George

[Guest Edgy DC]

]I seek out Tom McEwen, the onetime sports editor of the Tampa Tribune. He and Steinbrenner have been golfing buddies since 1973, the year the Boss bought the Yankees and moved his family from Cleveland to Tampa, Florida. But they haven�t talked to or seen each other in more than a year. �I�ve heard all the speculation,� McEwen says. �I hope he�s okay.� The 84-year-old McEwen doesn�t get around much anymore himself. Circulation problems in both legs have confined him to a wheelchair. Still, he offers to accompany me to Steinbrenner�s home, which borders the Palma Ceia Golf and Country Club in downtown Tampa. �I don�t care if George gets mad,� he says. �At this age, what can he do to me?� So on a bright, cloudless day in June, we pull up to the Steinbrenner compound, a stucco palace with thick white columns.

Seems to me that (1) McEwan is taking responsiblity for any breach of propriety here, and (2) he had concerns of his own for his friend, felt Steinbrenner would be better served by the truth (which the corporation is apparently not offering up) and trusted this journalist to publish that truth in a responsible manner, which he did.

Another thing here is that I think soup is inadvertantly misreading

]�Great to see you, George,� McEwen says. He introduces me as a writer working on a story and asks about Steinbrenner�s wife, Joan.

as

]�Great to see you, George,� McEwen says. He introduces me as a writer working on a story... about Steinbrenner�s wife, Joan.

[Guest Edgy DC]

Scooped.

[soupcan]

="Frayed Knot"]I think you're misinterpreting it. From the article: �Great to see you, George,� McEwen says. He introduces me as a writer working on a story and asks about Steinbrenner�s wife, Joan." In other words; this McEwen character introduces who Lidz is ... and then breaks the ice by asking George about Joan, presumably about how she's doing, etc. since he certainly knows her. That's how I see it at least.

You are correct - I misread that as 'He introduces me as a writer working on a story about Steinbrenner�s wife, Joan.'

[Guest metsguyinmichigan]

="soupcan"] ="Frayed Knot"]I think you're misinterpreting it. From the article: �Great to see you, George,� McEwen says. He introduces me as a writer working on a story and asks about Steinbrenner�s wife, Joan." In other words; this McEwen character introduces who Lidz is ... and then breaks the ice by asking George about Joan, presumably about how she's doing, etc. since he certainly knows her. That's how I see it at least. You are correct - I misread that as 'He introduces me as a writer working on a story about Steinbrenner�s wife, Joan.'

There you go. Sounds legit to me.

[G-Fafif]

If one can use the monolithic term "the media" for the purpose of this conversation, it's then accurate to say the media have been played like suckers by Steinbrenner for 35 years. They decided long ago that every burp this man manufactured was news, and if he didn't burp, that that was bigger news. This went way beyond covering a baseball team or the transactions the general manager might make. The media were the ones who stalked Steinbrenner coming into and going out of Yankee Stadium. They're the ones who raised his profile and the profile of his previously dormant franchise, that kept his and the Yankees' profile insanely high during what should have been their non-descript middling or worse years between dynasties. Steinbrenner indulged them and led them in their chase every step of the way. I believe this, as much as any on-field success, is why they are the financial juggernaut they are. George Steinbrenner understood there was no such thing as bad publicity.

Then the media (staying monolithic for a moment longer) write or say things like "can you believe how much attention this guy gets? It's crazy!" It's a variation on the media saying/writing, "New York is a tough place to play what with the way the media covers sports," as if it were an organic phenomenon that had no willing practitioners. I don't remember sports in New York being treated in nearly as circuslike or zooish a fashion before Steinbrenner implicitly or explicitly invited the media to pump up the importance of every little utterance he made. He has attracted more attention to himself since 1973 than the ownerships of every other professional sports team in New York combined.

So it's no wonder that it's come to this, the need for a writer to wheedle a way in to see if George is really still George, to make a big deal that an old man reportedly in a declining state is indeed an old man in a declining state. He created them as much as they perpetuated him.

Regarding McEwen, I remember him well from my college days in Tampa. He was a laughable columnist in that way that the main guy in a small market can be, puffing up everybody or everything that ever happened there beyond reason, but a legitimate champion of promoting the Bay Area sporting scene (banged the drums hard to get an NFL expansion franchise, for example) and by all counts an honorable sort.

[Guest metsguyinmichigan]

From Jon Heyman:

"� I called for a moratorium on hounding George Steinbrenner a little more than a year ago, and I am calling for the same now. Quite obviously, Franz Lidz, formerly of SI, wasn't listening. Journalistically speaking, I don't believe Lidz of Portfolio magazine did anything wrong by going to Steinbrenner's house to interview him and finding the Boss to be in and out. But now, please, it's time to leave Steinbrenner, a fading septuagenarian, alone."

A) Why should anyone give even a baby rat's ass about a moratorium called by Jon Heyman?

If, in fact, Steinbrenner is a "fading septuagenarian" then at least let the team acknowledge it. The fans -- and the taxpayers footing a big chunk of the bill for the stadium the fading one is getting -- should be allowed to know if the guy is healthy or a fugure head. Heyman himself makes reference to Steinbrenner making decisions on the manager. Is the guy with it or not?

The bottom line is that if the guy is battling dementia, the team needs to be honest about it.