A Few Words About George Steinbenner

As few as possible, in fact:  good riddance.

I don't normally speak ill of the deceased, and I am mindful of the fact that the man left a family behind (one who will, in turn, now receive his most cherished asset for free, thanks to the right-wing war on the so-called "death tax").  But it's hard to feel a drop of sympathy for a man whose systematically destroyed professional baseball in this country (for the middle-class, and for small-market teams), who damage the lives and reputations of people he employed, who blackmailed the government of a city he never intended to leave, and whose flagrant violations of the law led him to be suspended from the sport not once, but twice.

And, oh yes, his team won the World Series in seven of the nearly forty years that he owned the team.  Which means that, by his own standard of excellence, his personal batting average as an owner was under .250.  And even that is inflated by the fact that the players who won most of those World Series were developed during his second suspension.

I noticed, in all of the television coverage, of his departure, the oh-so-careful effort on everyone's part to overlook his sins, and talk reverently about his "impact" on the game.  No one would say whether that impact was good or bad.  No one could do so honestly, without seeming to disrespect the dead, especially given his net worth.  What a sad commentary on the extend to which, in modern times, money talks.  Far better it would have been to devote that level of coverage to two more deserving recently deceased members of the Yankee family:  public address announcer Bob Sheppard, and former manager Ralph Houk, two men who reflected Yankee pride in ways that Steinbrenner can only dream of.

Anyway, R.I.P., Boss--you, and the sport you did so much to destroy.