95 when my dad hired him?" Steinbrenner told The New York Post. "My dad was crucified for hiring him. "Let's not forget what my dad did in giving him that opportunity - and the great team he was handed." On Friday, Torre termed the team's offer of a one-year contract for $5 million with an added $3 million in incentives as an "insult."

Steinbrenner, who along with brother Hal have begun to take more control of the team from father George, said the offer was fair, and that Torre had to accept part of the responsibility for the team's failures. The Yankees, who have not won the World Series since 2000, have lost in the American League Division Series in each of the last three seasons.
"You can't take credit for success when you're going good, and then not take at least some of the blame when things change," Hank Steinbrenner told the paper. "I'm sorry he feels insulted, but that was not the intent." Torre, 67, guided the Yankees to four World Series titles during and compiled an impressive 1,173-767 record over his

Personally I dont think the deal was a slap to his face, he got paid 7.5m a year expecting him to make it to the WS, he has underachieved for the past 3 years, and giving him 5m with incentives up to 3m is not a slap to his face. He would still be the highest paid mananger in the majors.

[love_that_reefer]

Anyone who thinks any manager could have gotten this '07 Yankees team to the playoffs is just a moron. These Yankees teams the past few seasons haven't been that great and have lost to better teams in the playoffs. The front office is not doing a good job and hasn't for a long time. How many managers have won a WS with a $200 million payroll? Zero!!! That's the problem. Getting the most expensive players is not how you win. Those Yankee team in the late 90's didn't have such a huge payroll and got good team guys who played well with each other. They have gone from Brosius to Arod, Bernie to Johnny Damon, Mendoza to Farnsworth. Spending all that money doesn't get you a damn thing and Torre did the best with his "teams". Of course this deal was a slap in the face. Taking a paycut and only having a one year deal is not how you treat a HOF manager and one that got this franchise to October every year. Torre has put up with a lot of shit and we might have a Manager of the Year leaving his team two years in a row. And please don't forget that Torre had success with some really shitty teams with the Braves in the early 80's and overachieved with the Cardinals.

[Lance324]

And please don't forget that Torre had success with some really shitty teams with the Braves in the early 80's and overachieved with the Cardinals.

Yeah, that sub .500 record and having like 9 losing seasons out of 15 is really impressive!!!! You call that success?

[love_that_reefer]

You quoted it but I guess didn't read it. Yes he did have some success with some really awful teams as I pointed out. Go look it up!

[Lance324]

I quoted it and I read it!!!! I guess if you are happy with sub .500 and call that success more power to you. I certainly would not be happy with a sub .500 managerial job irregardless of the players on the team, at least not consistently like that, every team needs to retool from time to time.

What is your definition of success? Your reply got me to wondering if pre-Yankees Torre managed teams showed improvement over a course of years, so I checked like you suggested. Nope, no improvement, the '82-'84 Braves actually got a little worse every year he was there.

I'll give you that the Met's teams he managed were almost talentless, so we'll exclude his record with that team. That still leaves him at 5 seasons above 500 and 4 seasons below, and the teams that he managed at those two cities were not that bad, the Cardinals teams he managed were actually quite good.

Just for the hell of it, let's look at what happened to teams after Torre left...
The '82 and '83 Mets (.401 and .420), very similar to Torre's last years there (.398 and .414). Then Davey Johnson took over and they put together 7 consecutive winning seasons. The '85 and '86 Braves they took a dive after Torre for a few years under couple of other illustrious sub .500 managers, Chuck Tanner and Russ Nixon (whomever the heck he was), after that the Bobby Cox era, although too far ahead of Torre to have anything to do with the Torre led Braves teams. Then the '96 Cards, won the division the first year after Torre and have only had 3 losing seasons since he left. Of the last 30 years, those Torre seasons are probably the most disappointing to Cardinals fans of any seasons.

Sorry, I'm not buying that as success. Maybe you'll get lucky and his next job will be with the Giants since you are so high on him. I'm not calling him a bad manager, but what he's done with the Yankees is highly overrated.