Howe’s Job Still Involves Making a Pitch : Baseball: To comply with conditions of his drug probation, he sells tickets for the Yankees.

It’s like Rush Limbaugh sending contributions to the Democratic campaign. Seeing Lee Iacocca driving a Toyota. Frank Sinatra rapping.

Pitcher Steve Howe pulled his white van into the New York Yankees’ replacement camp parking lot at 9:20 Saturday morning, ducked into the offices and came out announcing that he is gainfully employed.

Howe, the Yankees’ co-player representative and a seven-time drug offender, will start work Monday in the Yankee front office.

His primary duty?

Would you believe selling tickets for Yankee replacement games, the very ones designed to break the union’s morale?

“Maybe he’ll sell some (extra) tickets, huh?” owner George Steinbrenner said. “Maybe a guy will come in and say, ‘If you autograph my ticket, I’ll buy one.’

“As well as he knows me, when I say he has to work, he’ll work.”

Howe, whether oblivious or merely indifferent to the apparent conflict of interest, hardly appeared fazed by the commotion caused by his arrival. He says he will not cross the picket line. He will not play in spring training. He won’t even work out alongside replacement players until they leave the field.

“I’m not in a replacement camp,” Howe said. “Where am I in a replacement camp? This is the New York Yankees’ offices. The replacement camp is out on the field. I’m not involved in that.”

Howe is being paid $702 a week by the Yankees.

The rest of his teammates on the 40-man roster are receiving nothing.

“Who does he think he’s kidding?” said Dodger hitting instructor Reggie Smith, a former teammate of Howe’s. “Wasn’t he the same guy lecturing the owners on morals?”

Said Dodger Manager Tom Lasorda: “He is working for the team isn’t he? What do you call that?”

Howe, scheduled to earn $2.3 million this season, argues that he’s in camp because he must have a job to comply with conditions of his three-year probation for his conviction of attempting to possess cocaine. The provision does not specify the nature of the job, but certainly, few are more convenient than working for your own team.

“The bottom line is this is a condition of my probation,” said Howe, whose father was a United Auto Worker. “I’m doing what I think is best for me and my family, and to comply with what the federal government has told me I have to do.

“Yeah, I could have gone out and flipped hamburgers at Denny’s. It just happened to work out that I could work and be associated with the Yankees and not be in a position to harm the union too.”

Howe could have stayed and worked in Montana. He could have worked in the Yankee offices in New York. He could have worked at the Yankees’ minor league complex in Tampa.

Instead, he’s here.

“That’s great he’s here,” said Yankee replacement pitcher Doug Cinnella. “I tell you what, if anybody was going to cross the picket line, Steve Howe is a good candidate. If he joins our team, he’ll be helping bring in more fans and give us the opportunity to play a little longer.

“Let’s face it, a lot of guys here really don’t want to see the strike end, and he can help us.”

Said replacement first baseman Matt Stark: “I hope this isn’t some sort of espionage mission. But I think a guy like him would have to cross just to keep his job.”

Howe talked openly about crossing the picket line two weeks ago, according to a high-ranking Yankee official, but was talked out of it. So until further notice, he will work half-days in the ticket office, speak to schools about drug abuse and work out on Yankee property.

The union says it understands and is sympathetic to Howe’s situation, but even union chief Donald Fehr can’t disguise the perception that Howe is straddling the line.

“It certainly would be unusual,” Fehr said, “but I don’t think this is going to be a long-term problem. We plan to talk to him (Tuesday) about it.”

Said Steinbrenner: “I don’t really care about anybody in this instance, what they think, except Steve Howe and his family. He’s probably been (drug-) tested more than all the racehorses put together at Gulfstream Park. People forget he’s a human being.”