Alex Rodriguez hit .250/.356/.486 this year with 33 home runs, which surprised the shit out of me. That's pretty damn good for a guy who is 40 years old. Of course, as soon as he starts hitting poorly next year the New York media will jump all over him again for the mistake of continuously getting older. Regardless of how good of a year A-Rod had at the plate, and regardless of how little controversy he stirred up, he still did many things wrong. He participated in an unfunny skit, he didn't increase YES ratings, he made his teammates like him, and most egregiously, he showed up early to Spring Training. Simply because the season is over doesn't mean that A-Rod still isn't doing things wrong. Of course. Now he was hired as an analyst for Fox during the playoffs and is ruining everything for "the kids," while poisoning their mind with the idea if they use steroids to enhance their performance then they may one day also be able to be a sports analyst. Christine Brennan has had enough of this and does a public service by finally speaking out about this travesty. In fact, Brennan says they (Fox) "swing and miss" (GET IT?????????) by hiring A-Rod as an analyst.
Of the thousands of baseball players and experts Fox Sports could have
selected to appear on its postseason shows, it picked the worst.
You mean the guy who has been banned from baseball permanently, Pete Rose?
It chose the most notorious, earnest and purposeful cheater to ever play
the game. It chose the man whose name is synonymous with
performance-enhancing drugs.
Barry Bonds? Roger Clemens? Mike Piazza's bacne?
It chose A-Rod.
Oh no, not A-Rod. His mere presence on the Yankees roster has caused steroid use among youth to be nearly tripled since April. Millions of kids are dying, with their last breath screaming, "I just wanted to be like A-Rod!" What about "the kids," doesn't Fox care about the kids at all?
Alex Rodriguez,
who admitted to using steroids from 2001-03 and then was suspended for
the entire 2014 season for his big role in the Biogenesis scandal, isn’t
just any old baseball steroids guy. He is the guy.
He's the guy unless you want to consider Mark McGwire "the guy," Barry Bonds "the guy" or Roger Clemens "the guy." It all depends on the type of article being written really. In this case, A-Rod is "the guy" but this could change if the column is about which current Hall of Fame eligible players should receive the honor of induction. When it comes to a Hall of Fame discussion, McGwire, Bonds and Clemens are the face of steroids. In fact, I would argue given all the government resources and the hysteria surrounding the breaking of Roger Maris' home run record that these three players will always be the face of the Steroid Era. I don't see A-Rod in that role.
Congratulations, Fox.
You're ruined the world's ability to prevent drug use among teens and driven thousands of young children away from the heroin they are using and into the arms of steroids by hiring A-Rod. Congrats.
What a terrible message this sends to children
WHAT ABOUT THE FUCKING KIDS? DO "THE KIDS" KNOW ABOUT A-ROD BEING ON FOX? WHAT KIND OF MESSAGE DOES IT SEND WHICH SAYS A BASEBALL PLAYER WHO CHEATED IS STILL CAPABLE OF DISCUSSING BASEBALL IN A NETWORK TELEVISION ENVIRONMENT?
if kids actually watched playoff baseball games anymore.
Oh, so it's not hurting the kids at all because they don't watch baseball? So disaster averted and we can all move on to other things. Though, if "the kids" did still watch baseball then A-Rod being on Fox would be a total disaster. Let's assume kids don't watch baseball, acknowledge nobody watches FS1 (yet...ever?), and still work under the assumption that A-Rod is singlehandedly poisoning today's youth. Sound like fun? Great, Christine Brennan will now continue.
Experts say the use of performance-enhancing drugs by kids in high school sports has reached epidemic proportions.
Experts also say kids in high school are increasingly getting addicted to heroin and other drugs such as that. I'm not going to downplay the impact of steroids, but the use of heroin among high school kids has also reached epidemic proportions. I really don't believe A-Rod being an analyst for Fox is going to drive more kids towards using steroids any more than his playing baseball for 162 games a year would drive them in that direction already.
Seeing superstars suspended or hauled before Congress can act an a deterrent to these kids.
This is the biggest crock of shit I have read in this column so far. Hauling these superstars before Congress can serve as a deterrent to these kids? I have quite a few issues with this statement.
1. How does Christine Brennan know this is true? Is there research she can cite that says seeing superstars hauled before Congress is a deterrent to drug use among kids? Is there anything she can use to show this as a true statement, outside of any anecdotal evidence or the idea this is what she WANTS to believe is true? I see nothing in this column confirming this statement isn't a lie.
2. If superstars being hauled before Congress or being suspended really served as a deterrent, then how come experts say the use of PED's by kids is reaching epidemic proportions? Using logic, which I know isn't something Christine is doing right now, wouldn't the stricter MLB drug policy after the Steroid Era where big name players (like A-Rod) have been suspended have served as a deterrent to using PED's?
3. Christine Brennan can't cite how A-Rod has been suspended twice, in an effort to expose his true villain tendencies, then explain that's why he shouldn't be working for Fox, and then claim seeing baseball players get suspended serves as a deterrent to kids. It doesn't work this way. So if seeing players get suspended did serve as a deterrent, then it wouldn't make a difference at all if A-Rod works for Fox during the postseason.
4. If seeing superstars hauled before Congress was a deterrent, then there should be a decrease in high school kids using PED's. These kids grew up seeing Palmeiro, McGwire, Sosa, and Clemens hauled in front of Congress and in court fighting accusations of PED use. Seeing this would cause a decrease in PED use among high school kids, if this statement by Brennan wasn't a crock of shit.
Seeing them propped up on pre-game shows as faux stars does not.
But A-Rod has been suspended! That's the deterrent for "the kids," right?
Perhaps next year, Fox can put together a panel featuring A-Rod, Barry Bonds, Mark McGwire, Roger Clemens and Rafael Palmeiro.
Bonds has worked with Giants hitters during Spring Training and McGwire has been a hitting coach in the majors. I get how Christine Brennan is upset, but it's well-known in baseball that A-Rod is a student of the game and knows something about hitting. He's a cheat and has a huge ego, but he's also really good at hitting a baseball and analyzing the game.
Fox Sports’ baseball audience is minuscule compared with the NFL’s, but
that doesn’t make the network’s decision any less egregious. In fact,
that’s probably why Fox did it, to try to boost ratings.
Let's see...no one watches Fox, players like A-Rod who get suspended serve as a deterrent to kids and kids don't watch baseball anyway. So how are A-Rod and Fox ruining kids by having him show up on their postseason coverage again?
It’s not a coincidence that one of Rodriguez’s fellow studio analysts is Pete Rose.
It's not a coincidence. Fox wants ratings and they want guys on their postseason shows that have played in the postseason and played the game at a high level. They also want eyes on their show and Rose/A-Rod also serve that purpose. ESPN hired Tim Tebow, but is he more qualified to talk about college football because he's a good person, as compared to the qualifications of Rose/A-Rod to talk about baseball even though they haven't always been good people? I wouldn't think so.
Our senses are so dulled by the misbehavior of athletes these days that
most of us probably don’t give it a second thought when a bad guy like
Rodriguez shows up talking about the playoffs. Do we have any standards
anymore?
I bet Christine Brennan's editor asked this same question when reading this article.
Or maybe we still do. Could you imagine an Olympics telecast featuring Ben Johnson? Lance Armstrong hosting coverage of the Tour de France?
It feels different with A-Rod being on MLB's postseason coverage. Perhaps because he is still an active player and has served his suspension. I can't explain the difference honestly.
Tonya Harding on Olympic figure skating? Thankfully, I think we’re safe from all three, at least for a few more years.
If she knew enough about Olympic figure skating these days, then I would have no issue with Tonya Harding commenting on Olympic figure skating. The issue is there are more knowledgeable commentators available to discuss Olympic figure skating. A-Rod is a really knowledgeable source about baseball and knows today's players because he is still an active player himself.
For all baseball’s talk and action on the subject of PEDs, it has never
taken them as seriously as the Olympic world has, and it still does not.
But MLB takes PED's much more seriously than every other major sport. Sorry, but the NFL and the NBA have a PED problem (mostly the NFL) even if they don't know it yet. Human beings don't look like NFL players look and I don't believe some guys in the NBA get as strong as they are without some additional help. I'm not pointing a finger at any certain players, but MLB has a strong PED policy. It's not strong enough for some people, of course. It never will be.
That’s why the sport allows someone who has flaunted the rules as badly as A-Rod has to still be one of the faces of the game.
A-Rod is not one of the faces of MLB. He is not. He's never really even been the face of the Yankees either. A-Rod doing postseason work for Fox doesn't make him a face of baseball. Max Scherzer does postseason work for Fox too and I'm not sure he can be considered one of the faces of baseball (perhaps wrongly). Even on his own team, Bryce Harper, Jonathan Papelbon and Stephen Strasburg move the needle more than Scherzer tends to, even if Scherzer appears on Fox's postseason coverage.
This tells us that the game, and Fox Sports, will do anything to get attention.
"The game" had nothing to do with Fox hiring A-Rod. That was a decision by Fox. Trust me, if MLB really had an issue with Pete Rose and A-Rod being hired by Fox then neither of these individuals would be working on Fox's postseason coverage.
Anything.
What about "the kids?" What will the kids who don't watch baseball on Fox and who are already deterred from using PED's by A-Rod's suspension for PED use think about A-Rod being seen on Fox's postseason coverage? Will it drive them right back into the arms of PED's, seeing that they could also one day get a job as a studio analyst if they just use enough PED's to get there? What will happen if an entire generation of studio analysts use PED's in order to further their career and make an even playing field that much more uneven?
Showing posts with label blame A-Rod. Show all posts
Showing posts with label blame A-Rod. Show all posts
Thursday, November 12, 2015
Monday, August 3, 2015
0 comments What A-Rod Has Wrong Today: He Participates in Unfunny Skits for ESPN
Lately A-Rod has made some serious missteps that the New York sports media has had a chance to jump all over. A-Rod hasn't helped the Yankees' ratings and then he failed to make the All-Star team. Those were two egregious errors that A-Rod made. Now Mike Lupica has made the vital discovery that A-Rod has in fact made another error in judgment. He participated in an unfunny skit at the ESPY's this year where he pretended to apologize for a variety of things. At this point, the New York media can't rip on A-Rod for his performance on the field, so they are having to reach in order to criticize him. Lupica says A-Rod "strikes out looking" (get it?) in taking part in the unfunny skit and takes joy in finally getting the chance to write about what an asshole A-Rod is. It's a glorious day for Mike Lupica. He's probably sitting on the edge of his seat talking over someone right now, gleefully happy that he finally can pile on A-Rod again.
Alex Rodriguez has made hardly any mistakes since he returned to the Yankees after serving a full-season suspension for Tony Bosch and for being up to his eyeballs in baseball’s case against Bosch’s Biogenesis clinic.
Ah, but now he has made a mistake that isn't really a mistake and Mike Lupica is all over it. He's on the edge of his seat, trying to seem as tall as possible and talking over anyone who dares to try to be in the same room as him.
