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BY NEIL BEST
neil.best@newsday.com
July 13, 2007, 12:39 PM EDT
Gary Sheffield asserts black and white players are treated differently under Yankees manager Joe Torre, says Derek Jeter "ain't all the way black," and denies he ever has used steroids because "steroids is something you shoot in your butt" in an eye-opening interview with Andrea Kremer for the next edition of HBO's "Real Sports," debuting at 10 p.m. Tuesday night.
In a copy of the interview made available to Newsday late Friday morning, Sheffield begins by saying, "I tell myself every offseason I'm not going to say anything crazy. I'm just going to have a peaceful season . . . Can't do it. I'm cut from a different cloth."
And how.
In the middle of the interview, Kremer reports that Sheffield believes white and black players are coached differently, then asks him to name teams on which they are not coached the same. He immediately answers: "The Yankees."
How so? "I know when I was there the couple of blacks that were there, every one of them had an issue with the organization," he says. Kremer asks him whether by "organization," he means George Steinbrenner, Brian Cashman or Joe Torre.
"They had an issue with Joe Torre," Sheffield says. "They weren't treated like everybody else. I got called out in a couple of meetings that I thought were unfair."
Kremer presses for details and he says, "He had a message to get across to the whole team, so he used me to get the message across."
And he never did that with white players? "No . . . I'd see a lot of white players get called in the office and treated like a man. That's the difference."
Kremer asked Sheffield whether he believes Torre is a racist. "No. I think it's the way they do things around there. Since I was there I just saw that they run their ship different."
Kremer points out that the Yankees' most prominent player is black. "Who?" Sheffield says. Derek Jeter. "Derek Jeter is black and white." Kremer then confirms that Jeter is half black and half white. "Exactly," Sheffield responds.
Kremer asks what the significance of that is. "There's really no significance. You just ain't all the way black," he says.
Asked whether he ever discussed the subject with Jeter, Sheffield says, "Derek Jeter used to come to me and try to tell you what Joe Torre is all about, he's a good man, he's this, he's that, but like I tell Derek Jeter, that's you. It's one thing that they treat you a certain way; you don't feel what other people feel."
Sheffield later asserts that to survive for long as a black player, the player must be "great," which he says has been the key to his longevity.
Sheffield says he has learned from his uncle Dwight Gooden "what not to do," as well as to not let anybody "tell me how to do anything, nothing. I do it the way I got to do it and that's it."
Later, Kremer asks Sheffield about his alleged steroid use, including his grand jury testimony that he used steroid cream on his legs and liquid (or "clear") under his tongue.
He says he started using those products when Barry Bonds, his workout partner at the time, saw his stash of vitamins and yelled, "What are you taking that stuff for? It's stupid."
So he got the other substances from BALCO, not knowing they were in effect steroids. In fact, he still denies every taking steroids, even though he was told the clear was for "muscle recovery, like when you lift weights you can recover."
He said, "In a million years, I don't care what anybody says, steroids is something you shoot in your butt. I do know that . . . The bottom line is steroids is something you stick in your butt –- period."
Sheffield wonders why "if I took what Barry Bonds took, why don't I look like him?" He says he parted ways with Bonds because he felt a trust had been violated. "I trusted this man, he allowed me to stay in his house," Sheffield says. "I started seeing the control factor. I started seeing, wait a minute, you aren't going to tell me what to do."
Sheffield initially says he had not received a letter requesting that he speak with George Mitchell about steroids, but Kremer turns to his manager and learns he has. He says "more than likely" he would agree to talk to Mitchell and would answer him the same way he did Kremer.
"I don't feel like it's all that much of a threat to me," he says. He adds he is unconcerned about the possibility of the controversy around him keeping him out of the Hall of Fame.
"I'm going to say what I got to say, and I'm going to do it how I got to do it and I can live myself," he says. "I sleep very good at night, very good."
Near the start of the interview, Kremer asks Sheffield how one man can have so much chaos in his life. "Bad choice of women," he says.
"That's way weak, man," Kremer says. "All the turmoil in your life is because of women?"
"Yeah," he says.
Kremer then asks him whether he takes any responsibility for it. "I picked 'em," he says.
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