Source: Shortnews (news.yahoo.com)

Bernie Williams has been told to go to spring training with the New York Yankees, despite the 38-year-old refusing to sign a contract with the club that would see him play in the minor leagues. Williams has only ever played for the Yankees.

Source: Associated Press

By RONALD BLUM,
Thu Feb 15, 2:50 PM ET

TAMPA, Fla. - Joe Torre spoke to Bernie Williams and the message from the New York Yankees manager was clear: Come to spring training.

Williams, feeling slighted by the only major league team he's played for, has thus far refused to accept a minor league contract. After Torre left some telephone messages, the 38-year-old outfielder called back on Wednesday afternoon.

"The only thing I stressed to him yesterday is: `If you want to continue to play, you can't do it if you stay up there. We have to see you,'" Torre said Thursday.

Torre said that if Williams does come to spring training, he would have a real chance of earning a spot on the Yankees' 25-man roster

"It doesn't mean you have to hit .400," Torre said. "I think it's what you see more so than what the numbers are."

Williams has been one of Torre's favorites and helped the Yankees win four
World Series and six AL pennants. Williams said last week that he was leaning against accepting the minor league contract but said he hadn't made up his mind.

"Yeah, it would be tough for me if you had to say goodbye," Torre said. "I sense he feels confident that he can still play this game."

Williams lost his starting job in center field to Johnny Damon last year. Because of injuries to Hideki Matsui and Gary Sheffield, Williams played a lot and hit .281 with 12 home runs and 61 RBIs in 420 at-bats.

New York doesn't currently have room for Williams because it plans to carry 12 pitchers, use Jason Giambi as a designated hitter and platoon Doug Mientkiewicz at first base with either Josh Phelps or Andy Phillips.

"If we see Jason as a first baseman, that all of a sudden opens up a spot," Torre said.

Torre spoke with Williams for about 20 minutes and planned to talk with him again in the next day or so.

"It's tough for him to feel wanted if it means getting spot on the 40-man roster at this point in time because there's no room," Torre said.

"I think we have to think more in terms of: `You come down and compete for a job and don't worry about the numbers,'" he said.

BTW - Whoever keeps rating this thread low? Grow up.

What do you mean

Source: Associated Press

TAMPA, Fla. -- Carl Pavano and Mike Mussina pitched off adjacent mounds in the bullpen as the New York Yankees started spring training workouts Thursday.

A short while later, Mussina said the oft-injured Pavano isn't in sync with his teammates just yet.

"He needs to show a lot of people that he wants to go out there and pitch for us. If he shows us that, I think everything is going to be fine," Mussina said.

Pavano hasn't pitched in the major leagues since June 2005 because of shoulder, back, buttocks, elbow and rib injuries. Entering the third season of a $39.95 million, four-year contract, the 31-year-old right-hander has made just 17 starts for the Yankees, going 4-6 with a 4.77 ERA.

On Tuesday, when asked how much work Pavano had to do to regain the trust and respect of his teammates, Yankees manager Joe Torre responded: "It's sizable."

"Joe obviously has his opinions on it," Pavano told reporters. "I didn't come in here nervous that my teammates are going to oust me or give me the cold shoulder. I know that definitely there's respect to be earned. Other things that were said, I think were just things that you guys are having a lot of fun with."

Mussina, the senior pitcher in the Yankees' starting rotation, took issue with that, saying the chasm was real and not just a media creation. Sitting in his corner chair in the clubhouse at Legends Field, taking pauses to phrase his words precisely, he spoke of the frustration he has felt.

"He's only looking at it from his perspective. We're looking at it from our perspective, those of us that have been through both years. We want him to go out there and show that he wants to do this," Mussina said. "It got to a point where we just didn't even want to hear about it or talk about it anymore."

The extent of how much Pavano must do to regain respect was evident when Mussina was asked whether he would give Pavano the benefit of the doubt that he's going to do all he can to pitch.

"No, not just yet. Not yet, no," Mussina replied. "I want to see that he wants to do it."

