Gag Clause Bad Idea for Yankees

Rob Neyer on Newsday's story about the Yankees considering "non-disparagement clauses:"

Uh-oh. Joe Torre might have queered the deal for everybody. From

today's Newsday

:

As a sometime historian, I can't help thinking that non-disparagement clauses would be a terrible thing. As a sometime consumer of baseball books, I can't help thinking that this is the greatest idea in the world, if only because it might significantly chop the number of books about the Yankees that are published every year.

It's not hard to justify a contract that prohibits an employee from disparaging his employer. But this non-disparagement clause lasts, what? Forever? No player or manager is going to refuse to sign such a clause, if only because the Yankees' money is a lot bigger than any book publisher's.

Which I have to say -- as a sometime author -- is really a shame. And when it comes to non-disparagement clauses? There oughtta be a law.

We're all aware that Rob isn't exactly pro-Yankee, which makes his perspective all the more pertinent.  Everyone, from authors to red-blooded Americans, should find something wrong with this concept at it's root.  As baseball fans, it seems almost ridiculous to think that someone wouldn't be allowed to tell stories, write books,

share the history

of a sports team beyond what we read and see on TV. From the Yankees perspective, it makes a tremendous amount of sense.  Some time around the mid to late nineties, the Yankees went beyond being just a sports franchise with a deep history to being a full-blown business.  And, like most businesses, the Yankees are nurturing what they call their "brand." Brand is another way of saying public image or how they want the public to perceive them as a company and as a consumable product. A good real-life analogy would be to look at celebrities.  The ebb and flow of the typical celebrity career is based solely on the management of their image.  So, for instance, fifteen years ago Tom Cruise made a bad epic movie called "Far and Away" on the heels of "Days of Thunder" and could pretty much laugh it off.  Now, maybe not so much because his image and been harmed significantly by his own lunacy. Companies are the same way with their brands.  A company like Coca-Cola can't afford to have their CEO telling Broke Shields that her postpartum depression can only truly be healed by the techniques of Scientology, nor would they want him or her to be jumping up and down on Oprah's coach.  It would negatively effect their bottom line. That's where the Yankees are right now.  They've spent a gazillion dollars over the last fifteen years on their team and their image in an effort to make the Yankees more than just a sports franchise, but a symbol.  That symbol, in their eyes, needs protecting.  Its a far cry from what you might expect from a sports team and a concept that would be almost unheard of thirty of forty years ago, but that's the effect of money. From the perspective of a sports team, it's a terrible idea.  History, good or bad, is context, depth, character.  The Steinbrenner years have been filled with the type of negative stories that the Yankees are now considering taking leal action to prevent from happening.  Yet, here they sit in 2009 with the most profitable and wealthy franchise in sports.  What damage have these types of stories done to the Yankees? It's this deep history that

draw

people to a franchise because drama breeds entertainment.  My wife watches a soap opera on the DVR every night.  She's been watching it since she was a kid.  All the time, she tells me how bad the show is getting and how silly some of the plot is.  But once or twice a week, I hear her on the telephone with her mother or sister, talking about the show and trying to figure out where all of the melodrama is leading to. It isn't any different with a sports team.  Look at the Dallas Cowboys.  Jerry Jones has spent the better part of the last twenty years collecting cast-offs and criminals to play for him and they are still referred to as America's team.  They probably have more fans coast to coast than any football team in the country.  Has Michael Irvin, TO, or Pacman Jones put a dent in Jerry Jones' wallet?  If they had, you could be sure he'd stop going that route. The Yankees need to realize that having their dirty laundry aired out isnt the worst thing in the world.  It gets people talking and, when people are talking, they're more likely to be watching.  Isn't that what sells tickets?