His situation began to sour, he reflected, after his team blew a lead of three games to none to the archrival Red Sox in the 2004 American League Championship Series.
"The last 3 years were difficult. I think it started probably with losing to the Red Sox. Because that becomes a mortal sin," he said. "And even though the Red Sox were obviously a very good team that year, we got lucky early. They didn't play well. Then we had two leads in Games 4 and 5 we couldn't hold onto.
"Since that time, it may be a little too strong to say [the Yankees] wanted to make a change. But for me it wasn't as comfortable. It could have been self-induced. I don't know. Last season was very uncomfortable, especially with the bad start we had. There were a lot of questions and stories I had to address.
"I'm sure it took its toll on me, but when you walk into the clubhouse and all of a sudden the players aren't sure what they should say, what they shouldn't say, your coaching staff, that made it doubly uncomfortable for me. I just think over the last few years it was gradually getting to the point of not being a helluva lot of fun. The baseball was still fun, but aside from that . . . "
It's really a shame that one of the best managers in the history of this franchise was alienated by some schmuck(s) within the organization. I'm going to guess it was Randy Levine and Brian Cashman.
I know these two were rarely on the same side of anything, but I get the feeling this is where they may have found some common ground. Cashman seems very happy with Girardi at the helm, and from comments he's made during the offseason seemed to be upset at some of the things Torre had been doing. Randy Levine, for some reason, always seemed to have it in for Torre.
I just hope that when the day comes that #6 is retired that Torre actually wants to show up.
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