Yankees general manager Brian Cashman has repeatedly said that all of Pavano's injuries were legitimate. But while Pavano wasn't pitching, center fielder Johnny Damon, first baseman Jason Giambi, Mussina and others played hurt.

"When one guy is out there playing the game despite whatever is going on and somebody else is not, that's how teammates get bad tastes in their mouths," Mussina said. "As another starting pitcher, who hasn't been 100 percent for all of the last two years, I know what it takes to be able to go out there and pitch, and I know when you can't go out there and pitch. And sometimes it's a fine line, but I think after 15 years I kind of know where the line is."

Pavano says that one injury led to another and that he finally feels well after working out with a new trainer in Arizona during the offseason. Some of his teammates kept pointing out that each time it appeared he was close to being ready to pitch in the major leagues, another injury occurred.

"I'm looking at from a perspective of just the way each thing happened and the timing of it and just piecing all those things together," Mussina said. "You get to form your own evaluation. It didn't look good. From a player's and a teammate's standpoint, it didn't look good. Was everything just coincidence over and over again? I don't know."

Taking his regular turn in the rotation would solve Pavano's problem with his teammates.

"If he does those things, eventually it's going to show everybody that he wants to be out there pitching for us," Mussina said.

On that, they agreed:

"Obviously, I've got to go out there and pitch. Other than that, I don't think there's really much left to do," Pavano said. "I know a lot of these guys obviously are frustrated. I think it's more of a compliment. They're frustrated because they know I can help them, and I haven't been able to do that."

As always, Yankees captain Derek Jeter was circumspect. Asked whether Pavano needed to regain trust and respect, he answered as if he were a diplomat.

"I wouldn't necessarily say that. You want him to be healthy," Jeter said. "He just has to go, prove he's healthy and go out there and pitch. Then he'll be fine."

After watching Mussina, Pavano, Andy Pettitte, Chien-Ming Wang and Kei Igawa pitch for eight minutes each, Torre said Pavano would have to learn to compete again in game situations.

"I think that's going to take a special preparation and focus, but again that's what spring training is for," the manager said. "Certainly can't do it in the bullpen."

Look at the thread rating (i.e. 'stars'). I know I gave this thread 5 stars when the boards switched to the new software. For awhile, it's been down to two stars. Today, it's now down to one star.

I realize that the thread rating system is supposed to be something that reflects the quality of a thread, but I suspect that in this case, it is more personal animosity or anti-Yankee than it is someone actually reading the thread, since very few non-Yankee people actually visit this thread until the season starts.

According to the mouse-over, 5 people have rated this thread. I know I gave it 5 stars. So the other four must have given it pretty crappy ratings (either one or two stars) to justify its current rating.

So poo on them.

I agree with Franc then, DJ. I just don't get the Yankees in their dealing with Rivera.

He's reliable, and most of all, he's earned his fucking butter for what he's done for the Yanks. Pay him the damn money.

I agree. I'm shaking my head. Ultimately, I know Mo's not going anywhere and would be more concerned if A-Rod left. Yes you read that right, because just like losing Sheffield, we'd lose A-Rod's bat. Now sure he's TERRIBLE in October, but the man has averaged 40 home run's and 120 RBI's in his 3 seasons in New York (not to mention a little piece of hardware called the American League MVP).

Who's this guy?

Clemens says only 20 percent chance he will return

HOUSTON -- Seven-time Cy Young winner Roger Clemens has given himself just a 20 percent chance of returning to the mound next season.


"Koby [his son] asked me last night when we were working out, he was doing more of a workout than I was," Clemens, 44, told Houston television station KRIV-TV in an interview on Thursday.

"I still told him 80-20 that I wasn't going to play.

"We get little notes at my foundation about people saying they wish I would make up my mind and decide because I am leaving people hanging. I'm not leaving anybody hanging.

"I don't want to play," added Clemens.

If Clemens, one of just four major league pitchers to record more than 4,000 strikeouts, does return for a 24th season, it probably will be back with his hometown Houston Astros or with another of his former teams, the Boston Red Sox or New York Yankees. The right-hander was part of two World Series championship teams during a five-year stint with the Yankees from 1999-2003.

