In Broadcast Booth, Yankee Nine Talks It Up : Team of Announcers Includes 6 Ex-Players, Which May Lead to Question: Who's 'on' First?

Rizzuto now stands, holding his scorebook. He seems perplexed. He turns to director Jim Hunter and asks, "Where the heck do I go now?"

Rizzuto always knew where he was headed during 13 distinguished seasons as the Yankee shortstop. He was the American League's Most Valuable Player in 1950, performed on nine pennant winners, authored credentials worthy of the Hall of Fame and eventually had his No. 10 encased next to the uniforms of Ruth, Gehrig, DiMaggio and Mantle, never to be worn by another Yankee.

He was known then as Scooter Rizzuto.

Now, after 30 years of exhibiting what one TV critic calls heavy-handed partisanship as a Yankee announcer, he is known as Rooter Rizzuto.

The Rooter, though, can be excused for his opening-day confusion.

In April of a new season, you can't tell the Yankee announcers without a cue card.

Of his daily attempt to arrange a rotation, WPIX producer Don Carney shook his head and said, "It's like a chess game."

WPIX televises 100 Yankee games. SportsChannel, the cable affiliate, televises 40 of the 62 games that WPIX doesn't. All 162 are on WABC radio.

Producer Carney can employ a batting order of nine announcers, several of whom rotate among WPIX, SportsChannel and WABC.

Six of the nine are former players.

Said Bill White, alluding to a broadcasting team that's missing only a catcher, third baseman and outfielder: "We might finish fourth or fifth somewhere."

There's a first baseman in White, a six-time All-Star with St. Louis, San Francisco and Philadelphia, and Rizzuto's partner for the last 16 years; a shortstop in Rizzuto; two outfielders in Mickey Mantle and Bobby Murcer; a recently signed pitcher in Jim Kaat, and a second baseman-manager in Billy Martin, who is also new to the team this year.

That leaves the venerable Mel Allen, who in his 26th year with the Yankees does pregame and postgame shows on SportsChannel; Yankee communications director John Gordon, who does pregame and postgame shows on radio, and Spencer Ross, who handles the radio play-by-play.

Ross attended Florida State on a basketball scholarship but believes he could fill the void at third, his position in a Brooklyn sandlot league.

He already serves a utility role, replacing color commentator Mantle, who works just 25 of the 40 SportsChannel telecasts.

Said Ross: "I'm proud to have grown up to be Mickey Mantle's first pinch-hitter."

Martin, meanwhile, does only very brief pregame and postgame shows on the WPIX telecasts. He would barely have time to second-guess Manager Lou Piniella if he wanted to, which Martin insists he doesn't and won't.

The limited role displeases him to the extent that he may withdraw by May 1, restricting his activity here to that of an adviser to his celebrated sparring partner, George Steinbrenner, the Yankee owner.

The brevity of Martin's TV appearances came as a surprise to former teammate and running mate Mantle, who watched in his hotel room last week as Martin was restricted to a 30-second wrap-up of the season's second game.

Mantle applauded Martin's decision to shave his desperado mustache, wondered about his nervousness and said, "I'll have to ask Billy if he's getting paid by the word."

Martin is being paid because he has two years left on the three-year contract he got when he was hired again as manager in 1985. The man Steinbrenner had fired three times previously will be paid as a special assistant for three additional years when the managerial obligation expires. Martin, 57, calls it a lifetime commitment by the Yankees.

"I can only fire myself," he said, having done it before. His penchant for self-destruction in the wake of each of his managerial triumphs has been chronicled.

Last year was no different. Steinbrenner went looking for the instant magic that Martin represents, after only 16 games. Yogi Berra's team was 6-10 at the time. Martin led it to a 91-54 record and a second-place finish, two games behind Toronto in the American League East.

Martin reflected the other day and said he thought it was one of his best jobs. Yet, there was a series of erratic acts in September, ultimately costing him the position.

Late in a key game, for instance, he insisted that the left-handed hitting Mike Pagliarulo bat right-handed. He fought with pitcher Ed Whitson in the bar of a Baltimore hotel and emerged with a broken arm. He told Steinbrenner that he would not return as manager unless he was given a raise.

The stunned Steinbrenner said that he had been more than generous and that Martin could now earn his salary in another capacity. According to Martin, however, that was going to happen no matter what he and the Yankees did last year.

"I knew going in that they were grooming Piniella," he said. "George told me. I went in with my eyes open. I knew in a year or two I'd be out.