Mostly Rodriguez has hit, and reminded everybody that if you can still produce in sports, fans will find so much forgiveness in their hearts they’re afraid sometimes those hearts might burst like frozen pipes.
Yes, fans are so good at finding forgiveness when a player hits well. Being that Mike Lupica is unable to focus on anything that doesn't involve him, I wonder if he knows that A-Rod has gotten more favorable coverage from sportswriters as the 2015 season progresses. Why? Because A-Rod is producing. But yeah, fans are the fickle ones.
He has said all the right things and attended charity events, and gotten himself straight, at least for the time being,
But the fuck up is coming. Mike Lupica knows it. If it doesn't come, then Mike Lupica will blow a small thing out of proportion to make it seem like A-Rod has not gotten himself straight.
and barring any future problems with baseball drugs, with the commissioner and with Yankee ownership. He has, by all accounts, been a bedrock of good behavior in the Yankee clubhouse, especially with young players.
I don't know how many times Mike Lupica can write "A-Rod has been on his best behavior...so far" in this column without it seeming more and more repetitive. Yeah, he hasn't screwed up. Get to your point.
the way he is covered these days, you can probably forgive him for wondering how Caitlyn Jenner beat him out for the Arthur Ashe Courage Award at the ESPY Awards — why he thought it was a good idea to stand in the spotlight at the ESPYs on Wednesday night and participate in a painfully lame and hideously unfunny apology skit with Joel McHale and Ken Jeong from “The Hangover” movies.
A-Rod screwed up because he participated in an unfunny skit at an awards show. This is where we are at now in trying to find things that A-Rod has done wrong. He was a part of a skit that wasn't funny, which apparently is the only reason needed for Mike Lupica to bring up the fact A-Rod used PED's again and criticize A-Rod for lacking funny. A-Rod didn't write the skit and he's not a comedian. He simply took part in the unfunny skit.
Because even Rodriguez has to know that what he was accused of doing with Bosch and convicted of doing by arbitrator Fredric Horowitz isn’t funny, with or without penis gags. And isn’t ever going to be funny.
PED's are a life and death situation to Mike Lupica. This shit is very serious. If a player uses PED's to gain an advantage, then he should not make jokes about it. Sure, he could casually mention he used amphetamines in an interview 30 years after he retired as if he was taking Flintstones vitamins and not amphetamines, but that's not big deal because those baseball players from the 60's and 70's are heroes and everyone was doing. So that makes it fine. Don't joke about PED's. It's a super-serious subject.
Just so you know: The set-up at the ESPYs was that Jeong would act as Rodriguez’s surrogate as he finally “apologized” to the whole wide world.
So Rodriguez stood there like a prop and kept handing pieces of paper to Jeong, while McHale stood on the other side of Jeong looking as flop-sweat desperate to get laughs as he had been since his opening monologue.
It wasn't funny. There's no doubt about that. Again, A-Rod didn't write the skit and this participation in the skit is just a way for Lupica to remind everyone that A-Rod is a cheater and find something to be angry with him over.
Nobody expects big yuks from award shows, at least when Tina Fey and Amy Poehler aren’t hosting them these days.
Mike Lupica: "A-Rod took place in an awards show skit that wasn't funny. How dare he do this while making the crowd uncomfortable with the lack of hilarity."
Mike Lupica: "Award show skits aren't ever funny, so nobody expected the ESPY's to be funny anyway."
But somebody thought this material was funny, and Alex Rodriguez clearly signed off on it, so on they went. And on.
Yes, I'm sure A-Rod spent a few days vetting the script and then re-writing portions of it to better capture his personality. After that, his agent signed off on it, but only after a few of A-Rod's demands were met.
There was some weird, nervous laughter from the crowd occasionally. There was even a shot of Derek Jeter laughing, though it was hard to tell whether he was doing that to be polite, or just reveling in Rodriguez making himself a part of the show like this on a night when Jeter received a Sports Icon Award.
The Jeter has to make an appearance as the anti-thesis of what A-Rod has become. The Jeter is the Batman to A-Rod's Joker, the Superman to A-Rod's Lex Luthor. The Jeter was not impressed with A-Rod's skit, merely only laughing at how Rodriguez was making an ass of himself. One would think the on-the-field performance comparison between The Jeter and A-Rod at the age of 40 might be made, but there's no need for that. Rest assured, if The Jeter had a line of .304/.363/.438 last year this would be something Lupica brings up. He didn't, so there's no need to compare the two hitters at the age of 40.
By the way: Here is a part of what Jeter said upon receiving that award:
This is especially relevant point in a column about A-Rod participating in an unfunny skit.
“I’ve had a special relationship with the fans and my teammates over the last 20 years, but in retirement I’ve come to realize that being a part of the larger community of sports is a gift — and more importantly it’s an honor. You’ve inspired me for years, and you continue to inspire me.”
(Bengoodfella wakes up because this was a boring and very cliched, yet kind, statement from The Jeter)
So Jeter took one route to the stage on this night and the guy who used to play to his right at Yankee Stadium took another.
It always comes back to a comparison between The Jeter and A-Rod...that is unless the comparison isn't flattering to The Jeter, in which case no comparison should be made. It's lazy writing, but nothing more should be expected from Lupica.
Maybe you could have given Rodriguez some props for being able to laugh at himself on this occasion, except there were no laughs here, about “Game of Thrones” or droughts or Greece or the Knicks or any of it.
Yeah well, as you just wrote, nobody expects big yucks from awards shows. So I'm not sure why you would expect this skit to be funny based on your own opinion of award show skits.
At the very end of it, after Jeong stopped reading, McHale asked Rodriguez if there was anything he wanted to say and Rodriguez said, “I’m good.” Before that, of course, we got this supposedly edgy material from Alex Rodriguez’s faux apology at the ESPYs:
It's not funny. Who cares? Why is this unfunny skit worthy of a column being written about it?
Yeah. These are the jokes. By the time it all ended, you felt as if you’d had to sit through one of those old four-hour Yankees-Red Sox games out of the past.
Brilliant writing by Lupica here. This is as opposed to one of those old four-hour Yankees-Red Sox games from the future or the present? Yeah, if those games are old then they must be out of the past. Mike Lupica is one of those old writers from the past who thinks his written word is the gospel and shall not be questioned. These are the things that happen when you've had an entire career of smoke being blown up your butt and choose to ignore any criticism others may have of you.
Maybe Rodriguez thinks he can be the kind of performer that we’ve found out Peyton Manning can be.
Yes, I'm sure at the age of 40 A-Rod has decided he's going to try and become the type of performer that Peyton Manning can be. More likely, A-Rod just took part in the skit without a long-term plan or a single thought of spring boarding a career off the skit.
Maybe he’s already thinking about a post-playing career in broadcasting, when his Yankee contract finally runs out sometime in the next century. But if he is considering a future career in show business, he might want to take a closer look at the material next time.
We all know Derek Jeter wouldn't take part in an unfunny skit for the ESPY's. He would never do that.
He has hit better than perhaps even he himself thought he ever would again. He’s said and done all the right things. Then came the ESPY Awards.
Yes, one unfunny skit at an awards show has ruined all of Alex Rodriguez's accomplishments over the 2015 season. This is a true and logical statement.
His arbitration hearing was funnier. This is the first dumb thing he’s done since Bosch.
Imagine how Mike Lupica would respond if A-Rod actually did anything worse than show bad taste in jokes made on an awards show. The fact that Mike Lupica actually took A-Rod's participation in this skit, managed to bring Derek Jeter into the discussion, and tried to make all of this into something more than bad comedy shows a dedication to the A-Rod hating craft that he may someday try to perfect...while sitting on the edge of his seat, trying to be as tall as possible and talking over others, of course.
Alex Rodriguez has made hardly any mistakes since he returned to the Yankees after serving a full-season suspension for Tony Bosch and for being up to his eyeballs in baseball’s case against Bosch’s Biogenesis clinic.
Ah, but now he has made a mistake that isn't really a mistake and Mike Lupica is all over it. He's on the edge of his seat, trying to seem as tall as possible and talking over anyone who dares to try to be in the same room as him.
Mostly Rodriguez has hit, and reminded everybody that if you can still produce in sports, fans will find so much forgiveness in their hearts they’re afraid sometimes those hearts might burst like frozen pipes.
Yes, fans are so good at finding forgiveness when a player hits well. Being that Mike Lupica is unable to focus on anything that doesn't involve him, I wonder if he knows that A-Rod has gotten more favorable coverage from sportswriters as the 2015 season progresses. Why? Because A-Rod is producing. But yeah, fans are the fickle ones.
He has said all the right things and attended charity events, and gotten himself straight, at least for the time being,
But the fuck up is coming. Mike Lupica knows it. If it doesn't come, then Mike Lupica will blow a small thing out of proportion to make it seem like A-Rod has not gotten himself straight.
and barring any future problems with baseball drugs, with the commissioner and with Yankee ownership. He has, by all accounts, been a bedrock of good behavior in the Yankee clubhouse, especially with young players.
I don't know how many times Mike Lupica can write "A-Rod has been on his best behavior...so far" in this column without it seeming more and more repetitive. Yeah, he hasn't screwed up. Get to your point.
the way he is covered these days, you can probably forgive him for wondering how Caitlyn Jenner beat him out for the Arthur Ashe Courage Award at the ESPY Awards — why he thought it was a good idea to stand in the spotlight at the ESPYs on Wednesday night and participate in a painfully lame and hideously unfunny apology skit with Joel McHale and Ken Jeong from “The Hangover” movies.
A-Rod screwed up because he participated in an unfunny skit at an awards show. This is where we are at now in trying to find things that A-Rod has done wrong. He was a part of a skit that wasn't funny, which apparently is the only reason needed for Mike Lupica to bring up the fact A-Rod used PED's again and criticize A-Rod for lacking funny. A-Rod didn't write the skit and he's not a comedian. He simply took part in the unfunny skit.
Because even Rodriguez has to know that what he was accused of doing with Bosch and convicted of doing by arbitrator Fredric Horowitz isn’t funny, with or without penis gags. And isn’t ever going to be funny.
PED's are a life and death situation to Mike Lupica. This shit is very serious. If a player uses PED's to gain an advantage, then he should not make jokes about it. Sure, he could casually mention he used amphetamines in an interview 30 years after he retired as if he was taking Flintstones vitamins and not amphetamines, but that's not big deal because those baseball players from the 60's and 70's are heroes and everyone was doing. So that makes it fine. Don't joke about PED's. It's a super-serious subject.
Just so you know: The set-up at the ESPYs was that Jeong would act as Rodriguez’s surrogate as he finally “apologized” to the whole wide world.
So Rodriguez stood there like a prop and kept handing pieces of paper to Jeong, while McHale stood on the other side of Jeong looking as flop-sweat desperate to get laughs as he had been since his opening monologue.