With the Astros the last two seasons, he got to spend time on the field with Koby, his son, an Astros minor leaguer. The Rocket didn't have to always be with the major league team on days he didn't pitch.

"The teams that are involved, I think they've got really good clubs that are together, and if somebody stubs their toe and my phone rings in May, I might have to think about it," Clemens told KRIV.

Source: ESPN

Moose, Pavano meet to make peace

TAMPA, Fla. (AP) -- Carl Pavano walked into the clubhouse attendants' room, across the hallway from manager Joe Torre's office at Legends Field. Three minutes later, Mike Mussina entered and shut the door.

Twelve minutes after that, the pair emerged, smiling. Peace and understanding had been achieved.

A day after Pavano said the rift between him and teammates was largely a media creation and Mussina responded with the verbal equivalent of a brushback pitch, the New York Yankees' pitchers said they were ready to move forward.

"I told him where I was coming from, and he told me where he was coming from," Mussina said Friday. "It should have been done without what happened yesterday, and I told him that. I apologized for that. It shouldn't have happened that way. But at some point we probably would have needed to do it anyhow."

Now, if only the frostiness that some say exists between Derek Jeter and Alex Rodriguez can be melted away.

Pavano hasn't pitched since June 2005 because of an unusual string of shoulder, back, buttocks, elbow and rib injuries, prompting ridicule in New York that even the diplomatic Jeter acknowledged "had pretty much gotten to the point of being comical." Mussina's remarks that Pavano must regain his teammates' confidence generated back-page banner headlines Friday.

"Moose's message to slacker Pavano: SHOW SOME GUTS!" said the New York Post.

"BUTTHEAD" the Daily News said under Pavano's picture.

Throw in the back-and-forth over whether Bernie Williams will accept a minor league contract and Thursday's arrest of general partner Steve Swindal -- George Steinbrenner's son-in-law and designated successor -- and the Yankees have dominated New York's sports sections all week.

"It's the Yankee spring," manager Joe Torre said.

"Camp Quiet," joked general manager Brian Cashman.

There are just three lockers between where Mussina and Pavano dress, a gap of perhaps 12 feet, but the gulf between them has been huge.

Pavano said he initiated the meeting with Mussina, an erudite Stanford graduate who sometimes in the setting of a baseball clubhouse can come off as condescending.

"We had a nice conversation," Pavano said. "I told him I understand his frustration. He's been counting on me for two years and I haven't been there for him, and he's had to carry the load that I should be picking up at times. I totally understand that. But we're both in agreement that we need to be on each other's side, we need to support each other and we need to lead this rotation."

While saying his injuries were "all streaks of bad luck," Pavano acknowledged that teammates had become suspicious of his desire to pitch.

"I'm not naive to that at all," he said.

Mussina told Pavano to look ahead and not behind.

"I think he understands where we're coming from, the other guys in the clubhouse," Mussina said. "It helped for him to hear our side of it from someone, and it helps us to hear his side of it from him. He doesn't have to stand up and do it in front of 45 guys in the middle of the clubhouse. I don't think that's necessary. But by him at least talking to me, we'll start the process."

Torre called Mussina's remarks Thursday "constructive criticism" and said of Pavano: "He has to get the clubhouse back."

"You're not always going to hear what you want to hear," Torre said. "I don't think Moose is in the attack mode right now."

Pavano and Mussina agreed that the issue can be put behind if Pavano returns to the Yankees' rotation. New York gave Pavano a $39.95 million, four-year contract before the 2005 season, and Cashman repeatedly has said the team is hoping to get a return on its investment during the next two seasons.

While many players say they don't read sports sections, Jeter said he had followed how the Pavano saga had played out.

"When I say comical, I'm saying some of the back pages were pretty funny. Some of the stories were funny," Jeter said.

There was a bit of an edge in his words. The Yankees' captain was asked whether he has any issues with Pavano.

"I don't know how I could. He hasn't been here," Jeter said. "You can't really miss someone that hasn't been here."

On another team, all this could have been worked out without fans knowing what had taken place. Not on the Yankees, where even the large spring-training roster is outnumbered by media.

