BASEBALL DAILY REPORT : AROUND THE MAJORS : Yankee Stadium in Manhattan?

The state of New York has launched a preemptive strike against New Jersey’s effort to lure the New York Yankees out of the Bronx, drawing up plans for a $550-million complex on Manhattan’s West Side, officials said Thursday.

“Nobody desires the Yankees getting out of the Bronx,” said Vincent Tese, head of the state Urban Development Corp. “On the other hand, nobody desires the Yankees going to New Jersey.”

New York had an architectural firm design a state-of-the-art ballpark--comparable to Baltimore’s Camden Yards or Toronto’s Skydome--above a Manhattan railyard.

The open-air stadium, with 48,000 seats and an adjoining parking garage for 6,900 cars, would sit above the Long Island Rail Road yard at 11th Avenue and 32nd Street. A retractable dome would add another $50 million to the cost, the UDC said.

Gov. Mario Cuomo, who earlier this month said he was convinced George Steinbrenner was moving the team, said the Manhattan stadium plan did not change his position that Yankee Stadium was the place for the team.

“I hope we’re able to sell him on Yankee Stadium, the greatest stadium ever built,” Cuomo said at the World Trade Center. “Our basic emphasis is to keep him in the Bronx.”

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The Senate Judiciary Committee backed away from voting on a bill that would strip baseball of its antitrust exemption, saying it wants to hold more hearings.

Committee chairman Joseph Biden (D-Del.) did not set a date for the hearings and said a vote on the bill might be put off until early next year.

Biden admonished the owners for not hiring a commissioner in the year since Fay Vincent’s forced resignation last Sept. 7.

“Baseball better get the message,” he said.