It wasn't funny. There's no doubt about that. Again, A-Rod didn't write the skit and this participation in the skit is just a way for Lupica to remind everyone that A-Rod is a cheater and find something to be angry with him over.
Nobody expects big yuks from award shows, at least when Tina Fey and Amy Poehler aren’t hosting them these days.
Mike Lupica: "A-Rod took place in an awards show skit that wasn't funny. How dare he do this while making the crowd uncomfortable with the lack of hilarity."
Mike Lupica: "Award show skits aren't ever funny, so nobody expected the ESPY's to be funny anyway."
But somebody thought this material was funny, and Alex Rodriguez clearly signed off on it, so on they went. And on.
Yes, I'm sure A-Rod spent a few days vetting the script and then re-writing portions of it to better capture his personality. After that, his agent signed off on it, but only after a few of A-Rod's demands were met.
There was some weird, nervous laughter from the crowd occasionally. There was even a shot of Derek Jeter laughing, though it was hard to tell whether he was doing that to be polite, or just reveling in Rodriguez making himself a part of the show like this on a night when Jeter received a Sports Icon Award.
The Jeter has to make an appearance as the anti-thesis of what A-Rod has become. The Jeter is the Batman to A-Rod's Joker, the Superman to A-Rod's Lex Luthor. The Jeter was not impressed with A-Rod's skit, merely only laughing at how Rodriguez was making an ass of himself. One would think the on-the-field performance comparison between The Jeter and A-Rod at the age of 40 might be made, but there's no need for that. Rest assured, if The Jeter had a line of .304/.363/.438 last year this would be something Lupica brings up. He didn't, so there's no need to compare the two hitters at the age of 40.
By the way: Here is a part of what Jeter said upon receiving that award:
This is especially relevant point in a column about A-Rod participating in an unfunny skit.
“I’ve had a special relationship with the fans and my teammates over the last 20 years, but in retirement I’ve come to realize that being a part of the larger community of sports is a gift — and more importantly it’s an honor. You’ve inspired me for years, and you continue to inspire me.”
(Bengoodfella wakes up because this was a boring and very cliched, yet kind, statement from The Jeter)
So Jeter took one route to the stage on this night and the guy who used to play to his right at Yankee Stadium took another.
It always comes back to a comparison between The Jeter and A-Rod...that is unless the comparison isn't flattering to The Jeter, in which case no comparison should be made. It's lazy writing, but nothing more should be expected from Lupica.
Maybe you could have given Rodriguez some props for being able to laugh at himself on this occasion, except there were no laughs here, about “Game of Thrones” or droughts or Greece or the Knicks or any of it.
Yeah well, as you just wrote, nobody expects big yucks from awards shows. So I'm not sure why you would expect this skit to be funny based on your own opinion of award show skits.
At the very end of it, after Jeong stopped reading, McHale asked Rodriguez if there was anything he wanted to say and Rodriguez said, “I’m good.” Before that, of course, we got this supposedly edgy material from Alex Rodriguez’s faux apology at the ESPYs:
It's not funny. Who cares? Why is this unfunny skit worthy of a column being written about it?
Yeah. These are the jokes. By the time it all ended, you felt as if you’d had to sit through one of those old four-hour Yankees-Red Sox games out of the past.
Brilliant writing by Lupica here. This is as opposed to one of those old four-hour Yankees-Red Sox games from the future or the present? Yeah, if those games are old then they must be out of the past. Mike Lupica is one of those old writers from the past who thinks his written word is the gospel and shall not be questioned. These are the things that happen when you've had an entire career of smoke being blown up your butt and choose to ignore any criticism others may have of you.
Maybe Rodriguez thinks he can be the kind of performer that we’ve found out Peyton Manning can be.
Yes, I'm sure at the age of 40 A-Rod has decided he's going to try and become the type of performer that Peyton Manning can be. More likely, A-Rod just took part in the skit without a long-term plan or a single thought of spring boarding a career off the skit.
Maybe he’s already thinking about a post-playing career in broadcasting, when his Yankee contract finally runs out sometime in the next century. But if he is considering a future career in show business, he might want to take a closer look at the material next time.
We all know Derek Jeter wouldn't take part in an unfunny skit for the ESPY's. He would never do that.
He has hit better than perhaps even he himself thought he ever would again. He’s said and done all the right things. Then came the ESPY Awards.
Yes, one unfunny skit at an awards show has ruined all of Alex Rodriguez's accomplishments over the 2015 season. This is a true and logical statement.
His arbitration hearing was funnier. This is the first dumb thing he’s done since Bosch.
Imagine how Mike Lupica would respond if A-Rod actually did anything worse than show bad taste in jokes made on an awards show. The fact that Mike Lupica actually took A-Rod's participation in this skit, managed to bring Derek Jeter into the discussion, and tried to make all of this into something more than bad comedy shows a dedication to the A-Rod hating craft that he may someday try to perfect...while sitting on the edge of his seat, trying to be as tall as possible and talking over others, of course.
Thursday, July 30, 2015
0 comments What A-Rod Has Done Wrong Today: He Isn't Increasing Ratings and He Didn't Make the All-Star Team
It's time for the New York media to relay what A-Rod has done wrong lately. The New York media previously gnashed their teeth that A-Rod wanted the full bonus the Yankees had promised him in his contract, and he wanted the full amount even if the Yankees gave the bonus to charity rather than A-Rod. Also, A-Rod wouldn't create controversy on demand, which frustrated Bill Madden. Now A-Rod isn't doing anything to increase the ratings at YES (because A-Rod is singlehandedly responsible for these ratings) and he didn't get voted on to the All-Star team. What a bunch of serious missteps by A-Rod.
I'll start off first with Bob Raissman, who says that A-Rod has played well on the field, but he still isn't helping the Yankees with television ratings. Because A-Rod's job is to make sure ratings increase, not perform well on the field, and it is A-Rod's job and only A-Rod's job to increase Yankees' television ratings.
Is there a Yankeeography on the Yankees Entertainment & Sports Network in Alex Rodriguez’s future?
Judging by pinstriped suits’ (Hal, Hankenstein, etc.) positive reaction to A-Rod’s “Summer of Love Tour,” we would have to say (Only On) YES. Rodriguez has done all the right things upon his return from a year-long sentence for his role in the Biogenesis caper.
The New York media is still a little bitter they can not bash A-Rod for underachieving this year, so resorting to being cutesy and sarcastic about A-Rod coming back from his year-long suspension and contributing to the team is the attitude of choice.
Since he embarked on this comeback, during which he’s posted the kind of numbers even know-it-all Analytics Aliens could not have predicted,
The media continuously has no idea what Sabermetrics are or how these statistics are supposed to be used. Using Sabermetrics isn't like being a psychic where they are trying to predict the future as if they know it all. It's the use of statistics to make predictions based on past information and A-Rod's age. It's less know-it-all and more let's-use-data-to-try-and-predict-but-this-isn't-guaranteed-to-be-right. Sabermetricians don't claim to be psychics.
much of the media has gifted him the kind of supernatural powers performance-enhancing drugs cannot produce.
Yes, the media is making A-Rod into a better player than he truly is. Why is the media always on A-Rod's side? Sure, it's really impressive he's putting up such numbers at the age of 40 (while apparently clean) after taking an entire year off from baseball, after suffering injuries prior to his year off from baseball, but stop talking about him like he's good at the sport. The media is always overrating A-Rod's abilities.
This is a much higher power — like the ability to jack up television ratings, which influence the rates networks can charge advertisers to buy time.
Sure A-Rod's doing a good job of hitting the baseball, but the real test of his baseball skill is his ability to increase television ratings. This is A-Rod's job and only A-Rod's job. If YES ratings are low, it's because A-Rod can't draw a viewing crowd. These ratings are a direct reflection on A-Rod and it's not at all possible ratings would be even lower if A-Rod wasn't drawing more viewers to YES Yankees broadcasts.
Part of the debate over whether Rodriguez deserves to be a member of the American League All-Star team Tuesday night in Cincinnati includes a perception he can draw eyeballs to the Foxies’ party.
But this perception is wrong because the Yankees don't have great ratings. This is just like the perception Paul Goldschmidt could help a contending team who trades for him is wrong because the Diamondbacks aren't very good. The D-Backs suck and that means so does Goldschmidt.
Kay admits Rodriguez does not belong on the AL All-Stars. “Just tell me who he replaces?” Kay asked. But on his ESPN-98.7 gabfest, Kay added: “I think it would be great for Fox (if A-Rod was on the team). I think it (the game) will get higher ratings with Alex there.”
Kay, and the many others who share his opinion, never quantify it. If they did, they couldn’t back up their words.
It concerns me that Bob Raissman gets paid to write about television broadcasts and ratings when he uses the logic he is about to use in order to justify his point. The big issue here is that there is no telling what the ratings would be this year if A-Rod wasn't playing, so it's almost impossible to say the effect he has on ratings. The Yankees are also not expected to be competing for the World Series, which also affects the ratings.
Through July 7, Yankees TV ratings on YES were averaging a 2.55 rating, down a hefty 15% from the same point in the 2014 season, according to The Nielsen Co. And average total viewership on YES’ Yankees cablecasts is 237,000, down 17% from the same point in 2014.
This is concerning for me. Bob Raissman uses ratings from the 2014 season, which could easily be skewed based on it being Derek Jeter's last season as a Yankee. Ratings could have been higher for 2014 than 2013, which would mean the ratings for the Yankees this season are normal. It's concerning to me that Raissman uses a potentially outlier year to prove his point without using any other data from previous seasons to compare 2014 to. Maybe he could learn something from the Analytics Aliens.
So, if A-Rod can’t put the Yankees ahead in the ratings department on YES, where the majority of peepers have forgot about his PED past and mostly have forgiven him (as long as he continues being productive) for past “sins,” there is no shot — absolutely none — that extraneous eyeballs from sea to shining sea are going to go out of their way to tune into Fox’s All-Star telecast to see A-Rod.
Who says A-Rod isn't helping YES ratings? Aren't there are other reasonable explanations for the decline in YES ratings? It's possible A-Rod is helping ratings, but the other factors that go into how many Yankees fans watch the games are hurting the ratings more.
Why waste time watching a guy they still despise?
This is the only obvious conclusion. Fans who will watch the All-Star game hate A-Rod because the ratings for Yankees games are down from the 2014 season.
Understand?
Yes, I understand you are making assumptions and using rating data from one year, a year that very well could be an outlier, in order to make the point you want to make. I understand you are assuming A-Rod is personally responsible for the ratings decline on YES and you are willfully ignoring all other factors that could affect ratings. I understand you get paid to do this job and I understand that makes me sad and embarrassed for you.
Rodriguez would have zero impact on All-Star TV ratings. And even if A-Rod were on the team, viewers would see him only during the opening introductions and likely in a pinch-hitting role.