"You always like everything to stay in house. It's not realistic," Cashman said.

Now that they appeared to be pals after the meeting, Mussina joked about what had gone on and how he and Pavano reached their accord.

"We were going to have rock, paper, scissors, best three-out-of-five," he said.

As Mussina was talking with reporters, Pavano walked by and left the clubhouse for the day.

"See you, Mr. Mussina," he said.

Source: SI

in regards to mariano all cashman is doing is being a business man. its a tuff argument to make against mariano that he shouldnt be paid because of risk factor of him getting hurt and the yanks being hamstringed for $$ if he doesnt come back

on the flip side of the coin mariano has done alot more than many recent yankee pitchers including ones that are so overpaid

its a tuff nut to crack but i think cashman may not what hes doing but maybe not...to be continued

The problems I have with this argument are:

a.) The Yankees have no cash concerns; this whole idea of fiscal responsibility is crap. It's nonsense.

b.) Mariano shows no signs of slowing down, their hesitant to sign him; Jaret Wright never finished a season off the DL, and they give him big money.

The Yankees are being retarded right now, and trying to save money on Mariano Rivera is pointless when you look at how stupid they have been in the past 4 or 5 years with their cash.

Source: NJ Star-Ledger

BY LISA KENNELLY
Star-Ledger Staff

TAMPA, Fla. -- The biggest adjustment for Kei Igawa has been tipping.

Not his pitches. At restaurants.

"They don't have tipping in Japan," said Igawa, the Yankees' latest acquisition from the Far East.

But like everything Igawa has encountered in America in his first week -- on the field and off -- it didn't take long for him to adapt. Culture shock seems to be a foreign concept to the left-hander.

Take getting an American driver's license. Igawa passed the test with no problem, despite the fact that in Japan they drive on the left side of the road. The only tricky part was the turn signal.

"It was a little difficult at first," Igawa said through his interpreter, Yumi Watanabe. "I put the wipers on when I tried to put on the blinker."

Igawa is reading a book to learn baseball English, and he's picking up other words and phrases. His vocabulary includes, "thank you for breakfast," "what's up?" and his favorite American food, "hot dog."

He has also broken out the game "shogi" in the clubhouse. Shogi is like Japanese chess, and Igawa has the level of master, the equivalent of a black belt in karate. The game helps with his concentration on the mound -- reading an opponent in shogi is like reading an opposing batter.

While cultural transitions are one thing, the big question is how Igawa will deal with facing major-league hitters. Jorge Posada, who caught Igawa on Thursday, said there's a lot he'll have to adjust to.

"Everything," Posada said with a laugh. "It's not going to be easy. Everything is completely different."

And Igawa's first pitches of spring training gave pitching coach Ron Guidry some cause for alarm. The first pitch sailed six feet above the plate. The next one flew wide. Guidry, a little rattled, went to ask Watanabe why the new guy was as wild as a rookie.

"Well, he hasn't pitched off the mound since November," Watanabe translated.

Given that information, and Igawa's much cleaner bullpen session yesterday, Guidry isn't concerned.

"Now you're not worried about him being precise," Guidry said. "That's going to come. The thing I noticed today was how much better he threw around the plate."

Reliever Mike Myers, who saw Igawa pitch in Japan during the off-season while playing in an all-star tour, said that getting over the language barrier with American catchers will be a hurdle. But basically, it's the same game.

"He had guys on base, he kept his composure real well," Myers says. "He worked in and out of the zone and up and down. So it's just a matter of adapting to hitters, and their strike zone is different."

Igawa describes himself as a calm pitcher, and says the biggest challenge has been getting used to American baseballs, which are smoother than what he's accustomed to. Still, he had no trouble tossing his first few curveballs yesterday.

And it only took him a day to switch over to the standard American bullpen session.

American pitchers are taught to start off by throwing fastballs to their glove side (for the left-handed Igawa, inside to a right-handed batter) as a way to establish good mechanics for the rest of the session, before working their pitches outward.

When Igawa threw on Thursday, he did the opposite, starting off throwing to his pitching hand side. It caught Posada off guard, but since that's the way they do it in Japan and the most important thing is to keep Igawa comfortable, he didn't tell the pitcher to change anything.

