George Steinbrenner

To many team owners and sports executives outside of baseball, George Steinbrenner was more than the top man at the New York Yankees. He was the quintessential New York model. "He turned the Yankees into the New York Yankees Corporation," said Eddie DeBartolo, a close friend of Steinbrenner's and former owner of the San Francisco 49ers. "He put them in a place beyond anybody's reachability. It transcended baseball." Steinbrenner, who died Tuesday of a heart attack, headed a small group of investors who bought the struggling Yankees from CBS in 1973 for roughly $10 million.

BASEBALL URBAN LEGEND : The Yankees had a costumed mascot during the 1970s. On July 10, 1979, the famous costumed mascot the San Diego Chicken (who was working for the Seattle Mariners that day), put a hex on New York Yankees pitcher Ron Guidry during a Mariners/Yankees game in Seattle. This upset Yankee outfielder Lou Piniella, who then chased the mascot and even threw his glove at the giant costumed bird. After the game, Piniella remarked regarding his irritation at the mascot trend, "If people want to pay to see a chicken, they should dress the players up in chicken suits.

George Steinbrenner sits in his command post in his cap with the 50-mission crush, the scrambled eggs on the visor, the red phone at one hand and the red button at the other. He has the weapon none of the other teams in all of baseball can match; he can blow them all away in the war for free agents. But it is the Doomsday Weapon, the neutron bomb of his staggering cable television contract, and he does not dare use it. If he did, it could destroy the world he seeks to conquer.

Soon after he bought the Angels in 2003, Arte Moreno endeared himself to fans by going on a $146-million free-agent shopping spree and lowering prices for beer and merchandise. Former Dodgers owner Peter O'Malley was beloved for the family atmosphere he created, his first-class treatment of players and buying his staff ice cream every day the team was in first place. George Steinbrenner ruled the New York Yankees with an iron fist, engaged in bitter public feuds with managers and players and popularized the phrase, "You're fired!"

Dallas Green on Thursday responded to criticism from owner George Steinbrenner with the most forceful rebuttal from a New York Yankees manager since Gene Michael's "fire me" challenge in 1982. With subtle sarcasm, Green refuted Steinbrenner's second-guessing and clearly implied the owner has a novice understanding of baseball. He even ridiculed the owner, saying: "The statement that 'Manager' George made about the game is a very logical second-guess.

New York Yankee owner George Steinbrenner was Japan-bashing before it was popular. At a U.S. Olympic Committee meeting in 1987, Steinbrenner, who had been appointed to the executive board as a public-sector member, was furious when he learned that the USOC had contributed $10,000 to Japanese sports. "Ten thousand dollars to the Japs?" he asked during a board meeting, not particularly caring who overheard him. "This . . . has got to stop."

The Courier-Journal, Louisville's morning newspaper, led its sports section Wednesday with a story about a controversy at Churchill Downs. George Steinbrenner's name was in the second paragraph. Why not? Steinbrenner is controversy's traveling companion. So whom did the Boss fire this time? Much to the relief of the hired hands in Barn 25, the answer is no one. The mention of the shipbuilding New York Yankees owner amounted to name-dropping.

George Steinbrenner unarguably is controversial, but his notoriety is confined to one continent. When International Olympic Committee President Juan Antonio Samaranch of Spain visited Colorado Springs, Colo., last summer during a U.S. Olympic Committee meeting that focused on Steinbrenner's status as an officer, Samaranch asked reporters, "Who is this man, George . . . ?" When the subject is boorish, bullying sports moguls, the man most of the rest of the world thinks of first is Bernard Tapie.

Just before the start of exhibition games this spring, George Steinbrenner walked by a batting cage and saw a bubble gum wrapper. In his batting cage! Immediately, an edict went out: No more gum wrappers on the ground. His players responded with a surprise the next day. Not one wrapper, but dozens, maybe hundreds.

They were looked at by others around baseball as a collection of mercenaries, the best team that money could buy. From the moment they broke camp in Fort Lauderdale last April, these New York Yankees were supposed to be champions. Only the rigors of a 144-game endurance test stood between them and the World Series berth many had predicted. No one should be surprised that it did not happen. Even $55 million could not purchase a pennant for principal owner George Steinbrenner.

