NEW YORK — Some guys like to sneak up on their target.

Joe Girardi put his on the back of a uniform:

No. 27.

And no sooner had Girardi delivered a 27th World Series title for the most storied franchise in American pro sports than he began plotting for the next one. No surprise there. The man always has a plan.

"We'll see," he said, "if anyone is going to charge me for No. 28."

It's yours, Joe. No one on the Yankees wore the number in the World Series, and by the time the next one rolls around, no one else would dare. Come to think of it, just about everything else in town will be yours for the asking, too.

It doesn't hurt, of course, that Girardi was a hero in New York long before he parked his backside in the manager's chair two years ago. That was because of the three World Series rings he won wearing pinstripes and the time he spent learning the trade as a bench coach under Joe Torre.

But this one was different. Girardi couldn't hand off the credit fast enough.

"As a player, it's what you dream about ever since you were a little boy. As a manager you still have that joy, but the joy is for other people ... and the behind-the-scenes work that it takes. It starts with the Boss and his family and Brian Cashman," Girardi said, crediting the Steinbrenners and his general manager first, then naming just about everyone on the organizational chart.

Girardi is smart that way, but genuine, too. As much as he's a stickler about getting things exactly right, the one thing he never forgets is that baseball is still a game played by people.

"Joe pushed all the right buttons," Yankee captain Derek Jeter said. "He was great to play for. Right from day one, we thought we had a special group and he was leading us."

It's no coincidence that catchers like Girardi, who wind up orchestrating the game on the field, make the best managers. Or that Philadelphia's Charlie Manuel was the only one of the four managers whose teams reached the league championship series who didn't play the position. Like Girardi, the Dodgers' Torre and the Angels' Mike Scioscia are former backstops as well.

None, however, was shaped by the experience more than Girardi.

He was ripped for micromanaging his bullpen throughout the postseason and called too smart for his own good. Critics said Girardi ran the game like an engineer and cited his bachelor's degree in industrial engineering from Northwestern as though it made a slam-dunk case. Much, too, was made about the binder of statistics stuffed with scouting reports and statistical matchups that sat on the bench never more than an arm's reach away.