BASEBALL / ROSS NEWHAN : Abbott Plans to Be a Yankee for a Long Time

He doesn’t have to give his regards to Broadway or spend a full season with the animals in the Bronx Zoo.

Former Angel Jim Abbott is ready to make a multiyear commitment to the New York Yankees--if and when the right offer is presented.

“I don’t believe in going team to team, looking for that rainbow you may never find,” he said the other day. “I believe in playing for one team or as few teams as you can. That’s the way the game has been passed down.

“If money had been the only issue, I’d still be with the Angels, but some of the issues that clouded the contract situation in California are not nearly as muddled here,” he said.

In Anaheim, Abbott said, “direction, focus and commitment” were lacking. And in New York, there is offensive potential built around Don Mattingly, Wade Boggs, Paul O’Neill and Danny Tartabull, hitting talent that he certainly didn’t find in Anaheim.

The Angels scored an average of 2.55 runs behind Abbott last year, the lowest support any American League pitcher has received in the 20 years of the designated-hitter era, according to the Elias Sports Bureau. Abbott was 7-15 despite the league’s fifth-best earned-run average of 2.77, including a 2.45 ERA after the All-Star break.

Abbott said he was comfortable in Southern California, but “miserable” at the same time.

“I don’t second-guess myself for turning down $16 million,” he said. “I had to ask myself if I wanted to lock into four more years of uncertainty. People have said to me, ‘Well, John Smoltz just signed a $16-million deal with the Atlanta Braves.’ Well, if I was John Smoltz, I’d have signed that deal, too. The Braves have been to the World Series two years in a row and have a chance to go again.

“I don’t see that happening soon with the Angels. At some point, you have to take control of your own destiny, and it was time to go.

“Almost all of the people I had grown up with in that organization were already gone. Kirk McCaskill, Wally Joyner, Dave Winfield, Bryan Harvey, Junior Felix. It hurts to see players of that caliber leave.

“Look at Harvey. He had signed a multiyear contract, then he gets hurt and they let him go in the expansion draft. Would they have let me go, too, if I had gotten hurt after signing a multiyear contract?

Abbott wanted $19 million for four years but was willing to compromise at $17.5 million. He was also willing to accept another one-year deal, but the Angels insisted on a condition that Abbott had to be signed or traded before beginning his fifth year, what is known as the “walk year” before free agency.

They maintain that the $16 million offer was the highest ever to a fourth-year pitcher. Abbott’s rejection of it prompted the Angels to trade their most popular player and arguably best pitcher for the unproven package of J.T. Snow, Russ Springer and Jerry Nielsen. Springer (12.91 ERA) and Nielsen (9.62) have pitched so ineffectively this spring that their respective positions as the club’s fourth starter and left-handed middle man could be in doubt.

“We’ll go with the best pitching staff we can,” Angel Manager Buck Rodgers said Saturday. “If Springer and Nielsen aren’t ready, there’s no pressure (because of the trade) to keep them on the staff or in the big leagues.”

Abbott, meanwhile, said he is not bitter, only disappointed about the direction the Angels have taken and “resentful” of the criticisms made by Rodgers regarding Abbott’s agent, Scott Boras.

The agent and his client began their relationship with the Yankees by going through arbitration. Abbott, who made $1.85 million last year, asked for $3.5 million, but the arbitrator opted for the Yankees’ figure of $2.35 million.

“The only person that takes it personally is the player,” Abbott said. “It’s blood, sweat and tears for the player, but just numbers to everyone else.”

REGGIE’S ROLE

As the special adviser to the general partner of the Yankees watched the team take batting practice the other day, Reggie Jackson said he has been assured by George Steinbrenner that his position is a meaningful one and that he has the responsibility to tell the boss he is wrong, if need be.

“George said to me, ‘This can’t be perceived as window dressing or a PR move because the media will crucify me and ridicule you,’ ” Jackson said. “It’s a decision-making position. I’ll be involved with personnel at the major and minor league level, and I’ll sit in on some of the partners’ meetings and take a role in business decisions.”

Jackson fills a similar role with Upper Deck, a card and memorabilia company, and will split time between the two jobs.

It remains to be seen how his Yankee assignments play out, how his involvement in player personnel affects General Manager Gene Michael and assistant Bill Bergesch, but Jackson said an overriding factor in accepting the offer was its impact on minority hiring.

“I’m the highest-ranking black in baseball aside from (NL President) Bill White,” he said. “It was important for me to take the job. I think it makes a statement to the black community and to baseball in general.”

THE BOOK

As the Florida Marlins prepared for the expansion draft and their initial season, author David Whitford was given access to private meetings and scouting reports.

His new book, “Playing Hardball,” provides some interesting views of former Angel Junior Felix, the talented but sometimes exasperating outfielder who led the Angels in runs batted in last year but was picked by the Marlins in the expansion draft:

--”He has the mind of a 10- to 12-year-old,” said Angel Vasquez, the Marlins’ director of Latin-America operations.

--”He’s not a bad kid, just very immature,” said Marcel Lachemann, the former Angel pitching coach who now has a similar position under his brother, Rene, the Marlin manager. “The things that excite him are like throwing pillows on an airplane. He just lights up like a Christmas tree.”

“You never know what he’ll do,” said Cookie Rojas, a Marlin coach and former Angel manager. “You can give him the sign to steal, but if he doesn’t feel like it, he won’t.”

TURNOVER

Randy Johnson has apparently been taken off the trading block. Seattle General Manager Woody Woodward will look for other ways to cut $2 million from his payroll. One way is with youth.

Three rookies seem slated for varsity jobs, including 23-year-old left-hander John Cummings, from Canyon High in Anaheim and USC. Cummings has pitched nine shutout innings this spring, convincing the Mariners that he can make the jump from Class A. He was 16-6 in the Carolina League last season, with 144 strikeouts and 68 walks.

BAD ATTITUDE

Rickey Henderson’s sulking about his $3-million contract has infuriated and exasperated the A’s. It has also left the A’s unable to satisfy his trade request. With his contract expiring at the end of the season, he can only hope the issue ultimately provides their leadoff hitter motivation in what certainly will be his last year with the team.

“It’s obvious that most clubs, including our own, consider attitude as important as ability,” Alderson said of the attempts to trade Henderson. “His attitude is getting in the way of his ability.”