Martin Myth Grows, Even After His Death

The grip Billy Martin held on some people did not loosen with his death. To the contrary, it probably will intensify as the mythology grows.

What he means to those people was so clear in the letters and phone calls to Newsday rejecting any examination of his blemishes. Those were the people who stood and cheered him each time he appeared about to be fired as Yankee manager and each time he was brought back.

It didn’t matter what the newspapers said about the nature of the man, those fans believed what they wanted to believe.

“I got very angry, regardless if (the writer’s) statements were true or false,” Robert Douglas of Franklin Square, N.Y., wrote.

It is a phenomenon in our society that only good people die. When mean-spirited old Ty Cobb died did he suddenly become a warm, cuddly fellow who charmed his way through life?

By that standard all the critical reporting and commentary on a public figure’s life and career should be dismissed at the time of death and what remains should be sanitized. It is especially so, as was pointed out, when that person dies on Christmas Day.

“He was a hero. He was a gentle, kind and sincere man,” wrote Carol Connors of Kirkwood, N.Y.

To point out otherwise was, as Bob Sheppard, the stentorian voice of Yankee Stadiun, wrote: “How unkind . . . “

Obviously it was not “kind.” The obligation of the newspaper in reporting or observing is not to be “kind.” Neither was it unkind. Martin was not an individual whose passing could go unnoticed. He was a public figure of great dimension. What he accomplished and how he lived was a public matter just as that of a politician who might have been caught with a hand in the till.

The fan somehow makes a separation between life and the toy department. “Of a hero, the people want to hear nothing but good,” said Dr. Thomas Tutko, professor of psychology at San Jose State. “That phenomenon is multiplied in sports. Sports is even more hallowed than politics. Things that are regarded as bad in our society and really rotten in politics are regarded as clever in sports.

“When Richard Nixon was caught trying to steal the election, he was condemned; if Billy Martin had stolen the World Series the same way, he would have been applauded.

“Martin is seen as an institution, not as a man. His attacking (George) Steinbrenner seemed to be something we may not have had the guts to do with our own bosses. Authority has been screwing us and here was a guy fighting back.”

Surely that was so. Steinbrenner was such a dark figure of power that anybody who fought him appeared to be on the side of the angels. But don’t forget the original line: “One’s a born liar, the other’s convicted” was said by a player about Martin and Steinbrenner.

“Only a very few people ever got to know Martin,” Tutko said. “He’d cash in his mother to win a Series: In the United States today that’s a highly-regarded characteristic. Winning here and now is the single most important thing, not where we’re going.

“What he had crystallized modern sports. It comes at the expense of other values -- being humanistic, being empathic, having the vulnerable side of yourself exposed.”

What that creates, Tutko said, is “winning-junkies.” If their team is No. 1, then they can say “We’re No. 1” and mean “I’m No. 1.”

Anyone who does not agree, then is seen as prejudiced against. To be critical of Billy Martin’s behavior or George Steinbrenner’s behavior is really not to hate the Yankees; not being critical of them would be derelict -- or stupid.

To then withhold that critical comment in retrospect, in obituary, would be irresponsible and misleading. Even dangerous.

“That people today have lionized Martin is a reflection of our society, which, as someone truly stated, is decadent indeed,” John Scope of Hicksville, N.Y., wrote.

Dave Halliday of Manhattan phoned to say critical commentary was in order. “Some people think canonization comes automatically with death,” he said. “Some people feel because a person dies on Christmas he was called specially. They didn’t know him; they knew only that he won for them. He represented win at any cost. I knew him, and some of the things Billy did were criminal.”

The dangerous aspect of the Martin myth is that accepting his conduct on and off the field warps the boundaries of what’s acceptable in a society that already accepts too much. He was a role model against civility.

“As a role model to the youth of this country he was an embarrassment,” wrote George Lasher, director of hockey at SUNY-Stony Brook. “... He was a superb manager and a man unable to control himself

To those who viewed him with eyes and ears covered, there is no intrusion of reality -- even to the later days when he was not a good manager anymore. “There’s such madness in sports,” Tutko said.