Only Don Mattingly did anything right. Everybody else messed up.

And I'm not even sure exactly what he did. Except that he's made That Man uncomfortable. Goodness knows, anything that makes him uncomfortable is a right thing.

The messing up part is obvious. Bob Watson and Joe Torre did that, and I like them. And that goes for Dan Reeves, too. And I even like him.

How in the world could Torre and Watson swap, in effect, Mike Stanley for Joe Girardi? Who would make a trade like that? This is the first thing they've done for the Yankees - a product of two insightful and experienced baseball men - and they give up the rarest of commodities, a catcher who can hit, for a putsy-downsy hitter who can't run.

And they turned the chemistry all inside out, upside down and backwards.

Mattingly's long-awaited statement said as little of substance as possible. He didn't say he wasn't going to spring training with them and he didn't say he was. He said the bus driver should see if he was on the corner when the bus left the Bronx and, if he wasn't, to go ahead without him. That Man didn't want to take another fan-relations hit with the popular Mattingly after taking a fan-relations hit with the popular Buck Showalter. He wanted Mattingly to walk out to a real Yankee's fanfare.

In the process, That Man has taken a team that essentially won in '94 and reached the playoffs in '95, and plowed it under.

So Mattingly is now a free agent, eligible to listen to, say, the Tigers, who could help him decide to play again by suggesting he could reach the fences at Tiger Stadium. Or, Mattingly could listen with a gimlet ear to anything That Man could offer. I like that.

But the catcher business boggles the - well - try this scenario:

There comes this critical juncture in late June in a tight game and Joe Girardi, described in Torre's terms as a clever man when putting his fingers down, is behind the plate. The still-maturing Andy Pettitte is on the mound. Coming to the plate is a hitter neither Girardi nor Pettitte has ever seen. After all, Giradi heretofore played his career in the National League.

So Girardi turns to the dugout for insight and looks to the pitching coach. Mel Stottlemyre shrugs. What does he know? He has been in the National League. So Stottlemyre turns to Joe Torre, who shrugs because he has been in the National League. So Torre turns to his bench coach, the heady Don Zimmer, and Zimmer shrugs. After all, he knows Girardi from the Cubs and Rockies, but really Zimmer was nowhere most of last season, and in the National League before that.

And what does Bob Watson make of all this shrugging? How should he know? He was trying to hold the Astros in Houston in the National League last season.

This is absurd, you say? What a revolting development this is. How could they do such a trade? How could they put together a braintrust whose brains are from another time and another place?

The catcher is supposed to run the ballgame, or at least take command of the pitching staff. This team is up the creek without a rudder.

It doesn't make sense on Home Shopping Network. It doesn't make sense to give up a hitter with genuine power credentials for a man with little power who may be marginally a better catcher.

How many catchers are there or have there ever been who hit as well as Stanley the last three years? Few. He hit righthanded in Yankee Stadium, averaged 20 home runs over three seasons even though two of them were shortened seasons, and was around .300. The second half of last season Stanley hit .275 with 11 homers and 49 RBI over the 65 games. Double those numbers and that's a terrific season.

Girardi's .262 was good for eight homers and 55 RBI over all of the season, and those were career highs in the thin air.

So where did they gain? They got a catcher who threw out 25 percent of stealers last season instead of a guy who threw out 19 percent. Big deal.

Consider this: The Rockies went to the playoffs with Girardi catching and sold millions and millions of tickets. Now they're willing to leave somebody named Jayhawk Owens as the catcher apparent.

Did the Yankees save so much money for the shopping cart? Girardi is contracted for $2.25 million. Surely Stanley will draw more than that on the market, but Watson never even made him an offer before jumping at Girardi. "I wanted to keep playing in New York, in that stadium, in front of those fans," is what Stanley said.

What do they have to pay to land Fred McGriff to replace the power lost? He made $4.25 million last season. And who would be the righty power?

Both Torre and Watson were catchers. I noted a long time ago that when former catcher Wes Westrum managed the Mets, there was no catcher good enough around. Someone out there had to be better.

Ultimately, this must be That Man's hand in the mix. Of course. We know Stanley played for $565,000 last season. He has been what Mad magazine calls "cheap." And That Man didn't offer to sign him before Watson and Torre got here. What held the Yankees together when they were about to burst into smithereens in August was they did have some chemistry. There were two personalities among them in Stanley and Mattingly. The team revolved around them. Wade Boggs is what he is by his history, but he stays largely out of the line of fire. Paul O'Neill is consumed by being the best hitter.

The soul of the team was its regard for Mattingly. Those guys rallied behind him. There's value to that, even if Mattingly never was as vocal as he should have been. Players deferred in their thinking to him. "There's a certain passion and feeling we have when Donnie is on the field; there's an energized feeling . . . " Showalter said during the September chemistry demonstration. Stanley was across the room, refusing to give up.

So it was and, so it isn't anymore.

Now consider Stanley free-agenting to the Red Sox and hitting in Fenway Park. Heh-heh-heh.

As for Reeves, he has been a no-baloney man. He said it was dumb for him to say what he said, but he didn't say he didn't say it. He is not one to say anything without being aware of the impact. That organization is not going to restructure itself for him and he knows it. What he did was invite himself out of here - not after the end of his contract but right now.

A lame duck for two years doesn't fly. Start shopping now. Steve Jacobson

Copyright 1995, Newsday Inc.