Igawa took care of that on his own. In his side session yesterday with catcher Wil Nieves, he started off throwing to his glove side.

Just another easy transition to his new life.

"From now on," Igawa said with a shrug, "I do it that way."

Source: New Haven Register

by Dave Solomon

I was thinking: Before the ink was dry on the two-year contract extension signed by Mariano Rivera in 2004, it was a horribly inadequate deal for the most valuable New York Yankee over the last decade. But I have never heard Mo demand it be ripped up, whine, threaten or rebel. That’s not his style. All he’s said is that the Yankees would be playing with fire if they let it get to the point of free agency following the 2007 season.

It sounds ominously like the Andy Pettitte situation four years ago when George Steinbrenner foolishly thought he had Pettitte in his back pocket until the home-grown lefty walked away.

I doubt that it will ever come to Rivera leaving the Yankees, but whoever is calling the shots to refuse to immediately negotiate an extension with Rivera — be it Brian Cashman, Steinbrenner or his drunk-driving son-in-law Steve Swindal — it’s a decision conceived in lunacy. Mo is the Mickey Mantle of closers, and a far more perfect role model and representative of the Yankees than Mantle ever was.

There are may be three Yankees in the last 15 years for whom you never, ever consider drawing a line in the sand. Their names are Mattingly, Jeter and Rivera.


*What did Southington’s Carl Pavano say that was so wrong? Contrary to the media frenzy, he didn’t attack the media or blame it for whatever strained relationship may exist between him and his New York Yankees teammates. What he said was, "I didn’t come (to spring training) nervous that my teammates are going to give me the cold shoulder. I know that definitely there’s respect to be earned." On the other things that were said, "I think were just things that you guys are having a lot of fun with."

You bet the media is having fun with the rift, real or perceived, between the oft-injured Pavano and the Yankees. But in no way could his words be construed as a blast of the media. If anything, it was his resignation that such stories take on a life of their own. Which they do.

*Does Roger Clemens need attention so badly he has to go through this public decision-making process every year?

*The Red Sox have no closer, no setup man, and no chance.

*If Alex Rodriguez finishes out his contract with the Yankees, he’ll have played the same number of years in New York as in Seattle — and likely have better overall average numbers with the Yankees. Does that mean he goes into the Hall of Fame as a Yankee? It just doesn’t seem proper.

Source: New York Times

by Tyler Kepner

TAMPA, Fla., Feb. 17 — There were 55,913 fans at Yankee Stadium on Oct. 21, 2000, and millions more watching on television. Todd Pratt had the best seat of all for the moment that came to define a Yankees dynasty.

In his last season at age 40, Todd Pratt hopes to earn a job as the backup catcher for the Yankees.

Pratt is in camp with the Yankees now, trying to win a job as the backup catcher. In 2000, he started for the Mets in Game 1 of the World Series. He had scored the go-ahead run in the seventh inning, and the Mets led, 3-2, in the ninth. The Yankees had swept the past two World Series, but Pratt could sense a momentum shift.

“If we had won that game,” he said at Legends Field this week, “we might have broken the Yankees’ glow, or whatever they had.”

It was up to Armando Benítez to close it, with Pratt guiding him. Jorge Posada flied out to start the ninth. Paul O’Neill came to bat, hitting .182 since mid-September. He could not catch up to Benítez’s sizzling fastball, and was helpless against the splitter.

Benítez got ahead, a ball and two strikes. But O’Neill would not give in.

“It was just incredible,” Pratt said. “He kept fouling off tough pitches after tough pitches. It was mentally wearing me thin back there, going, ‘Come on, he’s got to swing and miss, or he’s got to put it in play.’ ”

One foul ball landed just beyond the reach of third baseman Robin Ventura, whose range was restricted by the extra box seats set up for the World Series. Benítez kept firing, and O’Neill kept fighting.

On the 10th pitch, O’Neill walked on a high, outside fastball, enough to rattle Benítez and rouse the Yankees. O’Neill went on to score the tying run, and the Yankees won in 12 innings. They captured the series in five games.

