While George would lord over the Yankees, threatening Joe Torre and the players like a guillotine waiting to be loosed, Hank acts and sounds more like a general manager than an owner. And that begs the obvious question: Is GM Brian Cashman being marginalized as he enters the final year of his contract?
Anyone who would actually ask this question clearly hasn’t paid any attention to the change of direction this franchise has taken since Cash took full control of Baseball Operations in October 2005.
Both parties insist that’s not the case.
Hank Steinbrenner on Cashman: “Brian’s been with us for, what, 16 or 17 years? I can’t make any guarantees, but considering he’s been a lifelong Yankee, I don’t see any reason to make a change.”
Cashman says, simply, “My job has not changed at all” since Steinbrenner began eclipsing him. In fact, Yankees insiders say Cashman is still running the day-to-day operations, answering to Hank and Hal as he once did to George. The only difference is in visibility — or in Cashman’s case, his invisibility. The GM is rarely returning phone calls these days, deferring instead to Hank.
Bob, you wrote these words, why is this a question?
If the experiment fails, it won’t be Girardi who’ll be the casualty, not with a three-year deal as his buffer. It’s Cashman who’ll suffer the consequences. His profile has been reduced, in fact, even when Hank hasn’t been on center stage. It was team president Randy Levine, not Cashman, who conducted the press conference to announce the end of the Torre era last month. Levine insisted, “It was the responsibility of a president of an organization” to explain the details of the contract Torre rejected.
Cashman may have appeared out of the loop, but insiders say Levine volunteered to take the hit for the GM and all three Steinbrenners, knowing the fallout from Torre’s departure would be immediate and savage. But ever since then, Cashman has remained in the background while Hank has become the face and the voice of the Yankees
