AL CHAMPIONSHIP SERIES: MARINERS v YANKEES

October 17, 2000

Joe Torre

JOE TORRE: I don't know. When you look back on it when it is all said and done, you know, if you win, I can't say that it means more, because it takes so much hard work to get into it that you really want to enjoy the World Series, because it's so tough to get there. I don't think it means, you know, it is any different than the other ones. As I say when you look back on it and you see what the City goes through, you realize it's special.

JOE TORRE: I sent him out there and he had a five-run lead and he said he felt great. And then when he got two strikes on A-Rod, I said, "oh, good," because he was in there a long time. And then once he gave up the home run, yeah, I wanted him to get through the next guy because I was going to have Mo pitch to Olerud. The only way El Duque was going to pitch to Olerud was if he got the first two guys out. But I would like to get through the eighth inning and not use Mo in the eighth. And I was at the last World Series that the Dodgers and Yankees played here in 1956, and it's crazy, but it's much more crazy now, and when you see what the interleague games meant, and I was always a critic of that, because I thought they made more than you should, but to -- now you can make it as important as you want, because this is where you want to get. And I hope it is going to be a good series. I hope it is clean; I hope that people behave themselves, because it's going to split a few families up, I think.

JOE TORRE: There's no question. This is so much different than it was 40 years ago, because the media is so much greater and the game has taken on a much larger meaning, but I have feeling that this City is not going to be the same for this next ten days, and maybe for some time after that.

JOE TORRE: I don't think the rivalries are more intense. You have to remember, the Dodgers and the Giants played 22 times a year, and it was created. I think baseball-wise, the rivalry was great, but what's been created by the media here, not only here, but all across the country, makes it -- I mean, it's more than just a baseball game. The rivalry was enormous of the Giants and Dodgers, and, of course, the Yankees won every year and everyone was trying to knock them off their pedestal. But that was just baseball. I think it was bigger than that.