A constant challenge for those who worked for George Steinbrenner when he ran the Yankees was to try to keep track of who had his ear and happened to have a lot of influence at the moment. Sometimes it might have been a sports writer, other times it might have been a friend. Sometimes it might have been a former executive he once had fired (who later had worked his way back into his favor), and sometimes it might have been a club employee who theoretically was stacked lower in the team's chain of command but actually held more real power than the executives ranked higher.
Billy Connors, a former Yankees coach often referred to in print as the Yankees' pitching guru, intermittently had this kind of influence with Steinbrenner, sometimes going to lunch with The Boss and hanging out with him. Others in the organization were convinced that even if Connors wasn't undermining them directly, he was undercutting their work.
But the Yankees are not the only New York team with a history of guru trouble. For years, the Mets have had the same issue, when someone in the middle of the chain of command gains influence that goes beyond his title and favored-nation status with the owner. This alone doesn't make the guru a bad person, and in some cases, the guru is just answering questions that the person who signs his check has posed to him. This sort of thing almost inevitably becomes problematic within any business; in this case, it's the business of baseball.
The Mets' guru was Steve Phillips before he became the team's general manager. Then it was Bobby Valentine, who was able to spar with Phillips because of his strong relationship with ownership. Years later, Rick Peterson had more influence than any pitching coach in the majors because his work was so highly valued by ownership. Now the guru is Tony Bernazard, whose title suggests that he is responsible for the team's player development but whose influence goes way beyond that of a farm director. People who work within the organization believe that's because he has a particularly close relationship with owner Jeff Wilpon. According to club sources, Bernazard was influential in the decision to fire Peterson and former manager Willie Randolph, and he has been a key figure in many other personnel decisions.
Whether it's true or not, the perception of some within the organization is that Bernazard holds more practical power than Mets general manager Omar Minaya. That is not good, because Minaya hired him. And perception, real or not, is crucial, because it affects how others do their jobs.
In many cases, managers will politely tell second-tier front-office executives to steer clear of the clubhouse, or they'll ask the general managers to make that request or demand. But Randolph, known to be very frustrated with Bernazard's constant presence in the clubhouse, was reluctant to deal with the issue head-on because of the perceived relationship between the guru and the owner. Likewise, for years, others tiptoed around Connors, because they fretted that he would torpedo them by getting Steinbrenner on their case.
Now Bernazard is under investigation because of some bizarre antics, and Minaya has come off looking powerless because he didn't act aggressively and decisively. Minaya will take a hit no matter what happens, because within his organization, the perception that he does not have the chain-of-command muscle is festering. Even if he fires Bernazard or merely admonishes him, people who work for him would assume that the decision to mete out the punishment wasn't Minaya's.
To read Buster's solution to the plague of guru culture as well as the rest of his news, notes and analysis from around the league, you must be an ESPN Insider. 
To continue reading this article you must be an Insider
Buster Olney
