IT IS NOT POLITE TO MOVE A TEAM WITHOUT BEING ASKED

     Yankees Owner George Steinbrenner said if the state of New
Jersey wants the Yankees, Gov. Christine Todd Whitman is going to
have to invite the team to move, according to the Bergen RECORD.
Record Columnist Bill Pennington writes, "This is high school
stuff: Christie wants to ask George to the senior prom but is
afraid he may turn her down, or worse, use her offer as a ploy to
get a better one."  Pennington speculates Steinbrenner and
Whitman will reach a compromise by which Steinbrenner will
declare the Yankees will leave Yankee Stadium when his lease
expires in 2002.  This will open the bidding for the team and NJ
will be able to "unveil its already designed, researched, printed
and bound plans for a Yankee Stadium west of the Hudson River."
Meetings have reportedly already "being called" for NJSEA
officials and Steinbrenner.  Pennington: "A new Yankee Stadium in
New Jersey would be a classically simple case of a product moving
closer to its market" (Bergen RECORD, 8/9).