Steinbrenner Was Blackmailed by Lawsuit Informant, Paper Says

George Steinbrenner, owner of the New York Yankees, was blackmailed by an unemployed gambler who was involved in Steinbrenner’s legal battle with outfielder Dave Winfield, according to the New York Daily News.

In Sunday’s editions, the News said Steinbrenner acknowledged paying $40,000 Jan. 8 to Howard Spira of the Bronx. Spira gave Steinbrenner information to use in his lawsuit against Winfield, but Steinbrenner said that was not the reason for the payoff.

The paper said Spira signed an agreement promising never to disclose the payoff but threatened to make it public, along with their tape-recorded conversations, unless Steinbrenner gave him an additional $110,000 and a job at Steinbrenner’s American Shipbuilding Co. in Tampa, Fla.

Steinbrenner has accused Spira of extortion and Spira is under investigation by the FBI, which raided the apartment where he lives with his parents, the paper said.

“If it was stupidity on my part, then it was,” the News quoted Steinbrenner as saying in an interview Saturday. “But I honest to God felt that I could help this young man to get his life straight.”

Steinbrenner and Winfield came at odds when the owner learned that the outfielder’s contract included a cost-of-living clause that made it worth several million dollars more than Steinbrenner thought. Steinbrenner also was required to make annual contributions to Winfield’s foundation and the two wound up in a bitter lawsuit.

Based on information from Spira, Steinbrenner charged that Winfield’s agent, the late Al Frohman, had concocted a death-threat letter against Winfield during the 1981 World Series to provide an excuse for the outfielder’s one-for-22 slump. The Yankees later reported to the baseball commissioner’s office that Winfield made a usurious loan to a gambler; Spira says Winfield loaned him $15,000 and demanded $18,500 in repayment.