How Bob Raissman knows that Rodriguez would have zero impact on All-Star TV ratings is beyond me. He seems to really lack the ability to think three dimensionally about this topic.
Maybe, MAYBE, ESPN would enjoy a ratings boost from A-Rod if he were added to the Home Run Derby. In that freak show, an oddity of A-Rod’s proportion could be a ratings difference maker.
Maybe, MAYBE, Bob Raissman has very little evidence anything he is writing is fact-based.
That said, it’s surprising that A-Rod is not driving ratings higher on Yankees telecasts. Think about it: The numbers were better at this point last season WITHOUT him.
True, but the ratings could have been higher last season due to one of the greatest Yankees ever playing his last season. I'm sure the 2014 ratings had less to do with The Jeter retiring and more to do with Yankees fans watching games again now that they were rid of A-Rod.
Rodriguez brings controversy, legitimate star power and a possible comeback of the year storyline to a team with little marquee value to sell, unless you believe Chase Headley, Brett Gardner, Mark Teixeira or Didi Gregorius are all major attractions.
Bob Raissman a few paragraphs ago: "The Yankees had better ratings WITHOUT A-Rod. How come the ratings for Yankees games on YES are so low and A-Rod can't pull them up? What else could explain the decreased ratings?"
Bob Raissman now: "The Yankees have no star power and the team is a tough sell. Here is a list of players who don't provide marquee value."
Think perhaps the lack of other players on the roster with marquee value affects the ratings of Yankees games? Perhaps the ratings would be even worse without A-Rod on the team, which means he would have an impact on the All-Star games' ratings.
Maybe this can be attributed to boring baseball (played by both teams in this city) and a lack of offense. Has this caused viewers to tune out?
Absolutely not. Do not entertain this wild idea. I'm sure A-Rod has more to do with the decreased ratings from 2014 than the fact it was The Jeter's last season, as well as the perception the 2015 Yankees lack marquee value and don't seem like they would be competitive. It's A-Rod, not the boring (supposedly) team that causes viewers to tune out.
Anyway, even though he has proven not to be a ratings magnet, A-Rod sure ain’t boring.
This has provided plenty of material for use inside the Valley of the Stupid and other media precincts. The Gasbags wonder why. Or they ask who really is keeping A-Rod out? Is it players who can’t stand him?
Yes, it is the players who can't stand A-Rod. His not being selected is not a result of other players being more deserving, but instead is the result of the players not liking A-Rod and getting their revenge by choosing to put more deserving players on the team.
“I’m not going to make it (A-Rod not being an All-Star) like it’s the crime of the century because it isn’t,” Mike Greenberg said on ESPN Radio.
Just enough of a “crime” to float across many media platforms where opinions can be delivered between commercial messages. Consider it a gift delivered by A-Rod.
Yes, it is definitely A-Rod's fault that many media platforms are discussing his not being in the All-Star game. A-Rod specifically tells ESPN what to talk about and when to talk about it. The network will immediately do as they are told.
Just don’t ask him to deliver any ratings. He doesn’t have that kind of juice.
Maybe he doesn't, maybe he does. The ratings on YES aren't simply a by-product of A-Rod's presence on the Yankee roster. Bob Raissman admits the Yankees lack marquee stars, yet he isn't capable of connecting the dots and seeing that could be part of the reason in the ratings dip. He also doesn't compare the 2015 ratings to any other year for further perspective, outside of 2014 when The Jeter was making his farewell tour. It's Raissman's job to talk about ratings and the media, yet he fails at this job.
Now John Harper thinks the fact A-Rod didn't make the All-Star team shows that the people really hate A-Rod. Because, you know, it's so embarrassing to hate A-Rod that people who don't like him have to do it in private and through passive-aggressiveness acts rather than just admit how they feel about him. No one has the guts to hate A-Rod publicly, so the fact he didn't make the All-Star team proves what John Harper chooses to believe. Weird how that works. Harper has a belief and tries hard to fit reality into that belief.
Nope, for all of the stature A-Rod has regained in baseball this season with his bat and his contrite demeanor, his peers wouldn't let him slip past the velvet rope to mingle with the best of the best, as he once did every summer.
It's the result of a vendetta against A-Rod, not a snub based on A-Rod's merit compared to the merit of other AL hitters.
Does that have anything to do with the many bridges A-Rod torched when he was at war with every facet of Major League Baseball — including the Players Association — in 2013 while trying in vain to avoid a PED suspension?
It’s a fair question, though one to which there is no obvious answer.
This is a fair question. It is also a question that makes more assumptions than is required when the easy and more obvious answer is that A-Rod's exclusion on the AL All-Star roster was based on his merit versus the merit of other AL hitters. But why would John Harper go with the easy answer when he can come up with an answer more elaborate that helps him to write a column about how this All-Star exclusion means everyone hates A-Rod?
A-Rod had the numbers to warrant a DH spot on the AL All-Star team, but after the fans voted Nelson Cruz as the starter, the Yankee star was not named among the reserves that are chosen by player vote and manager Ned Yost’s preference.
Perhaps, and I know this doesn't fit the story that John Harper wants to push, the players just thought there were more deserving candidates to represent the AL in the All-Star game and A-Rod's exclusion wasn't because they don't personally like him. I know, that would be a logical conclusion, but what's the fun in logic when Harper can shoehorn his beliefs into this (lack of a) story?
Prince Fielder earned the back-up DH nod, and it’s tough to argue with his selection, considering that he’s hitting .347 with 13 home runs, 50 RBI and a .943 OPS.
John Harper a few paragraphs ago: "Was A-Rod left off the All-Star roster because the MLB players hate him for suing the union? It's possible!"
John Harper now: "Here is a player who took A-Rod's roster spot that was more deserving than A-Rod."
I think we have our answer on why A-Rod didn't make the All-Star team.
Had Yost somehow finagled Kendrys Morales, his Royals DH, onto the team, then you could have made the case that A-Rod got snubbed.
But you are the one making the case A-Rod was left off for reasons other than merit. You are the one suggesting it was a conspiracy among the players that ended with A-Rod not being on the All-Star roster. Now you are refuting your own theory, but only refuting it after trying to make the case that everyone hates A-Rod. It's important to put that line of thought out in the universe before refuting it.
But Fielder certainly was deserving.
So, there we go. It wasn't about whether A-Rod was hated or not by his fellow players, but about Prince Fielder being more deserving than A-Rod.
In truth, Brett Gardner is the Yankee who had a right to feel he got jobbed.
Gardner is clearly having an All-Star season, and in many ways he has become the heart and soul of these Yankees, his hustle and aggressiveness setting a tone at the top of the lineup for a team that has exceeded expectations so far.
So does this exclusion mean that John Harper thinks the AL players hate Gardner like he believes A-Rod's exclusion was the result of the players passive-aggressively telling A-Rod how they feel? Of course not! That's silly. The "he got snubbed because everyone hates him" logic is only used for A-Rod.
As for A-Rod, Yost made the case on the ESPN All-Star selection show that much discussion went into his candidacy, but ultimately the need for position players outweighed whatever desire there was to include him.
“We wanted to try to find a way to get Alex Rodriguez on there,” Yost said. “We couldn’t.”
How hard they tried is anybody’s guess.
PROBABLY NOT HARD AT ALL!
In fact, I bet AL pitchers threw Prince Fielder fastballs straight down the plate in order to ensure he made the All-Star team over A-Rod. How could this not be true? It's a fair assessment with no obvious answer.
A-Rod would have added some sizzle to an event that remains mostly a spectacle, no matter how determined MLB is to cling to this silly idea that the game should decide home-field advantage in the World Series.
It’s not likely that a pitcher would have thrown A-Rod the “pipe-shot” that Adam Wainwright served up for Derek Jeter last year.
It's not likely. In fact, I wouldn't have been surprised if A-Rod had made the team, and the second he stepped in the batter's box, the NL catcher would have pulled out a switchblade and knifed him to death. It could happen. Would the NL catcher murder A-Rod in the All-Star game? It's a fair question with no obvious answer.
Nor would you think someone might pull a Ryan Dempster and drill him on such a big stage as some sort of statement on behalf of the union members who were included in the suit Rodriguez temporarily brought against the Players Association — at least until he seemed to come to his senses.
It could happen since the only assumption that is being worked under right now is that everyone hates A-Rod. Sure, there's no evidence this is true, but who needs evidence when John Harper has a fancy computer and inclination to believe this conclusion?
On the surface, at least, all seems to have been forgiven this year as A-Rod has made his return from his 2014 suspension. He has long since won over Yankee fans with his rather stunning offensive production, to the point that he was practically given the Jeter treatment, curtain call and all, when he hit a home run for his 3,000th hit.
He almost got "the Jeter treatment," which apparently is what a curtain call will now be referred to as being.
And while he was never the outcast in the Yankee clubhouse he was sometimes portrayed as,
Gee, I wonder who sometimes portrayed A-Rod as the outcast in the clubhouse? I'm sure it wasn't John Harper and his fellow media members.
all indications are that he is admired now more than ever by teammates for his work ethic, his superstar status and his singular talk of winning as a team.
But fuck indications, let's make some shit up. Sure, A-Rod isn't an outcast like the media portrays him as being, and sure, he probably didn't make the All-Star team based on merit and not based on some long-held grudge, but where's the fun in coming to this conclusion?
Everybody loves A-Rod? Well, not enough to give him a Jeter-like All-Star sendoff, even with a deserving resume. Perhaps forgiveness only goes so far.
Wait, "a Jeter-like All-Star sendoff"? Is Alex Rodriguez retiring after this season? I think all indications are that A-Rod will be back next year, so why would his presence in the All-Star game this season have been a "sendoff"? It's likely that John Harper is doing what every boring, predictable New York sportswriter does, which is compare A-Rod to Derek Jeter, and therefore lazily assumes this is A-Rod's last season or chance to the make the All-Star team. Everything always comes back to Derek Jeter for sportswriters. Always.
I'll start off first with Bob Raissman, who says that A-Rod has played well on the field, but he still isn't helping the Yankees with television ratings. Because A-Rod's job is to make sure ratings increase, not perform well on the field, and it is A-Rod's job and only A-Rod's job to increase Yankees' television ratings.
Is there a Yankeeography on the Yankees Entertainment & Sports Network in Alex Rodriguez’s future?
Judging by pinstriped suits’ (Hal, Hankenstein, etc.) positive reaction to A-Rod’s “Summer of Love Tour,” we would have to say (Only On) YES. Rodriguez has done all the right things upon his return from a year-long sentence for his role in the Biogenesis caper.
The New York media is still a little bitter they can not bash A-Rod for underachieving this year, so resorting to being cutesy and sarcastic about A-Rod coming back from his year-long suspension and contributing to the team is the attitude of choice.
