Jeter Was Once Rebuked for Ties to Rodriguez
February 22, 2007
Jeter Was Once Rebuked for Ties to Rodriguez
By JACK CURRY
TAMPA, Fla., Feb. 21 — Chad Curtis collected 1,061 hits across 10 seasons in the major leagues, he hit a game-winning home run for the Yankees during the 1999 World Series and he was a part of the memorable team that won 125 games in 1998. But to some fans, Curtis is remembered mostly for being the teammate who dared to challenge Derek Jeter in public.
Long before Alex Rodriguez started spring training by saying that he and Jeter are not as friendly as they once were and Jeter responded by refusing to discuss their relationship, Curtis helped ignite the first controversy involving them.
During a brawl between the Yankees and the Seattle Mariners in August 1999, Curtis was irked when he noticed that Jeter was acting nonchalantly off to the side with Rodriguez. Jeter smiled when Rodriguez told him he would get him if there was another skirmish in the game. One Yankee had been punched and another had been plunked, and Curtis felt Jeter should have shunned an opponent like Rodriguez, even though they were close friends at the time.
Curtis confronted Jeter near the dugout and in the clubhouse. With teammates and reporters watching, Curtis scolded him. Curtis told Jeter he was a good player, but that he did not know how to play the game.
“I constantly self-evaluate,” Curtis said Wednesday in a telephone interview. “Was I wrong? Did I do something wrong? Maybe what I said was proper. The way I said it, where I said it and when I said it, wasn’t proper.”
Jeter’s relationship with Rodriguez has been scrutinized anew this week, so the incident with Curtis is a worthwhile footnote.
Jeter is proud of the polished way he plays and is repeatedly lauded, so he was angered by Curtis’s criticism, so much so that he and Curtis barely spoke afterward. One of Jeter’s attributes is his ability to eliminate any and all distractions. The Yankees traded Curtis to the Texas Rangers after the 1999 season.
Although Jeter would not address it, Rodriguez said the chill in their relationship came after his critical comments about Jeter in an interview with Esquire magazine in 2001. Rodriguez said Jeter “never had to lead” and was “never your concern” when playing against the Yankees. After Rodriguez drove 95 miles from Port Charlotte, Fla., to Tampa in the spring of 2002 to apologize, he said, “I thought it was over.”
But by finally being candid Monday, saying that the friendship with Jeter was not as intimate as it once was, Rodriguez liberated himself. Now Rodriguez, who is more concerned than Jeter about how others view him, does not have to act as if he and Jeter still hang out regularly.
The former Yankee Gary Sheffield, now with the Detroit Tigers, said Rodriguez is one superstar who still seeks the approval of others.
“If he doesn’t get that, this is what happens,” Sheffield said Wednesday in Lakeland, Fla. “Because he has to talk about things that he normally wouldn’t talk about.”
Interestingly, when Sheffield spoke to Jeter on Monday, he said Jeter never mentioned Rodriguez’s remarks. Sheffield said the intensity of the news media coverage had fueled the fascination with the relationship between Jeter, the Yankees’ shortstop and captain, and Rodriguez, their third baseman.
“Their situation is what it is,” Sheffield said. “I don’t know what triggered it to get to this point.”
Curtis said Rodriguez, his Rangers teammate for two years, must always determine whether people want to be his friend because he is A-Rod, the $252 million man, or because they truly like him. People in that lofty position, Curtis said, gravitate toward people in the same stratosphere. For Rodriguez, one of those people was Jeter.
“Not to get all Dr. Phil-ish, but we don’t want our friends thinking bad about us,” Curtis said. “It’s not that we’re looking for their approval. We’re looking for their friendship.”
Two days after Curtis challenged Jeter in 1999, he apologized for the manner in which he made his point. Jeter told Curtis that he had done nothing wrong, so there was no reason to apologize.
Curtis said that the last time he went to a Tigers-Yankees game in Detroit, he spoke with Jeter, who was “cordial and nice because that’s who he is.” But after Curtis said he did not think Jeter held a grudge, he added that he ended the conversation feeling there was “something there.”
“I think he thinks, ‘This is the guy I had that incident with,’ ” Curtis said. “That’s the part I regret.”
Now a teacher and a weight-lifting coach at North Point Christian School in Grand Rapids, Mich., Curtis said he has reflected on how and why he confronted Jeter. Curtis, a 45th-round draft pick, said his “old school” upbringing considered it taboo to fraternize with opponents.
Yet after watching Jeter and Rodriguez play a respectful, entertaining style for so many years, Curtis pushed aside some of his old-school ways and said, “Maybe the Derek and Alex version of the game is the right way.”
Maybe it is. Still, the friendship that Curtis once questioned is officially a memory after what Rodriguez and Jeter said this week. The relationship they had eight years ago has changed.
