Yankees SS Derek Jeter on Thursday said that he "felt good about the choice" to retire after the '14 season, according to Anthony McCarron of the N.Y. DAILY NEWS. Jeter, making his first public comments since the announcement, said, "I will address it when we get over there (spring camp), the first day of spring. It's easier that way." A Yankees spokesperson "confirmed that Jeter will hold a press conference next week" (N.Y. DAILY NEWS, 2/14). In N.Y., Richard Sandomir writes the Jeter "farewell tour is coming." The "breadth and tenor of the season-long Adieu to Derek will largely be up to Jeter; his agent, Casey Close; and his family." He will want to "balance his desire to give fans something to remember his final season by and his goal of raising money for his Turn 2 Foundation." Steiner Sports Founder & CEO Brandon Steiner said, "This is really personal to Derek, so we’ll wait and see what, if anything, he wants. I would expect him to be reluctant, but raising money for his foundation is always a premium for him." MLB Exec VP/Business Tim Brosnan: "Derek is conservative in his approach to monetizing anything. We will be respectful and take our marching orders from him." Sandomir notes the Yankees "quietly kicked off the campaign within hours of Jeter’s retirement announcement." An e-mail hailing the coming season as his last offered the slogan "Captain’s Final Voyage." Yankees COO Lonn Trost on Thursday said that the team "had not thought in detail about Jeter’s goodbye." He added, "Right now, I don’t think he’s considering what [Mariano Rivera] did, but we haven’t sat down to get his thoughts" (N.Y. TIMES, 2/14).
IRREPLACEABLE FACE OF THE GAME? Turnkey Intelligence data from August showed that 38% of people polled consider Jeter "the Face of Baseball." ESPN.com's Jayson Stark wrote the data shows that MLB now has "another monstrous challenge on its hands." Stark: "How does any sport replicate what Derek Jeter has meant to baseball over the last decade and a half -- and still does? Is that even possible?" The question that "everyone inside Major League Baseball should be asking themselves today: Is Derek Jeter irreplaceable?" (ESPN.com, 2/13).
