The press conference was a spectacle, a piece of stagecraft that married a marvelous era from the franchise's past, its thrilling present, and its hopeful future. The franchise had just acquired the biggest and, at that moment, highest-paid star in Major League Baseball, and so the event would be less an announcement than a celebration, a heralding of what had happened and what was ahead.
But George Steinbrenner wasn't there for it. When the Yankees held their introductory press conference for Alex Rodriguez in February 2004, they held it at Yankee Stadium, and they made sure that Joe Torre, Derek Jeter, and Reggie Jackson were on hand.
Steinbrenner was 1,200 miles to the south, at the Yankees' minor-league complex in Tampa, watching on TV. The trade to get Rodriguez, Steinbrenner said that day, according to the Associated Press, was "probably right up there with Reggie. I'm not going to say number two. How can you argue when you get arguably the best player in baseball?" He just said it over the phone, away from the cameras and the trumpets.