INSIDE PITCH
The Yankees’ starters will throw batting practice to the hitters Thursday, with the top prospects Phil Hughes and Humberto Sánchez joining the projected major league rotation. The team will hold an intrasquad game Tuesday before the first exhibition game two days later.TYLER KEPNER
Copyright 2007 The New York Times Company
Jeter Was Once Rebuked for Ties to Rodriguez
By JACK CURRY
TAMPA, Fla., Feb. 21 — Chad Curtis collected 1,061 hits across 10 seasons in the major leagues, he hit a game-winning home run for the Yankees during the 1999 World Series and he was a part of the memorable team that won 125 games in 1998. But to some fans, Curtis is remembered mostly for being the teammate who dared to challenge Derek Jeter in public.
Long before Alex Rodriguez started spring training by saying that he and Jeter are not as friendly as they once were and Jeter responded by refusing to discuss their relationship, Curtis helped ignite the first controversy involving them.
During a brawl between the Yankees and the Seattle Mariners in August 1999, Curtis was irked when he noticed that Jeter was acting nonchalantly off to the side with Rodriguez. Jeter smiled when Rodriguez told him he would get him if there was another skirmish in the game. One Yankee had been punched and another had been plunked, and Curtis felt Jeter should have shunned an opponent like Rodriguez, even though they were close friends at the time.
Curtis confronted Jeter near the dugout and in the clubhouse. With teammates and reporters watching, Curtis scolded him. Curtis told Jeter he was a good player, but that he did not know how to play the game.
“I constantly self-evaluate,” Curtis said Wednesday in a telephone interview. “Was I wrong? Did I do something wrong? Maybe what I said was proper. The way I said it, where I said it and when I said it, wasn’t proper.”
Jeter’s relationship with Rodriguez has been scrutinized anew this week, so the incident with Curtis is a worthwhile footnote.
Jeter is proud of the polished way he plays and is repeatedly lauded, so he was angered by Curtis’s criticism, so much so that he and Curtis barely spoke afterward. One of Jeter’s attributes is his ability to eliminate any and all distractions. The Yankees traded Curtis to the Texas Rangers after the 1999 season.
Although Jeter would not address it, Rodriguez said the chill in their relationship came after his critical comments about Jeter in an interview with Esquire magazine in 2001. Rodriguez said Jeter “never had to lead” and was “never your concern” when playing against the Yankees. After Rodriguez drove 95 miles from Port Charlotte, Fla., to Tampa in the spring of 2002 to apologize, he said, “I thought it was over.”
But by finally being candid Monday, saying that the friendship with Jeter was not as intimate as it once was, Rodriguez liberated himself. Now Rodriguez, who is more concerned than Jeter about how others view him, does not have to act as if he and Jeter still hang out regularly.
The former Yankee Gary Sheffield, now with the Detroit Tigers, said Rodriguez is one superstar who still seeks the approval of others.
“If he doesn’t get that, this is what happens,” Sheffield said Wednesday in Lakeland, Fla. “Because he has to talk about things that he normally wouldn’t talk about.”
Interestingly, when Sheffield spoke to Jeter on Monday, he said Jeter never mentioned Rodriguez’s remarks. Sheffield said the intensity of the news media coverage had fueled the fascination with the relationship between Jeter, the Yankees’ shortstop and captain, and Rodriguez, their third baseman.
“Their situation is what it is,” Sheffield said. “I don’t know what triggered it to get to this point.”
Curtis said Rodriguez, his Rangers teammate for two years, must always determine whether people want to be his friend because he is A-Rod, the $252 million man, or because they truly like him. People in that lofty position, Curtis said, gravitate toward people in the same stratosphere. For Rodriguez, one of those people was Jeter.
“Not to get all Dr. Phil-ish, but we don’t want our friends thinking bad about us,” Curtis said. “It’s not that we’re looking for their approval. We’re looking for their friendship.”
Two days after Curtis challenged Jeter in 1999, he apologized for the manner in which he made his point. Jeter told Curtis that he had done nothing wrong, so there was no reason to apologize.
Curtis said that the last time he went to a Tigers-Yankees game in Detroit, he spoke with Jeter, who was “cordial and nice because that’s who he is.” But after Curtis said he did not think Jeter held a grudge, he added that he ended the conversation feeling there was “something there.”
“I think he thinks, ‘This is the guy I had that incident with,’ ” Curtis said. “That’s the part I regret.”
Now a teacher and a weight-lifting coach at North Point Christian School in Grand Rapids, Mich., Curtis said he has reflected on how and why he confronted Jeter. Curtis, a 45th-round draft pick, said his “old school” upbringing considered it taboo to fraternize with opponents.
Yet after watching Jeter and Rodriguez play a respectful, entertaining style for so many years, Curtis pushed aside some of his old-school ways and said, “Maybe the Derek and Alex version of the game is the right way.”
Maybe it is. Still, the friendship that Curtis once questioned is officially a memory after what Rodriguez and Jeter said this week. The relationship they had eight years ago has changed.
INSIDE PITCH
The Yankees’ starters will throw batting practice to the hitters Thursday, with the top prospects Phil Hughes and Humberto Sánchez joining the projected major league rotation. The team will hold an intrasquad game Tuesday before the first exhibition game two days later.TYLER KEPNER
Copyright 2007 The New York Times Company
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