Baseball Musings
Baseball Musings
July 28, 2002
Steinbrenner's Foot:

Looks like George's foot is inserted tightly in his mouth. In an otherwise encouraging story about Clemen's rehab, Steinbrenner finds a way to criticize female umpires:


Steinbrenner also thought Clemens had a few things going against him, including female plate umpire Ria Cortesia.

''It was tough, you had a second-string catcher, which was a mistake, a kid that didn't belong catching him. Our regular catcher is hurt,'' Steinbrenner said. ''And you've got a female umpire, that's a tough thing to cover. Nothing against females, but I mean for Roger, I think she was probably as excited as anybody in the stands.''

Cortesia said she umpired Clemens' kids in Little League in Texas a few years ago.

''Is that right? Well that's good, I guess she'll go back there,'' Steinbrenner said. ''She wasn't that good, she wasn't bad, but she wasn't that good.''


Can't wait to see what Maureen Dowd and Molly Ivins have to say about this. Yankee PR department must be scrambling. Clemens, as it turns out, thought she was fine:

''She was pretty good, she was great,'' he said. ''I told her before the last inning that this was probably it for me and that I enjoyed it, and she said, 'Thank you.' It was a great time.''

I think that's the difference between being born in the 30's and born in the 60's. Those of us born in the 60's have grown up with the women's movement, we've gone to co-ed schools, worked and competed with women all our lives. Why not women referees and umpires? But George is real old school and still thinks surface differences are a sign of something deeper. I think he's going to catch a lot of flack about this.


Posted by David Pinto at 12:22 PM | Baseball