COMMENTARY : Mattingly Is Still Class of the Yankees

Today’s no different than any other day,” Don Mattingly was saying. “I just want to play the game and talk about the game. It’s all I’ve ever wanted to do. I don’t want to argue with anybody. I don’t want to fight with anybody. I don’t ever try to argue with the facts of the season. All I can say is, there’s a lot of season to go. I’m willing to put it all on the line the rest of the way. Then judge me. If I deserve to be raked at the end, go ahead.”

It was an hour before Wednesday’s game between the Yankees and Tigers. Mattingly had just attacked an infield workout as if he were still 22 and trying to make the team. He took ground balls after the rest of the Yankee infielders were back in the clubhouse. Now he was sitting at his locker, the corner locker that once belonged to Sparky Lyle and Dave Righetti and Ron Guidry and now belongs to him. Another day in an elegant Yankee career, a career that is more than his last 150 at-bats, was beginning for one of the best people to ever sit in this room.

He is no longer the best player in the room. That is Paul O’Neill now. Mattingly is still one of the most important. If you don’t know that, you don’t know anything about his team’s character, or its personality, or what makes it work. It means you know nothing about the Yankees.

Mattingly’s batting average is .265. He has one home run and 17 RBIs. It is not the first slow start of his career, although it is suddenly treated that way. There was once a season, in 1988, when Mattingly went 124 at-bats into the season without a home run. He was at .262 after a comparable period in 1993. He was at .250 after 200 at-bats in 1992. He was younger then, and did not have any problems seeing the ball.

Suddenly it is not supposed to matter that Mattingly spent half the season battling a virus that attacked his eyes, made it difficult and sometimes impossible to pick up both spin and speed. Buck Showalter was forced to sit him sometimes against lefthanders, against whom Mattingly sometimes could not pick up the ball until it was on top of him.

He does not make any excuses for the way he has hit. He does not talk about his eyes any longer. He has never cared about what was written about him, or said. He has always been better than that. He is certainly better than his owner. Publicly George Steinbrenner talks about “Donnie” Mattingly as if Mattingly were one of his children. And privately, Steinbrenner whispers that Mattingly cannot do the job anymore. It is typically gutless of him, predictably two-faced.

Here is the game, just so you will understand it over the rest of the season: Steinbrenner does not want to re-sign both Wade Boggs and Mattingly after this season, at least not at their current salaries. Boggs and Mattingly make about $8 million between them. Steinbrenner isn’t too worried about the public relations damage if he lets Boggs go. But he doesn’t want to be the one with Mattingly. He wants it to be somebody else’s idea.

And Mattingly cannot be bothered by any of it. He is starting to see the ball, and hit the ball. He is still looking for a clear shot at October.

“I’m not going to cry about why this happened or why that happened, because that’s not my way,” Mattingly said. “It’s never been my way. It’s too late for me to change now. It’s only been 150 at-bats, that’s all I’ll say. I feel like there’s plenty of time for me to end up where I want to be, where I want our team to be. I feel I’ll be strong enough and healthy enough to get there.”

Mattingly is off to a slow start. So is Danny Tartabull. But there are some differences between them, the most noticeable being this one: Tartabull does everything but beg out of the lineup. Mattingly, even when he can’t see, is always begging to get in. In the Yankee homestand before this one, there was a meeting late on a Friday night with Steinbrenner, Gene Michael, Showalter and the Yankees coaches. When Showalter came back to his office, there was a message to call Mattingly.

Randy Johnson was pitching the next afternoon for the Mariners. This was at a time when Showalter was still worried about sending Mattingly out against any lefthander, much less Johnson, who is as tall as the upper deck and throws harder than anyone.

Showalter called Mattingly, who said, “Put me in there tomorrow.”

Showalter told him no.

“I can see well enough,” Mattingly said.

Showalter told him no again. And says he will never forget the offer.

O’Neill was sitting across the clubhouse when Mattingly came in after infield practice Wednesday. This is O’Neill’s third season with Mattingly.

“He’s the first guy I’ve ever played with who moves so far into the hole that he actually gets in my way when I’m in right field,” O’Neill said. “He’s so good, he has too much range, that even in the outfield, I have to play around him.”

Finally O’Neill said, “I love watching him play baseball. I love being on the same team with him.”

So do his teammates. So does his manager. “Maybe other people take him for granted,” Showalter said. “I don’t.”

Mattingly got a couple of hits Monday night. He got a hit off lefthander David Wells Wednesday afternoon, on a day when Wells was acting like Randy Johnson. He is six for his last 18. A small beginning. There is the feeling that the Yankees’ season is just beginning. If they aren’t through in June, Don Mattingly isn’t either.