Yankee Coaches Have Love Affair With Game

Professional baseball coach: From hitting infield practice, fungos, filling out lineup cards and spitting . . . it’s the blue-collar side of a high-profile game.

Joe Altobelli and Don Zimmer fill the job description for the New York Yankees. Altobelli coaches first base and Zimmer third.

You might recall the names. Altobelli has five-plus years of experience as a major league manager with San Francisco and Baltimore. Zimmer has nine years experience as a manager with San Diego, Boston and Texas.

In 1983, it was Altobelli who had the unenviable job of replacing Earl Weaver as manager of the Baltimore Orioles. Baltimore won the World Series that year, making Altobelli only the ninth manager to win a championship his first season with a club.

Oh yeah, it also made him a savior, a baseball genius and just about the best thing to hit Baltimore since, well, since Earl Weaver.

By 1985, he was out of a job. These days he hits infield practice and fills out the Yankees’ lineup card.

Zimmer is best remembered for his five seasons with the Red Sox, from 1976 to 1980. Boston adored Zimmer’s pugged face all the while the Red Sox seemingly had the division won in 1978. They burned him in effigy when the Red Sox lost the division title in a one-game playoff with the Yankees.

By 1980, he was unemployed. Zimmer hits infield and spits a lot.

So what does it do to a man to go from top enchilada to second banana? How does he suppress his ego, his opinion when he disagrees with the manager? How does he deal with the mental anguish, the humiliation, the sleepless nights?

“What problem?” Zimmer asked. “When you’re a manager, you manage. When you’re a coach, you coach.”

Oh.

Altobelli and Zimmer, each of whom has more than 30 years of service in baseball, say that the adjustment to coaching is no adjustment at all.

“The duty is always to help the team be as successful as possible,” Altobelli said. “It’s just that the way you do that changes. That’s not hard if you love the game.”

Said Zimmer: “My job is to help the manager, that’s it. I don’t worry about anything else.”

Of course, when you work for the Yankees, which manager you will be serving is always a question. Just ask Dick Howser, Gene Michael, Bob Lemon, Gene Michael again, Clyde King, Billy Martin, Yogi Berra and Billy Martin again. And that’s just this decade.

“I think when you’ve been in this game and know it as a professional, you’re not surprised by changes . . . in personnel or attitudes,” Altobelli said. “When you approach this game as a professional, you accept it on its terms.

“People say things are crazy in New York. Don’t you think it was crazy for me to get fired--two years after winning the World Series--with a 28-26 record in June?

“It’s a humbling game. You learn to eat humble pie, and if you don’t learn how to eat humble pie, this game will eat you up.”

So the two go about their duties seemingly quite happy. Saturday afternoon, Zimmer made his way around the visiting clubhouse at Anaheim Stadium, fungo bat in hand, gnawing on a couple sticks of licorice. Altobelli was seated, sipping a cup of coffee, filling out the lineup card.

What a life.

“It does allow you to work with individual players a lot more,” Zimmer said. “That’s something I missed when I managed.”

And what about managing? Each says he’s not seeking it right now. They know it’s good work if you can get it, but only 26 people get that chance at a time. Each says he is very happy in New York. Each seems to enjoy hitting infield and being in the ballpark. But each also confirms that it would not take much of an arm twist to get him to return to managing.

“I can’t imagine my life involved in anything but baseball,” Zimmer said. “Coaching, managing. . . .”

A voice suggests scouting. Zimmer scowls and tugs on his warmup T-shirt.

“In uniform,” he booms. “In uniform.”