Since he embarked on this comeback, during which he’s posted the kind of numbers even know-it-all Analytics Aliens could not have predicted,
The media continuously has no idea what Sabermetrics are or how these statistics are supposed to be used. Using Sabermetrics isn't like being a psychic where they are trying to predict the future as if they know it all. It's the use of statistics to make predictions based on past information and A-Rod's age. It's less know-it-all and more let's-use-data-to-try-and-predict-but-this-isn't-guaranteed-to-be-right. Sabermetricians don't claim to be psychics.
much of the media has gifted him the kind of supernatural powers performance-enhancing drugs cannot produce.
Yes, the media is making A-Rod into a better player than he truly is. Why is the media always on A-Rod's side? Sure, it's really impressive he's putting up such numbers at the age of 40 (while apparently clean) after taking an entire year off from baseball, after suffering injuries prior to his year off from baseball, but stop talking about him like he's good at the sport. The media is always overrating A-Rod's abilities.
This is a much higher power — like the ability to jack up television ratings, which influence the rates networks can charge advertisers to buy time.
Sure A-Rod's doing a good job of hitting the baseball, but the real test of his baseball skill is his ability to increase television ratings. This is A-Rod's job and only A-Rod's job. If YES ratings are low, it's because A-Rod can't draw a viewing crowd. These ratings are a direct reflection on A-Rod and it's not at all possible ratings would be even lower if A-Rod wasn't drawing more viewers to YES Yankees broadcasts.
Part of the debate over whether Rodriguez deserves to be a member of the American League All-Star team Tuesday night in Cincinnati includes a perception he can draw eyeballs to the Foxies’ party.
But this perception is wrong because the Yankees don't have great ratings. This is just like the perception Paul Goldschmidt could help a contending team who trades for him is wrong because the Diamondbacks aren't very good. The D-Backs suck and that means so does Goldschmidt.
Kay admits Rodriguez does not belong on the AL All-Stars. “Just tell me who he replaces?” Kay asked. But on his ESPN-98.7 gabfest, Kay added: “I think it would be great for Fox (if A-Rod was on the team). I think it (the game) will get higher ratings with Alex there.”
Kay, and the many others who share his opinion, never quantify it. If they did, they couldn’t back up their words.
It concerns me that Bob Raissman gets paid to write about television broadcasts and ratings when he uses the logic he is about to use in order to justify his point. The big issue here is that there is no telling what the ratings would be this year if A-Rod wasn't playing, so it's almost impossible to say the effect he has on ratings. The Yankees are also not expected to be competing for the World Series, which also affects the ratings.
Through July 7, Yankees TV ratings on YES were averaging a 2.55 rating, down a hefty 15% from the same point in the 2014 season, according to The Nielsen Co. And average total viewership on YES’ Yankees cablecasts is 237,000, down 17% from the same point in 2014.
This is concerning for me. Bob Raissman uses ratings from the 2014 season, which could easily be skewed based on it being Derek Jeter's last season as a Yankee. Ratings could have been higher for 2014 than 2013, which would mean the ratings for the Yankees this season are normal. It's concerning to me that Raissman uses a potentially outlier year to prove his point without using any other data from previous seasons to compare 2014 to. Maybe he could learn something from the Analytics Aliens.
So, if A-Rod can’t put the Yankees ahead in the ratings department on YES, where the majority of peepers have forgot about his PED past and mostly have forgiven him (as long as he continues being productive) for past “sins,” there is no shot — absolutely none — that extraneous eyeballs from sea to shining sea are going to go out of their way to tune into Fox’s All-Star telecast to see A-Rod.
Who says A-Rod isn't helping YES ratings? Aren't there are other reasonable explanations for the decline in YES ratings? It's possible A-Rod is helping ratings, but the other factors that go into how many Yankees fans watch the games are hurting the ratings more.
Why waste time watching a guy they still despise?
This is the only obvious conclusion. Fans who will watch the All-Star game hate A-Rod because the ratings for Yankees games are down from the 2014 season.
Understand?
Yes, I understand you are making assumptions and using rating data from one year, a year that very well could be an outlier, in order to make the point you want to make. I understand you are assuming A-Rod is personally responsible for the ratings decline on YES and you are willfully ignoring all other factors that could affect ratings. I understand you get paid to do this job and I understand that makes me sad and embarrassed for you.
Rodriguez would have zero impact on All-Star TV ratings. And even if A-Rod were on the team, viewers would see him only during the opening introductions and likely in a pinch-hitting role.
How Bob Raissman knows that Rodriguez would have zero impact on All-Star TV ratings is beyond me. He seems to really lack the ability to think three dimensionally about this topic.
Maybe, MAYBE, ESPN would enjoy a ratings boost from A-Rod if he were added to the Home Run Derby. In that freak show, an oddity of A-Rod’s proportion could be a ratings difference maker.
Maybe, MAYBE, Bob Raissman has very little evidence anything he is writing is fact-based.
That said, it’s surprising that A-Rod is not driving ratings higher on Yankees telecasts. Think about it: The numbers were better at this point last season WITHOUT him.
True, but the ratings could have been higher last season due to one of the greatest Yankees ever playing his last season. I'm sure the 2014 ratings had less to do with The Jeter retiring and more to do with Yankees fans watching games again now that they were rid of A-Rod.
Rodriguez brings controversy, legitimate star power and a possible comeback of the year storyline to a team with little marquee value to sell, unless you believe Chase Headley, Brett Gardner, Mark Teixeira or Didi Gregorius are all major attractions.
Bob Raissman a few paragraphs ago: "The Yankees had better ratings WITHOUT A-Rod. How come the ratings for Yankees games on YES are so low and A-Rod can't pull them up? What else could explain the decreased ratings?"
Bob Raissman now: "The Yankees have no star power and the team is a tough sell. Here is a list of players who don't provide marquee value."
Think perhaps the lack of other players on the roster with marquee value affects the ratings of Yankees games? Perhaps the ratings would be even worse without A-Rod on the team, which means he would have an impact on the All-Star games' ratings.
Maybe this can be attributed to boring baseball (played by both teams in this city) and a lack of offense. Has this caused viewers to tune out?
Absolutely not. Do not entertain this wild idea. I'm sure A-Rod has more to do with the decreased ratings from 2014 than the fact it was The Jeter's last season, as well as the perception the 2015 Yankees lack marquee value and don't seem like they would be competitive. It's A-Rod, not the boring (supposedly) team that causes viewers to tune out.
Anyway, even though he has proven not to be a ratings magnet, A-Rod sure ain’t boring.
This has provided plenty of material for use inside the Valley of the Stupid and other media precincts. The Gasbags wonder why. Or they ask who really is keeping A-Rod out? Is it players who can’t stand him?
Yes, it is the players who can't stand A-Rod. His not being selected is not a result of other players being more deserving, but instead is the result of the players not liking A-Rod and getting their revenge by choosing to put more deserving players on the team.
“I’m not going to make it (A-Rod not being an All-Star) like it’s the crime of the century because it isn’t,” Mike Greenberg said on ESPN Radio.
Just enough of a “crime” to float across many media platforms where opinions can be delivered between commercial messages. Consider it a gift delivered by A-Rod.
Yes, it is definitely A-Rod's fault that many media platforms are discussing his not being in the All-Star game. A-Rod specifically tells ESPN what to talk about and when to talk about it. The network will immediately do as they are told.
Just don’t ask him to deliver any ratings. He doesn’t have that kind of juice.
Maybe he doesn't, maybe he does. The ratings on YES aren't simply a by-product of A-Rod's presence on the Yankee roster. Bob Raissman admits the Yankees lack marquee stars, yet he isn't capable of connecting the dots and seeing that could be part of the reason in the ratings dip. He also doesn't compare the 2015 ratings to any other year for further perspective, outside of 2014 when The Jeter was making his farewell tour. It's Raissman's job to talk about ratings and the media, yet he fails at this job.
Now John Harper thinks the fact A-Rod didn't make the All-Star team shows that the people really hate A-Rod. Because, you know, it's so embarrassing to hate A-Rod that people who don't like him have to do it in private and through passive-aggressiveness acts rather than just admit how they feel about him. No one has the guts to hate A-Rod publicly, so the fact he didn't make the All-Star team proves what John Harper chooses to believe. Weird how that works. Harper has a belief and tries hard to fit reality into that belief.
Nope, for all of the stature A-Rod has regained in baseball this season with his bat and his contrite demeanor, his peers wouldn't let him slip past the velvet rope to mingle with the best of the best, as he once did every summer.
It's the result of a vendetta against A-Rod, not a snub based on A-Rod's merit compared to the merit of other AL hitters.
Does that have anything to do with the many bridges A-Rod torched when he was at war with every facet of Major League Baseball — including the Players Association — in 2013 while trying in vain to avoid a PED suspension?
It’s a fair question, though one to which there is no obvious answer.
This is a fair question. It is also a question that makes more assumptions than is required when the easy and more obvious answer is that A-Rod's exclusion on the AL All-Star roster was based on his merit versus the merit of other AL hitters. But why would John Harper go with the easy answer when he can come up with an answer more elaborate that helps him to write a column about how this All-Star exclusion means everyone hates A-Rod?
A-Rod had the numbers to warrant a DH spot on the AL All-Star team, but after the fans voted Nelson Cruz as the starter, the Yankee star was not named among the reserves that are chosen by player vote and manager Ned Yost’s preference.
Perhaps, and I know this doesn't fit the story that John Harper wants to push, the players just thought there were more deserving candidates to represent the AL in the All-Star game and A-Rod's exclusion wasn't because they don't personally like him. I know, that would be a logical conclusion, but what's the fun in logic when Harper can shoehorn his beliefs into this (lack of a) story?
Prince Fielder earned the back-up DH nod, and it’s tough to argue with his selection, considering that he’s hitting .347 with 13 home runs, 50 RBI and a .943 OPS.
John Harper a few paragraphs ago: "Was A-Rod left off the All-Star roster because the MLB players hate him for suing the union? It's possible!"
John Harper now: "Here is a player who took A-Rod's roster spot that was more deserving than A-Rod."
I think we have our answer on why A-Rod didn't make the All-Star team.
Had Yost somehow finagled Kendrys Morales, his Royals DH, onto the team, then you could have made the case that A-Rod got snubbed.
But you are the one making the case A-Rod was left off for reasons other than merit. You are the one suggesting it was a conspiracy among the players that ended with A-Rod not being on the All-Star roster. Now you are refuting your own theory, but only refuting it after trying to make the case that everyone hates A-Rod. It's important to put that line of thought out in the universe before refuting it.
But Fielder certainly was deserving.
So, there we go. It wasn't about whether A-Rod was hated or not by his fellow players, but about Prince Fielder being more deserving than A-Rod.
In truth, Brett Gardner is the Yankee who had a right to feel he got jobbed.
Gardner is clearly having an All-Star season, and in many ways he has become the heart and soul of these Yankees, his hustle and aggressiveness setting a tone at the top of the lineup for a team that has exceeded expectations so far.
