NEW YORK - The New York Yankees' Don Mattingly says the
  five-year contract that takes him through next season will be his
  last multiyear deal as he begins to wind down his career.
     While Mattingly emphasized his desire to play beyond 1995 and
  remain with the Yankees, he told Gannett Suburban Newspapers, "I'll
  never do another long deal. I'll never do anything more than a
  one-year deal."
     Mattingly, who turns 33 Wednesday, says: "I want to be on edge,
  and I want the freedom to know if (the Yankees) don't want me, I'll
  go where they want me.
     "I'd love to stay (with the Yankees). I don't really want to
  play anywhere else."
     Mattingly is in the fourth year of a five-year, $19.3-million
  contract that made him the game's best-paid player when he signed
  it in 1990.
     Mattingly does not have a timetable for retirement, except to
  stress that he will not leave anytime soon. "I'm not looking to
  retire," he says. "The game keeps me going."
     Mattingly, widely regarded as the game's best player in the
  mid-1980s before chronic back problems took their toll, batted .291
  last season with 17 home runs and 86 RBI.
     A slow starter even in his glory days, Mattingly is batting
  .209 through 11 games. Still, he's confident he will regain his
  stature. "I'm not willing to say I'm back," he says. "I'm saying I
  feel good. I feel this is going to be a good year for our club and
  for me."


Copyright 1994, USA TODAY, a division of Gannett Co., Inc.