Pratt pointed to another play in Game 1, Derek Jeter’s pinpoint relay to cut down Timo Pérez at the plate in the sixth inning, as the pivotal moment. Jeter has never gotten enough credit, Pratt said, for whirling and throwing without a crow hop, somehow knowing that the speedy Pérez had not run hard all the way.

But O’Neill’s at-bat had greater symbolism, Pratt said, for what it represented about those Yankees.

“That was the heart right there,” Pratt said. “Every foul ball was a beat of the heart. It just kept them going, kept them going. That would be the description of that team.”

Much has changed for the Yankees since then. But Jeter and Posada remain, and the two Yankees who hit Pratt with pitches that night — Andy Pettitte and Mariano Rivera — are his new teammates this spring.

Pratt turned 40 this month, and he said this would be his last season in the majors. He will retire if he does not make the Yankees out of spring training. “I’m not going to take a younger guy’s job,” Pratt said.

Pratt would seem to have an excellent chance to make the team. On the first day of workouts, he caught the staff ace, Chien-Ming Wang, in the bullpen. On the second day, he caught Rivera.

He also has a low uniform number (14), the locker next to Posada and a much longer track record than the other leading candidate, Wil Nieves. The initial front-runner, the veteran Raúl Chávez, broke his hand in winter ball, prompting the Yankees to call Pratt.

Pratt was glad to accept their invitation. He was a candidate for the backup job last year until the Yankees signed Kelly Stinnett, who had experience catching Randy Johnson. Pratt signed with Atlanta and hit .207, his lowest average in five years.

But he reported here in good shape and has a strong supporter in the third-base coach, Larry Bowa, his manager in Philadelphia for more than three seasons. Bowa praised Pratt for his preparation and said he was the rare backup who could be a team leader.

“He’s not afraid to get on somebody,” Bowa said. “Even though he’s not playing, if he sees something, he’ll say something.”

Part of the reason players listen, Bowa said, is that Pratt can also laugh at himself. It was Pratt, after all, who rushed from the Mets’ dugout to hoist Ventura in the air as he rounded first base after smacking a ball over the fence to end Game 5 of the 1999 National League Championship Series. Ventura never made it to the plate, turning a grand slam into a single.

“When he plays, somebody’s going to laugh at something he does,” Bowa said. “Whether he screws himself into the ground on a swing or fouls a ball off his foot, he just has that personality.”

Pratt, whose home run clinched the Mets’ 1999 division series victory against Arizona, can appreciate the major league life because he once gave it up. In 1996, when Pratt was 29, he retired after the Seattle Mariners cut him in spring training.

He returned home to Florida, worked at Bucky Dent’s baseball school and entered the business world. Pratt’s goal was to own a Domino’s Pizza franchise, and to do so, he tried to learn every aspect of the job.

Three years before, Pratt earned a World Series bonus as a member of the N.L. champion Phillies. He spent it on a luxury car, which turned out to be an unusual way to deliver pizzas.

“I wasn’t a delivery guy, because you’re not learning much there,” Pratt said. “But there were times when we were short-handed and I had to go out. It was kind of funny, because I was delivering pizzas in a BMW. It cost me in tips. People would see the car outside and say, ‘Hey!’ But I needed the tips.”

The Mets brought him back into baseball in 1997 and improved his salary. Ten years later, Pratt has pulled up to the Yankees’ door for his final stop.

INSIDE PITCH

Position players report to spring training Sunday, but Bernie Williams will not be among them. Williams has not ruled out accepting the Yankees’ minor league offer, but he has not instructed his agent to take it. “I have not heard anything from Bernie,” the agent, Scott Boras, said Saturday night. “He’s not given me any information, so I don’t know what his timetable is.” Boras said Williams could report by March 10 and still be ready for opening day.

The Yankees’ starters threw Saturday for the second time, and catcher Jorge Posada said he was convinced that Carl Pavano was healthy again. The pitching coach, Ron Guidry, was also impressed. “I was tickled to death by how he threw the ball today,” Guidry said. “If he threw 45 pitches, he probably didn’t miss but five spots.”