So does this exclusion mean that John Harper thinks the AL players hate Gardner like he believes A-Rod's exclusion was the result of the players passive-aggressively telling A-Rod how they feel? Of course not! That's silly. The "he got snubbed because everyone hates him" logic is only used for A-Rod.
As for A-Rod, Yost made the case on the ESPN All-Star selection show that much discussion went into his candidacy, but ultimately the need for position players outweighed whatever desire there was to include him.
“We wanted to try to find a way to get Alex Rodriguez on there,” Yost said. “We couldn’t.”
How hard they tried is anybody’s guess.
PROBABLY NOT HARD AT ALL!
In fact, I bet AL pitchers threw Prince Fielder fastballs straight down the plate in order to ensure he made the All-Star team over A-Rod. How could this not be true? It's a fair assessment with no obvious answer.
A-Rod would have added some sizzle to an event that remains mostly a spectacle, no matter how determined MLB is to cling to this silly idea that the game should decide home-field advantage in the World Series.
It’s not likely that a pitcher would have thrown A-Rod the “pipe-shot” that Adam Wainwright served up for Derek Jeter last year.
It's not likely. In fact, I wouldn't have been surprised if A-Rod had made the team, and the second he stepped in the batter's box, the NL catcher would have pulled out a switchblade and knifed him to death. It could happen. Would the NL catcher murder A-Rod in the All-Star game? It's a fair question with no obvious answer.
Nor would you think someone might pull a Ryan Dempster and drill him on such a big stage as some sort of statement on behalf of the union members who were included in the suit Rodriguez temporarily brought against the Players Association — at least until he seemed to come to his senses.
It could happen since the only assumption that is being worked under right now is that everyone hates A-Rod. Sure, there's no evidence this is true, but who needs evidence when John Harper has a fancy computer and inclination to believe this conclusion?
On the surface, at least, all seems to have been forgiven this year as A-Rod has made his return from his 2014 suspension. He has long since won over Yankee fans with his rather stunning offensive production, to the point that he was practically given the Jeter treatment, curtain call and all, when he hit a home run for his 3,000th hit.
He almost got "the Jeter treatment," which apparently is what a curtain call will now be referred to as being.
And while he was never the outcast in the Yankee clubhouse he was sometimes portrayed as,
Gee, I wonder who sometimes portrayed A-Rod as the outcast in the clubhouse? I'm sure it wasn't John Harper and his fellow media members.
all indications are that he is admired now more than ever by teammates for his work ethic, his superstar status and his singular talk of winning as a team.
But fuck indications, let's make some shit up. Sure, A-Rod isn't an outcast like the media portrays him as being, and sure, he probably didn't make the All-Star team based on merit and not based on some long-held grudge, but where's the fun in coming to this conclusion?
Everybody loves A-Rod? Well, not enough to give him a Jeter-like All-Star sendoff, even with a deserving resume. Perhaps forgiveness only goes so far.
Wait, "a Jeter-like All-Star sendoff"? Is Alex Rodriguez retiring after this season? I think all indications are that A-Rod will be back next year, so why would his presence in the All-Star game this season have been a "sendoff"? It's likely that John Harper is doing what every boring, predictable New York sportswriter does, which is compare A-Rod to Derek Jeter, and therefore lazily assumes this is A-Rod's last season or chance to the make the All-Star team. Everything always comes back to Derek Jeter for sportswriters. Always.
Wednesday, June 24, 2015
5 comments What A-Rod Has Done Wrong Today: He Hates Charities and Won't Create Controversy on Demand
It's been a long, tough summer for New York writers who were waiting to jump on the many mistakes A-Rod would make over the 2015 season. He really hasn't made many at all. He's hitting the baseball well and adapting to his job as the Yankees' designated hitter. He's caused no problems that I know of, and if he wasn't hated due to his cheating, the fact he's playing so well at an advanced age for a professional athlete would be celebrated. But that's not how it is. No one likes A-Rod, especially when there is no reason not to like A-Rod. When A-Rod doesn't give New York sportswriters a reason to dislike him, that's more annoying than anything else. So Bill Madden does what he can to drum up some controversy by pointing out that A-Rod will not drum up any controversy to respond to the Yankees' offer of donating $6 million to the charity of A-Rod's choice.
Why won't A-Rod say anything or respond publicly to the offer? Doesn't A-Rod realize it's more exciting for him to publicly reject this offer rather than privately reject the offer? Doesn't A-Rod realize the Yankees promising him $6 million if he met a milestone is the exact same thing as the Yankees giving $6 million to the charity of A-Rod's choice? If I promise you $10,000 to run a package from Philadelphia to Japan, but don't like the fact it took longer than I wanted it to, so I say I will give the $10,000 to your favorite charity instead, wouldn't that just please you? You are getting $10,000 to give to your favorite charity. That's better than having the money for yourself.
Can A-Rod not be satisfied? He was promised $6 million and the Yankees don't want to pay it to him. Why can't he just accept the Yankees giving this money to a charity? Does A-Rod hate charities that much? If A-Rod doesn't hate charities and hates the Yankees for not giving him $6 million, why can't he say it publicly so Bill Madden can write a story about A-Rod's quotes on this topic?
I like the "new" A-Rod. He's hitting the ball and he's not really saying much. He's letting this whole grievance of $6 million play out behind the scenes and not commenting. Of course, the New York media finds this unacceptable, so they have to find something wrong with A-Rod's approach to take the high ground.
In his ever-percolating home run milestone grievance with the Yankees — which was expected to come to a head Saturday but was pushed back until Monday — Alex Rodriguez’s silence is deafening.
"THE FACT A-ROD WON'T CAUSE A DISTRACTION HAS IN ITSELF NOW BECOME A DISTRACTION! WHEN WILL THIS MONSTER BE SATIATED WITH THE DAMAGE HE HAS CAUSED?"
A face-saving olive branch from the Yankees has been out there for a while, but A-Rod, on the advice of his attorneys and handlers, is having none of it.
I always throw this disclaimer in here it seems, but I'm not an A-Rod apologist. I really try not to be. The way the New York media frames anything that concerns A-Rod forces me to call them on their bullshit. Let's be clear here...the Yankees signed a contract saying they would give A-Rod $6 million when he passed Willie Mays on the all-time home run list. The Yankees don't like that A-Rod got busted for using steroids, which is their right to be horrified by this. A-Rod still wants the $6 million that was in the contract he signed for passing Willie Mays on the all-time home run list, which is his right as a person who signed the contract.
Bill Madden is framing this discussion in such an anti-Rodriguez way though. Look at the language he is using.
"A face-saving olive branch from the Yankees..." like the Yankees are the ones trying to make peace in this situation when the grievance Rodriguez has is that the Yankees won't give him the money promised in his contract. The Yankees are not living up to a contract they signed, but they get credit for offering the olive branch?
"but A-Rod, on the advice of his attorneys and handlers..." like A-Rod has no control over the decision. He's totally and completely at fault on his own for using PED's, but when it comes to anything else he's just a puppet on a string. It's silly to believe A-Rod isn't anything but 100% culpable for his errors, but when it comes to making decisions about $6 million, all of a sudden A-Rod can't make his own decisions.
"...is having none of it" like the Yankees aren't trying to violate a contract they signed with A-Rod, as if he is a villain forcing them to pay money they didn't contractually agree to pay him. Bill Madden is framing this like he himself wouldn't go after $6 million in this situation. It's ridiculous the way Madden writes about this situation.
Sunday marked the 45-day deadline for A-Rod to file a grievance against the Yankees for their refusal to recognize his tying Willie Mays on the all-time home run list as a milestone, which under a separate marketing deal from his contract would have required them to pay him a $6 million bonus.
That day came and went with no agreement and no grievance filed.
So not only is A-Rod a huge distraction, but he's also not filing a grievance at this point in an effort to get the situation resolved without ever having to file a grievance. Does it get more diabolical than a person quietly asserting what he believes to be his rights in a manner that is as non-confrontational and distracting as possible? What type of monster tries to see if an agreement can be worked out before filing a grievance? He thinks he's A-God, not merely A-Rod.
Rodgriguez, when asked following Sunday’s win in Baltimore about a possible grievance, said: “That stuff will work itself out. I don’t know much about those kind of things.”
Oh sure, now Rodgriguez (spelling, Bill, spelling) claims to have NO KNOWLEDGE about what is going on, just like Bill Madden claims he has no knowledge of what's going on. Bill Madden knows that he was wrong when he said A-Rod's handlers were taking care of the situation and making him hold out for more money, but he can't admit that. Bill can't believe that A-Rod is pretending not to know what Bill Madden claims A-Rod doesn't know when it's obvious that Bill Madden doesn't know what A-Rod knows but A-Rod knows enough to know he's playing coy about what he does know. This is very, very clear.
While the Yankees remain confident in their position that A-Rod’s admission to using steroids and his subsequent year-long suspension from baseball has made him and his accomplishments unmarketable, they suggested to the MLB Players Association months ago that the dispute possibly could be settled by the Yankees making a donation — less than the $6 million — to a charity of Rodriguez’s choice.
So to sum it up, the Yankees not only won't give A-Rod the $6 million he claims he's owed for passing Willie Mays on the all-time home run list, but they won't even give the charity of his choice the full $6 million instead of giving the money to A-Rod. The Yankees won't give A-Rod $6 million and have held out an olive branch of an offer to give a charity less than the $6 million A-Rod claims they owe him. But again, Rodriguez is the bad guy here, not the Yankees.
“If you guys are so interested in my charities, I’ll be at the Boys and Girls Club on Tuesday,” said a smiling Rodriguez Sunday.
Oh, you snide son of a bitch. Bill Madden would cut your throat if he could. Smiling while talking about the Boys and Girls Club, bragging about how involved you are.
“That’s a great organization and we welcome all you guys to come out and give the Boys and Girls Club some exposure.”
What a son of a bitch's son of a bitch. A-Rod knows the New York media has no intent on giving the Boys and Girls Club some exposure. That's not what they want to do at all, but he just HAS to be cocky about it and point out the New York media is only looking for controversy to stir up rather than having a genuine interest in a charity receiving the "less than $6 million" that was supposed to go to A-Rod. What kind of animal points out the media's fake concern that charities are receiving exposure?
Rodriguez, however, has given no indication to the union or the Yankees that he has any intentions other than trying to make them pay him the full $6 million bonus and additional $6 million bonuses should he tie Babe Ruth (714), Hank Aaron (755) and Barry Bonds (762) on the all-time homer list.
He's given no intention he's willing to accept less than $6 million, but of course he's also not filed a grievance yet. So A-Rod also hasn't given an indication he isn't willing to work something out with the Yankees. But yeah, stay negative.
Rodriguez is apparently willing to once again go before the same baseball arbitrator, Fredric Horowitz, who found him guilty on all counts — but reduced his sentence — in his appeal of his 211-game suspension for doping in 2013, to force the payments.
