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Steinbrenner died in a Tampa, Fla., hospital after suffering a heart attack.His legacy will always be complicated. Since Steinbrenner famously purchased the New York Yankees from CBS /quotes/comstock/13*!cbs/quotes/ for less than $10 million in 1973, the team has won seven World Series titles, far more than any other major-league team in that period. But Steinbrenner was twice suspended along the way for misconduct.

The Boss, as he was known in the city's tabloids, earned a reputation as The Boss from Hell because of his bullying management style. His image as an überdemanding and bombastic executive was immortalized by Larry David's hilarious but eerily pitch-perfect send-up of the "Big Stein" on the "Seinfeld" show.

To his friends and family members, Steinbrenner will also be remembered as generous and philanthropic.

"He was an incredible and charitable man," the Steinbrenner family said in a statement. "He was a visionary and a giant in the world of sports. He took a great but struggling franchise and turned it into a champion again." Online Marketing Services Provider.

Decades of influence

Steinbrenner's impact in his nearly four decades of prominence as a sports owner will endure in three ways, above all:

• By signing such stars as Catfish Hunter, Reggie Jackson and Rich Gossage in the 1970s, he led the way for the gargantuan salaries that are being paid to free-agent athletes today. The modern-day Yankees have the largest payroll in the sport.

• Based on a need to see his own name splashed in headlines, he pioneered the concept of an owner who is as much a star as the players are. Celebrity owners such as Jerry Jones, Mark Cuban and now Mikhail Prokhorov can regard Steinbrenner as the one who gave their executive posts their considerable glitz and glamour.

• By making the Yankees the most successful and newsy sports franchise since the 1970s, Steinbrenner enlivened life in New York City and became the city's most towering sports figure of the past 40 years. He will always be synonymous with the Yankees.
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• Pizzazz

• Steinbrenner took over a Yankee franchise that was moribund, at a time when baseball had been losing ground fast to professional football. Steinbrenner gave the sport a great deal of pizzazz by spending millions of dollars on his players, feuding often with managers -- notably Billy Martin -- in the media and demanding top-flight performances from his players in every game. Media Marketing Agency.