Guidry also urged Kei Igawa to slow his delivery and took note of the top prospect Phil Hughes, who is working on a slider to complement his fastball, curve and changeup. Posada said Hughes, 20, was talented enough to make the team out of spring training, although that almost certainly will not happen. “It’s different from last year,” Posada said. “The way he’s walking around, waiting to take the ball — the attitude, you see it.” ... Manager Joe Torre had a cold and missed the workout.

Source: Daily News

by Mike Lupica

The Yankees sell winning first, and that doesn't just mean first place. At Yankee Stadium, winning has always meant the World Series. You see it way up there on the outside wall above the players' entrance, in print almost big enough to be seen from the Major Deegan, where they list all 26 seasons in which Yankee teams have won it all.

There is no similar list about how many pennants they have won, or how many division titles in a row, as amazing as the accomplishments in both areas are.

Now the Yankees don't promise their fans a World Series every year. They don't come out and say the money they spend on ballplayers, at a rate of $200 million every year, give or take a few million, guarantees them or their fans another trip to the Series.

They still sell the winning. They still fire coaches like Lee Mazzilli when they don't last long enough in October because, well, why wouldn't you fire the bench coach when you can't beat the Tigers? Somebody's got to be blamed, right?

Even this week, when Mike Mussina wasn't talking about Carl Pavano - whose travails seem like they belong on "American Idol" - he was talking about how Yankees are ultimately judged on how they do in the postseason, not the regular season.

So no Yankee can be surprised, or hurt, or act victimized, when people get mad at them, or say mean things about them, when they can't make it out of the first round of the playoffs for the second year in a row.

The Yankees seem to have a real good plan for getting younger now, and not spending the way they have in the past. They got rid of Randy Johnson as a way of accomplishing both. But do you really think Johnson would be in Phoenix if he had pitched like Whitey Ford in October? Come on. You think money or age will be an issue when Roger Clemens is in play, whatever he's saying now about retiring?

Here is what Joe Torre said this week to the media in Tampa:

"The thing that is a little disappointing, and this is something I guess we created ourselves by having success, is that winning 97 games is disappointing. Everybody is criticized - and I don't mean me, personally, but the team - for not getting where they want you to get. That part is frustrating even though I understand it."

He ought to be less frustrated.

And when Torre talks about the criticism, he IS talking about himself, because he didn't like it that people, starting with the owner of the team, were after him when the Tigers series ended the way it did, with another team of his going down in October when it got hit and stayed down.

The Yankees who are still around - and even ones like Bernie Williams, for whom they have left a light on in the window - got rich because they won. There are a lot of reasons Torre is making more than any baseball manager has ever made, and all of those reasons have been repeated for years, but it starts with the fact that in his first six years managing the team he won four World Series.

He is still getting paid off that. Derek Jeter got paid the second biggest contract in baseball history when all that winning was going on. Bernie got paid, Jorge Posada got paid, so did Mo Rivera, even though he thinks it should have been more and wants to get paid again.

Andy Pettitte got paid bigger than ever to come back, and you better believe a lot of that money was on the table because he won here, and that does mean he won the AL East.

So this idea that the expectations for the Yankees are suddenly unreasonable are at least disingenuous, and silly. As silly as the idea that those last three games against the Tigers were some sort of aberration. As if it was just one first-round loss out of the blue, instead of the third in five years.

Guess what? The media didn't do this to the Yankees. Their fans, the ones who show up four million strong every year at Yankee Stadium, didn't suddenly develop delusions of grandeur. Torre is right about this: They did it to themselves.

You know who talks constantly about how the season is a failure if the Yankees don't win it all? The captain of the team. The owner did it for years. Reggie Jackson talks constantly about the 11 games the Yankees are supposed to win in October. Even A-Rod has become part of the sales force.

It is why they all get to do everything about the treatment they got last October except act surprised. If winning the division is enough, if they want to talk as much about the vagaries of a short series as the Atlanta Braves and Oakland A's always have, all that should be part of the marketing now.

Somebody should put it in a brochure.