Barbara Kopple's "The House of Steinbrenner," the latest in the ESPN documentary series "30 for 30," in which notable filmmakers look at sports events and figures of the last three decades — over the life of ESPN, in other words — is a tale of two ballparks: the old Yankee Stadium, born 1923, and the one that replaced it next door in 2009. It's a lightweight but affecting little film, about time and tradition and torches passed, that doesn't get into any of the controversies over the new stadium's gestation or delve too deeply into the being of the team's late, brand-defining principal owner, George Steinbrenner, a figure loved or hated in New York in direct proportion to how well his team performed.

To many team owners and sports executives outside of baseball, George Steinbrenner was more than the top man at the New York Yankees. He was the quintessential New York model. "He turned the Yankees into the New York Yankees Corporation," said Eddie DeBartolo, a close friend of Steinbrenner's and former owner of the San Francisco 49ers. "He put them in a place beyond anybody's reachability. It transcended baseball." Steinbrenner, who died Tuesday of a heart attack, headed a small group of investors who bought the struggling Yankees from CBS in 1973 for roughly $10 million.

Michelle Kwan was a 13-year-old whose parents were trying to scrape up money for her skating when Yankees owner George Steinbrenner stepped up to the plate. Kwan, who became the most decorated figure skater in U.S. history, never would meet Steinbrenner, who died Tuesday at age 80. But she still has the "wicked cool" Yankees jacket Steinbrenner sent in response to her thank-you letter for his $10,000 contribution to her funding in the fall of 1993. "He was like an angel to come and help us," Kwan said Tuesday.

'I'm obsessed with winning and everything that goes with it — discipline, pride, achievement. Isn't that the essence of this country? Isn't that what New York is all about and the Yankees always should be?' — George Steinbrenner, who died Tuesday at 80 of a heart attack 'The thing with the boss, he's an old football coach.... He sort of looked at the baseball season like we played 12 games and we had to win every single day.' —Yankees shortstop Derek Jeter 'All he was was a winner.

The New York Yankees had reclaimed what they consider their rightful place, atop baseball's throne. They celebrated on opening day, the champions with their rings, and George Steinbrenner came in for a little teasing from the man he had appointed as captain of the team. The owner had worn his Ohio State ring. Derek Jeter told him to take it off and replace it with that shiny new Yankees ring. "Those are the memories that you remember," Jeter said, "those intimate moments."

George Steinbrenner, who made his name synonymous with the revival of the New York Yankees as a dominant baseball team and leveraged multiple championships into business ventures that forever changed the economics of the sport, has died. He was 80. Steinbrenner died Tuesday morning in Tampa, Fla., according to a statement released by his family. The cause was not given. The death comes as Major League Baseball prepared to hold its All-Star game in Anaheim. "He was and always will be as much of a New York Yankee as Babe Ruth, Lou Gehrig, Joe DiMaggio, Mickey Mantle, Yogi Berra, Whitey Ford and all of the other Yankee legends," baseball Commissioner Bud Selig said.

For those of you who don't know me, poor fools, my name is Steinbrenner, I own the Yankees, and I have been hired to write about the 1986 World Series. My articles have been appearing for several weeks now in the New York Post, right next to the ones about killer nuns from outer space. For some reason, the newspaper you are now reading has resisted running my columns.

The fat lady finally sang an overdue aria over the fallen fat man and George Steinbrenner became baseball history. What would you like to hear on your way out, big guy? Let's try a little Hank Williams: He's a lo-ong g-o-one and n-o-o-body's blue. Baseball? It was really an 18-year crusade to get the Yankee owner's name in New York's tabloid newspapers, and it produced baseball's first tabloid team. The franchise ran on sensationalism and the owner's personality.

The place is majestic. The place is imposing. You can feel all $1.5 billion. As the April sun shone brightly Thursday for the official opening of the new Yankee Stadium, you sensed you were walking into the imperial palace of some 19th century archduke. "You know George will go first class," Yogi Berra said. "It's George Steinbrenner style," Reggie Jackson said. "Forget the cost, just do it right." The 31,000-square foot Grand Hall is, well, grand.

NEW YORK -- Good morning, Joe Torre: I'm on the verge of firing you, and you can hear all about it from the media, not from me. Nothing like pressure compounded by chaos, courtesy of New York Yankees owner George Steinbrenner. With his team one loss from playoff elimination, Steinbrenner chose not to rally behind his manager but to point the finger at him. "It's a regular day around here," Yankees captain Derek Jeter said. "You're from Los Angeles. It's a regular day in New York."