Steinbrenner's Noose: It's Your Neck

In a column in today’s newspaper, former Yankee Scott Nielsen speaks of working for George Steinbrenner, who died last week.
Deseretnews.com

An amazing experience, he said.
Stressful, but amazing.
So I asked if he were to do it over, would he rather have played elsewhere (he also played briefly for the Chicago White Sox).
“Sometimes I think my baseball career might have been prolonged if I had not played for the Yankees,” Nielsen said.
Which makes sense. Steinbrenner’s Yankees weren’t a patient organization.
“But,” Nielsen continued, “having played for the Yankees and worn the pinstripes, and played in the House that Ruth Built –there were so many great players, you can almost feel the ghosts in the stadium – it’s a once in a lifetime experience and one I would NEVER want to give up.”
Nielsen said he was “a nobody when it come to folklore,” yet he still gets 20-30 autograph requests a month (he retired in 1991).
“I’m thinking, holy smokes, people say they love their Yankees, so being a Yankee is pretty special – something I’m glad I experienced, and if I had to do it over again, I certainly would.”
Nielsen recounts a story that could apocryphal, but said it illustrates what it was like to work for Steinbrenner. The Boss called manager Lou Piniella into his office and said he was frustrated with some of Piniella’s on-field decisions.
Piniella said he always did the best he could.
Steinbrenner replied that before making a change, Piniella should look to the owner’s box. If Steinbrenner gave him a thumbs up, Piniella was to make the change; if it was thumbs down, he should stand pat.
During the next game, Piniella looked up into the box and saw Steinbrenner’s thumb held level with his hand — an in-between gesture. Piniella grabbed the dugout phone and called upstairs.
“I understand thumbs up and thumbs down,” he said. “But what’s that where your thumb is in the middle?”
Said Steinbrenner: “That means you make the call – but you better be right.”