All of a sudden it's A-Rod, and not his handlers, who is at the controls of this scheme again. It's hard for me to keep up with when A-Rod is and is not in control of this situation. And yes, A-Rod seems to be willing to go to this arbitrator, but as I often say when it comes to Peter King discussing contract negotiations, this is all a part of the negotiation so who knows what really A-Rod is willing to do? It could all be posturing.
If Rodriguez should prevail — and all the parties are said to privately have agreed not to hold Monday as a firm deadline for A-Rod to file his grievance since it won’t be heard anyway until after the season — the Yankees would also be required to pay an additional $3 million in luxury taxes.
Rodriguez is basically a cartoonish Bond villain at this point. Not only is he insisting the Yankees pay him the amount they contractually agreed to, but the fact the Yankees won't pay A-Rod $6 million is now costing the team $3 million more in luxury taxes. When will Rodriguez finally stop his continuous reign of evil? He's forcing the Yankees to spend more money, thereby hurting the team, by winning a grievance he hasn't filed yet in a hearing that hasn't occurred yet. If Rodriguez would just let the Yankees cheat him out of money, the Yankees could save even more money. But nooooooooooo, his selfishness knows no end.
It would appear to be a difficult case for A-Rod to prove since there have been zero commercial/endorsement opportunities presented to either Rodriguez or the Yankees for his passing of Mays — or, for that matter, to Rodriguez for the 3,000-hit milestone he’s closing in on.
A player can be marketable even without getting commercial/endorsement opportunities. Go check out how much a signed A-Rod jersey bids for and see if he is still not marketable.
(By contrast, Derek Jeter had numerous commercial/endorsement deals after he reached 3,000 hits.)
Jeter also had numerous commercial/endorsement deals before he reached 3,000 hits as well. And of course Derek Jeter is going to be mentioned at some point, as if nearly any professional athlete can live up to the image Jeter crafted for himself on the field and as an endorser. Simply because A-Rod isn't as marketable as Derek Jeter doesn't mean he isn't marketable.
As one baseball official noted Sunday: “Alex can’t even make the case that he’s helped the Yankees this year with his comeback season as their attendance and TV ratings are both down.”
How do we know ratings and attendance wouldn't be further down if A-Rod wasn't playing? Perhaps ratings and attendance would have declined further if it weren't for Rodriguez. Plus, attendance and ratings are a sign that the Yankees team as a whole isn't as marketable as it once was and not a reflection simply on one player.
It is believed the only reason the Yankees made any suggestion to settle with a charity donation was because of the enormous cost of litigating the case —
It's also believed that a charity donation isn't what A-Rod thinks the contract he signed called for and a charity donation of less than $6 million isn't even the amount A-Rod was promised for passing Mays. But again, Bill Madden has to look at this issue from the point of view of the Yankees organization.
Regardless, if it’s war he wants with them again, the Yankees are said to be confident they will win it and prepared to spend whatever it takes to make their case.
One minute Madden is decrying how the Yankees will have to spend $3 million more in luxury taxes if A-Rod wins and talks about how ratings and attendance are down, then he paints the Yankees as an organization with deep pockets who are fighting a moral war to avoid having to pay money they contractually agreed to pay.
“I’m not going to get into that now. All that stuff is family business and will be handled privately,” said Rodriguez.
Congratulations A-Rod, you are now causing a distraction by refusing to cause a distraction. Now the whole team is upset with you (they aren't) and this will probably if all goes well affect your play (it won't) so that the New York media can then state you were too concerned about lining your pockets when you needed to be worried about helping the Yankees win games. Not causing a distraction is a distraction. Bill Madden is horrified that you refuse to comment on the grievance you haven't filed yet, thereby creating controversy when he has to write this column about how you aren't creating controversy.
Why won't A-Rod say anything or respond publicly to the offer? Doesn't A-Rod realize it's more exciting for him to publicly reject this offer rather than privately reject the offer? Doesn't A-Rod realize the Yankees promising him $6 million if he met a milestone is the exact same thing as the Yankees giving $6 million to the charity of A-Rod's choice? If I promise you $10,000 to run a package from Philadelphia to Japan, but don't like the fact it took longer than I wanted it to, so I say I will give the $10,000 to your favorite charity instead, wouldn't that just please you? You are getting $10,000 to give to your favorite charity. That's better than having the money for yourself.
Can A-Rod not be satisfied? He was promised $6 million and the Yankees don't want to pay it to him. Why can't he just accept the Yankees giving this money to a charity? Does A-Rod hate charities that much? If A-Rod doesn't hate charities and hates the Yankees for not giving him $6 million, why can't he say it publicly so Bill Madden can write a story about A-Rod's quotes on this topic?
I like the "new" A-Rod. He's hitting the ball and he's not really saying much. He's letting this whole grievance of $6 million play out behind the scenes and not commenting. Of course, the New York media finds this unacceptable, so they have to find something wrong with A-Rod's approach to take the high ground.
In his ever-percolating home run milestone grievance with the Yankees — which was expected to come to a head Saturday but was pushed back until Monday — Alex Rodriguez’s silence is deafening.
"THE FACT A-ROD WON'T CAUSE A DISTRACTION HAS IN ITSELF NOW BECOME A DISTRACTION! WHEN WILL THIS MONSTER BE SATIATED WITH THE DAMAGE HE HAS CAUSED?"
A face-saving olive branch from the Yankees has been out there for a while, but A-Rod, on the advice of his attorneys and handlers, is having none of it.
I always throw this disclaimer in here it seems, but I'm not an A-Rod apologist. I really try not to be. The way the New York media frames anything that concerns A-Rod forces me to call them on their bullshit. Let's be clear here...the Yankees signed a contract saying they would give A-Rod $6 million when he passed Willie Mays on the all-time home run list. The Yankees don't like that A-Rod got busted for using steroids, which is their right to be horrified by this. A-Rod still wants the $6 million that was in the contract he signed for passing Willie Mays on the all-time home run list, which is his right as a person who signed the contract.
Bill Madden is framing this discussion in such an anti-Rodriguez way though. Look at the language he is using.
"A face-saving olive branch from the Yankees..." like the Yankees are the ones trying to make peace in this situation when the grievance Rodriguez has is that the Yankees won't give him the money promised in his contract. The Yankees are not living up to a contract they signed, but they get credit for offering the olive branch?
"but A-Rod, on the advice of his attorneys and handlers..." like A-Rod has no control over the decision. He's totally and completely at fault on his own for using PED's, but when it comes to anything else he's just a puppet on a string. It's silly to believe A-Rod isn't anything but 100% culpable for his errors, but when it comes to making decisions about $6 million, all of a sudden A-Rod can't make his own decisions.
"...is having none of it" like the Yankees aren't trying to violate a contract they signed with A-Rod, as if he is a villain forcing them to pay money they didn't contractually agree to pay him. Bill Madden is framing this like he himself wouldn't go after $6 million in this situation. It's ridiculous the way Madden writes about this situation.
Sunday marked the 45-day deadline for A-Rod to file a grievance against the Yankees for their refusal to recognize his tying Willie Mays on the all-time home run list as a milestone, which under a separate marketing deal from his contract would have required them to pay him a $6 million bonus.
That day came and went with no agreement and no grievance filed.
So not only is A-Rod a huge distraction, but he's also not filing a grievance at this point in an effort to get the situation resolved without ever having to file a grievance. Does it get more diabolical than a person quietly asserting what he believes to be his rights in a manner that is as non-confrontational and distracting as possible? What type of monster tries to see if an agreement can be worked out before filing a grievance? He thinks he's A-God, not merely A-Rod.
Rodgriguez, when asked following Sunday’s win in Baltimore about a possible grievance, said: “That stuff will work itself out. I don’t know much about those kind of things.”
Oh sure, now Rodgriguez (spelling, Bill, spelling) claims to have NO KNOWLEDGE about what is going on, just like Bill Madden claims he has no knowledge of what's going on. Bill Madden knows that he was wrong when he said A-Rod's handlers were taking care of the situation and making him hold out for more money, but he can't admit that. Bill can't believe that A-Rod is pretending not to know what Bill Madden claims A-Rod doesn't know when it's obvious that Bill Madden doesn't know what A-Rod knows but A-Rod knows enough to know he's playing coy about what he does know. This is very, very clear.
While the Yankees remain confident in their position that A-Rod’s admission to using steroids and his subsequent year-long suspension from baseball has made him and his accomplishments unmarketable, they suggested to the MLB Players Association months ago that the dispute possibly could be settled by the Yankees making a donation — less than the $6 million — to a charity of Rodriguez’s choice.
So to sum it up, the Yankees not only won't give A-Rod the $6 million he claims he's owed for passing Willie Mays on the all-time home run list, but they won't even give the charity of his choice the full $6 million instead of giving the money to A-Rod. The Yankees won't give A-Rod $6 million and have held out an olive branch of an offer to give a charity less than the $6 million A-Rod claims they owe him. But again, Rodriguez is the bad guy here, not the Yankees.
“If you guys are so interested in my charities, I’ll be at the Boys and Girls Club on Tuesday,” said a smiling Rodriguez Sunday.
Oh, you snide son of a bitch. Bill Madden would cut your throat if he could. Smiling while talking about the Boys and Girls Club, bragging about how involved you are.
“That’s a great organization and we welcome all you guys to come out and give the Boys and Girls Club some exposure.”
What a son of a bitch's son of a bitch. A-Rod knows the New York media has no intent on giving the Boys and Girls Club some exposure. That's not what they want to do at all, but he just HAS to be cocky about it and point out the New York media is only looking for controversy to stir up rather than having a genuine interest in a charity receiving the "less than $6 million" that was supposed to go to A-Rod. What kind of animal points out the media's fake concern that charities are receiving exposure?
Rodriguez, however, has given no indication to the union or the Yankees that he has any intentions other than trying to make them pay him the full $6 million bonus and additional $6 million bonuses should he tie Babe Ruth (714), Hank Aaron (755) and Barry Bonds (762) on the all-time homer list.
He's given no intention he's willing to accept less than $6 million, but of course he's also not filed a grievance yet. So A-Rod also hasn't given an indication he isn't willing to work something out with the Yankees. But yeah, stay negative.
Rodriguez is apparently willing to once again go before the same baseball arbitrator, Fredric Horowitz, who found him guilty on all counts — but reduced his sentence — in his appeal of his 211-game suspension for doping in 2013, to force the payments.
All of a sudden it's A-Rod, and not his handlers, who is at the controls of this scheme again. It's hard for me to keep up with when A-Rod is and is not in control of this situation. And yes, A-Rod seems to be willing to go to this arbitrator, but as I often say when it comes to Peter King discussing contract negotiations, this is all a part of the negotiation so who knows what really A-Rod is willing to do? It could all be posturing.
If Rodriguez should prevail — and all the parties are said to privately have agreed not to hold Monday as a firm deadline for A-Rod to file his grievance since it won’t be heard anyway until after the season — the Yankees would also be required to pay an additional $3 million in luxury taxes.
