Derek Jeter Launches Website for Pro Athletes



10/01/2014 AT 05:00 PM EDT



Just three days after New York Yankees shortstop Derek Jeter took a bow on 20 years in major league baseball, he's back – as a media mogul out to reshape the press box.

"I do think fans deserve more than 'no comments' or 'I don't knows,' " Jeter wrote Wednesday on the homepage of his new website, The Players' Tribune, which he describes as a place for pro athletes to "connect directly with our fans with no filter."


The former Yankees captain, who described his emotional final game at Yankee Stadium on Thursday as "an out-of-body experience," said that, through all the tributes that came in the eight months since he announced his retirement, "I realize I've been guarded. I learned early on in New York, the toughest media environment in sports, that just because a reporter asks you a question, doesn't mean you have to answer."


Jeter, who's seen his share of career highs and lows, says he hopes his website will give players safe haven from "genuine concern that any statement, any opinion or detail, might be distorted. … We just need to be sure our thoughts will come across the way we intend."


Beyond the new website, Jeter is also heading an imprint, Jeter Publishing, with Gallery Books at Simon & Schuster, and his debut children's book, The Contract , is out this week.


"He has a lot of interests, and he is interested in developing content," Gallery president Louise Burke tells PEOPLE. "He's a curator of all things cool, is how I see it. So many people want to work with him."


A book aimed at young fans and athletes was a natural for Jeter, Burke adds, because he already runs the Turn 2 Foundation, which aims to engage kids in healthy activities and help them avoid drugs and alcohol.






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