The Big Eye League

Yogi Berra grinned at the news.

"Gee," said the manager of the New York Yankees, "nobody asked me to buy the club. Mickey and I would have bought it." But others were not so amused last week upon hearing that the Yankees had been sold to the Columbia Broadcasting System. "I think it's lousy," said Chicago White Sox Owner Arthur Allyn, who objected to the hurry-up way the league had polled its owners for permission. "This is a hell of a way to run the American League," roared Kansas City Owner Charles Finley, who objects to everything. But the league's eight other owners said O.K., and in the space of a few hours, one of the most sensational sales in sports history was consummated.

The mighty Yankees, winners of 28 pennants and 20 World Series, were now in showbiz. The terms called for CBS to pay Yankee Owners Dan Topping and Del Webb $11.2 million cash for 80% of the franchise. Topping and Webb would retain 10% each until 1969, after which CBS had the option of buying them out. Until then, Topping would remain as president and operating boss, running the club as an "independent" subsidiary of CBS.

Obvious Advantages. If the deal came as a surprise, it was obviously a good one for both sides. Topping and Webb had already taken tremendous profits since purchasing the club with Larry MacPhail in 1945 for $2,800,000. Two years later, they bought out MacPhail for $2,000,000, got that back and more when they sold Yankee Stadium and the land under it for $6,500,000 in 1953. All the rest was gravy. Then why sell? Easy. The gravy was getting thinner. Last year's attendance (1,308,920) was the lowest since World War II, may be heading lower this year. So is the team, which at sale time was bumping along 31 games behind and in third place, their worst position in mid-August since 1960. Moreover, the Yanks have always been crowd pleasers because of their legendary heroes. But Mickey Mantle is now 32; he aches in every muscle, and after him, who? Finally, there are those bad neighbors, the Mets. Better to sell than be outdrawn by the Mets.

From the CBS channel of view, there were just as many reasons to buy. The $11.2 million price is small change for a network that cleared $41 million last year. CBS is already massively committed to sports ventures--it has agreed to pay $31.8 million to the National Football League in the next two years. Owning a club in the world's biggest market also puts CBS in a stronger position to deal with the pay-TV problem, since the network will be able to control whether the Yankees are seen for free or for pay. In fact, CBS Chairman William S. Paley and President Frank Stanton had been secretly negotiating with the Yanks for more than a year. Last week, they put up the kind of money that, as Topping said, "you just can't walk away from."

Jackie for Mickey? No sooner was the news out than the monopoly and antitrust implications of a network-owned team raised a rumble in Washington. How much power might Club Owner CBS wield in pending business between the TV industry and baseball? Would ownership give CBS an unfair advantage in future bidding for World Series rights? (NBC has them now.) "The effect," said one Government lawyer, "is that CBS is taking over a very rich broadcasting property to the exclusion of everybody else."

At CBS they wondered what all the fuss was about, pointed out that three other clubs (the Detroit Tigers, Los Angeles Angels, Houston Colts) are owned by people with big TV interests. The World Series bidding would be open as before; it would also be foolish to forfeit afternoon and prime evening time for the day-by-day Yankee telecasts, which WPIX Channel 11 has until 1966 anyway. It was just a simple, profit-making business deal. "We're in show business, and this is show business," a CBS executive kept insisting. "I can't see the difference between Mickey Mantle and Jackie Gleason. They're both entertainers."

That novel idea had already dawned brightly in the Yankee locker room. As the actors were packing for a three-game weekend series with the league-leading Orioles in Baltimore, someone's stentorian voice rang out: "Better shake a leg, you guys, or they'll trade you for a bunch of stagehands!" Catcher Elston Howard had an even more interesting thought. "Do you think," he asked, "that Walter Cronkite will replace Yogi?"

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