Sports Radio Interviews

Joe Girardi On The Yankees’ Rough Start, Joba, And A-Rod

Joe Girardi, as a second year Manager for the most storied team in baseball, is doing a fine job in my opinion.  Injuries, new players, and most especially this Alex Rodriguez drama, are enough to cripple a man.  Many people criticized his hiring but it takes a special man to occupy this special position and he appears to fit the mold – hard-nosed, a grizzled mentality, and non-wavering.  That’s what Yankees baseball is to me.  It’s impossible to follow up Joe Torre, but given the time, I see Girardi doing an admirable job.  His Florida years likely helped him a lot in learning to deal with these random issues which have been a part of New York’s clubhouse.  Joe Girardi joined Mike Francesa on WFAN to discuss what they’re doing with A-Rod, Joba’s “confrontation” last week, and the team’s slow start in general.

On whether or not he feels his team has been snake-bitten:

“We’ve had a lot of things we’ve had to deal with and it’s something that you don’t want to have, but it’s reality and you have to deal with it.  And, the thing is we have a chance to go on a road trip, or we’d have some things pop up, we lost both of our catchers before we left on this road trip… Others are getting the chance to step up and they’ve done a decent job.”

On monitoring Alex Rodriguez’ return from injury:

“We’re checking with him every day to make sure… We have to be careful and have to be smart with this guy -  we understand how big a part of a lineup he is, but a day off here or there early on is not going to hurt him, I think it’s only gonna benefit him and benefit us in the long run.”

On how his team has handled the tough start to the season:

“I think our clubhouse has done a nice job of nipping that in the rear end because we’ve had some brutal losses, some real tough losses.  Our guys just keeping comeback, people think it’s gonna affect us for a while, our guys have done a real nice job of coming back.  Leadership in there is very good – I’m proud of what our guys have been able to do in those situations.”

On Joba Chamberlain’s supposed stare-down with Aubrey Huff last week:

“The one thing I don’t wanna take away from my pitcher is emotion – I don’t think Joba (Chamberlain) does it to show anybody up.  I really don’t.  I don’t think he stares at the guy, I think it’s just an emotional part for Joba.  I’ve seen AJ (Burnett) do it, AJ did it against us last year, I didn’t have a problem with it.  For me to worry about that kinda stuff, if I think it’s detrimental to our team, then we’ll talk abut it, but as long as I don’t think it is, it’s not something I’m gonna worry about and let’s just play baseball.”

Listen to Joe Girardi on WFAN with Mike Francesa

Tags: Alex Rodriguez, Baseball, Joe Girardi, MLB, New York Yankees