Joe Girardi, a former catcher known for his sharp baseball mind and ability work well with pitchers, is the New York Yankees' choice to replace Joe Torre as the manager of the team. He would take over a storied franchise that went to the postseason in all 12 years under Torre, some of them with Girardi behind the plate.

A native of Washington, Ill., near Peoria, Girardi played baseball at Northwestern University, where he earned a degree in industrial engineering, and then constructed a 15-year major-league playing career. What kept him on big-league rosters was his soundness as a catcher and his baseball mind -- his knack for putting together pitch sequences that defeated hitters. Playing for the Chicago Cubs, Colorado Rockies, St. Louis Cardinals, and Yankees, he finished with a .267 career average, and hit just 36 home runs in more than 4,000 major-league at-bats.

While with the Yankees, from 1996 to 1999, he helped lead the team to three World Series titles, along the way mentoring fellow catcher Jorge Posada, among others. In his years with the Yankees, whenever he wasn't playing, he sat in the dugout beside Joe Torre, the manager, and the coaches Don Zimmer and Mel Stottlemyre. In 2001, Girardi got the most votes in a survey that asked players, managers and front-office personnel to pick the likeliest future manager among active major-league players.

In the fall of 2004, the Yankees hired Girardi, then 40, as the youngest bench coach in the majors. He worked closely with Torre and Mel Stottlemyre, the pitching coach, on virtually every decision. He consulted with Torre on lineups and in-game strategy, and used his knowledge of pitchers with Stottlemyre.

After a season as the Yankees’ bench coach, Girardi became the manager of the Florida Marlins. In his first year, 2006, and despite the team’s tiny payroll, Girardi led the team into contention for part of the season, and won the Manager of the Year award. Along the way, however, he butted heads with the team’s owner, Jeffrey Loria, and was fired after the end of the season. During the 2007 season, Girardi worked as a broadcaster with the YES Network and Fox, and his name was regularly floated around when managing vacancies opened up around the major leagues.