Rodriguez is basically a cartoonish Bond villain at this point. Not only is he insisting the Yankees pay him the amount they contractually agreed to, but the fact the Yankees won't pay A-Rod $6 million is now costing the team $3 million more in luxury taxes. When will Rodriguez finally stop his continuous reign of evil? He's forcing the Yankees to spend more money, thereby hurting the team, by winning a grievance he hasn't filed yet in a hearing that hasn't occurred yet. If Rodriguez would just let the Yankees cheat him out of money, the Yankees could save even more money. But nooooooooooo, his selfishness knows no end.
It would appear to be a difficult case for A-Rod to prove since there have been zero commercial/endorsement opportunities presented to either Rodriguez or the Yankees for his passing of Mays — or, for that matter, to Rodriguez for the 3,000-hit milestone he’s closing in on.
A player can be marketable even without getting commercial/endorsement opportunities. Go check out how much a signed A-Rod jersey bids for and see if he is still not marketable.
(By contrast, Derek Jeter had numerous commercial/endorsement deals after he reached 3,000 hits.)
Jeter also had numerous commercial/endorsement deals before he reached 3,000 hits as well. And of course Derek Jeter is going to be mentioned at some point, as if nearly any professional athlete can live up to the image Jeter crafted for himself on the field and as an endorser. Simply because A-Rod isn't as marketable as Derek Jeter doesn't mean he isn't marketable.
As one baseball official noted Sunday: “Alex can’t even make the case that he’s helped the Yankees this year with his comeback season as their attendance and TV ratings are both down.”
How do we know ratings and attendance wouldn't be further down if A-Rod wasn't playing? Perhaps ratings and attendance would have declined further if it weren't for Rodriguez. Plus, attendance and ratings are a sign that the Yankees team as a whole isn't as marketable as it once was and not a reflection simply on one player.
It is believed the only reason the Yankees made any suggestion to settle with a charity donation was because of the enormous cost of litigating the case —
It's also believed that a charity donation isn't what A-Rod thinks the contract he signed called for and a charity donation of less than $6 million isn't even the amount A-Rod was promised for passing Mays. But again, Bill Madden has to look at this issue from the point of view of the Yankees organization.
Regardless, if it’s war he wants with them again, the Yankees are said to be confident they will win it and prepared to spend whatever it takes to make their case.
One minute Madden is decrying how the Yankees will have to spend $3 million more in luxury taxes if A-Rod wins and talks about how ratings and attendance are down, then he paints the Yankees as an organization with deep pockets who are fighting a moral war to avoid having to pay money they contractually agreed to pay.
“I’m not going to get into that now. All that stuff is family business and will be handled privately,” said Rodriguez.
Congratulations A-Rod, you are now causing a distraction by refusing to cause a distraction. Now the whole team is upset with you (they aren't) and this will probably if all goes well affect your play (it won't) so that the New York media can then state you were too concerned about lining your pockets when you needed to be worried about helping the Yankees win games. Not causing a distraction is a distraction. Bill Madden is horrified that you refuse to comment on the grievance you haven't filed yet, thereby creating controversy when he has to write this column about how you aren't creating controversy.
Saturday, May 9, 2015
0 comments What A-Rod Has Done Wrong Today: He Didn't Take PED's to Help the Yankees Like Andy Pettitte Did
As part of the ongoing commitment from the media to be as obsessed with A-Rod as possible, which not ironically means I sound obsessed with A-Rod by writing about their obsession with A-Rod, I have put together all of the things the sports media sees that A-Rod has done wrong. Today, Johnette Howard says that Andy Pettitte and Alex Rodriguez are not the same. Pettitte took PED's to help the Yankees, while A-Rod took PED's to soothe his own ego and antagonize others. Apparently "intent" is now a part of the PED judgment that the media will make. Simply taking PED's isn't a huge issue as long as the player's intent was good. A player took PED's to make enough money to help support his child dying from a rare disease? It's perfectly acceptable to cheat and profit from it. Taking PED's just to enhance your performance in a selfish manner? Well, you are an asshole, liar, and cheater. I might need a chart to help differentiate what reasons are and are not acceptable to take PED's. Of course, some in the media are trying to be easier on A-Rod now that he is playing well. Success cures all.
The debate this week that the Yankees and everybody else should treat Andy Pettitte no differently than Alex Rodriguez because both players were admitted performance-enhancing drug users is so absurd it makes my head hurt.
It's absurd because they both took PED's and there shouldn't even be a discussion based on that. One guy is nice and the other is an asshole. That's mostly how I feel that the media views the difference in Pettitte and A-Rod, no matter how often they protest otherwise.
There is no disconnect at work here. Saying Pettitte and Rodriguez are the same is a false equivalency.
A false equivalency is defined as, "a situation where there is a logical and apparent equivalence, but when in fact there is none." It's based on measuring different information the exact same way and oversimplification of this information. Pettitte was busted one time for PED use and is seen as good guy. A-Rod was busted twice for PED use and is an asshole. The difference in these two situations are that one player got busted once more than the other player and is seen as an asshole. I'm not sure that means the end result, that both players cheated and should be treated the same way, is a false equivalency or not. Nelson Cruz got busted one time for PED's and he's a pretty nice guy from all appearances. So should he be treated in the same manner that Andy Pettitte is treated, like a nice guy who just a made a mistake? If so, someone alert the media they are treating Cruz as a PED user when they shouldn't be.
Pettitte isn't just getting a Nice Guy discount because the Yankees announced a few days ago that they're retiring his number and giving him a plaque in Monument Park, two honors that A-Rod will never experience in New York.
A-Rod's habitual PED recidivism, lying and character assassination attempts against his accusers make Pettitte's PED use look like a fender bender.
Pettitte isn't getting a Nice Guy discount, it's just A-Rod is so much more of an asshole compared to Pettitte that he should be treated more harshly than Pettitte is treated. Got it. There's no Nice Guy discount because it's called something else. It's not like Pettitte had conflicting testimony when brought up on the stand to accuse his friend Roger Clemens of HGH use. If A-Rod would only misremember some things then maybe he wouldn't assassinate so many people's character.
Pettitte's actions aren't totally excusable, but again, they hardly rise to the level of what A-Rod finally admitted to, or how he's continued to exacerbate his problems with clumsy grabs for the forgiveness Pettitte has enjoyed because of how he behaved before and after he was exposed.
But remember, Pettitte is not getting a Nice Guy discount. Not at all. His actions regarding the use of PED's gets some forgiveness from the media because Pettitte acted kindly before and after he was exposed. Again, it's not a Nice Guy discount if you just call it something else.
A-Rod's latest stunt, the handwritten apology letter he released Tuesday, instantly led to photos of mock letters being posted on Twitter with handwritten lines like, "Sorry! I got caught!"
An apology is only as sincere as the audience wants it to be. People want to believe Pettitte, so they do believe he is sincere.
Yankees management is giving Pettitte a pass for his PED use, which Pettitte has always insisted was a one-time mistake. He's said he did it only to rehab an injury so he could hurry back to help the team, and you can choose to accept that or not.
And intent apparently matters now. Pettitte was trying to enhance his performance to help the team, while A-Rod enhanced his performance to help himself hit home runs, none of which counted as helping the Yankees team in any way. This is a kind of funny argument since intent really shouldn't matter and either way the player helps the team by helping himself. The only difference is how the media wants to shade the apology and the reason given in the apology.
But let's be completely frank and grown-up here.
Oh, it's super-serious time. I'll put my Serious Face on when talking about the Nice Guy discount that doesn't exist by the name "Nice Guy discount."
The decision to not disqualify Pettitte because of his PED use isn't really an enormous shift for the team.
The Yankees profited greatly from employing a large cast of other PED users during the steroid era such as Roger Clemens, Gary Sheffield, Jason Giambi, Chuck Knoblauch, and Mike Stanton. The Mitchell report and BALCO trials revealed that.
Regardless of whether it is an enormous shift in how the team works or not, none of these players are represented in Monument Park like Andy Pettitte will be. No matter how hard Johnette Howard tries to differentiate Pettitte from A-Rod or claim that Pettitte isn't being treated differently despite being a PED user, the facts simply don't represent Pettitte as being as different as she claims him to be.
The Yankees profited from PED users, but Pettitte is the only one in Monument Park. Pettitte used PED's "to help the team," but his intent shouldn't matter, because A-Rod's PED use helped the team as well. It's just he doesn't hide behind the "it's for others, not me, because I felt a huge obligation to help my teammates out" excuse. The sports media wouldn't buy it anyway when this excuse came from A-Rod.
The Yankees' ethical squishiness on PED use is nothing new. Nor was it unique in baseball during the steroid era. Or since.
Oh, so now everyone was doing it, so it's not such a big deal if Pettitte took part as well. I guess everyone quit using PED's around the time A-Rod started using them. That's just like A-Rod, he's so detached from reality that he doesn't know it isn't cool to use PED's anymore.
The Yanks signed Giambi -- McGwire's and Jose Canseco's former training pal with the Oakland A's -- to a $120 million contract seven months before Caminiti's tell-all.
Is Jason Giambi in Monument Park? He isn't? So how is Pettitte not being treated differently from other PED users again? He was a Yankee for a longer span of time than Clemens and is closely tied to the organization, but Johnette Howard is trying to draw a firm line as to why Pettitte isn't being treated differently as a PED user for any other reason than he's a nice guy. She's only going to prove the point that he is treated a little differently, because every other PED user she has mentioned is being treated differently by the media and the Yankees than Pettitte has been treated.
Yet when asked directly at Giambi's mea culpa news conference if possible steroid use by Giambi was ever part of discussions about whether to sign him to such an enormous deal, Yankees general manager Brian Cashman said no, no, the issue "wasn't in the winds" back then.
So really, it is the fault of the Yankees organization that Pettitte used PED's. They created an atmosphere where taking PED's was acceptable, so naturallya nice guy like Pet a person who treats other with such respect and reverence like Pettitte would find it acceptable to take PED's. It was for the team, you know. Pettitte would NEVER take PED's to help himself like other PED users did. Other PED users like A-Rod wanted to enhance their performance for selfish reasons, while Pettitte wanted to enhance his performance, but so he can come back from injury quicker and help the team he loves so dearly (tear falls down his face).
A-Rod, who played with Caminiti in Texas in 2001, one of several Rangers teams that might've had one of the greatest collections of juicers of all time (Juan Gonzalez, Rafael Palmeiro, Ivan Rodriguez, et al.), was already with the Yanks for one season when Caminiti's SI story came out. But that didn't stop the Yanks from buying the storyline that A-Rod was the exception, The Last Natural, when they first traded for him, or when they re-signed him to the $275 million deal they're now stuck with.
This is some revisionist history right here. There was nothing tying A-Rod to PED's prior to his being traded to the Yankees. That Caminiti story from "SI" came out in 2002 according to the "Sports Illustrated" site. A-Rod joined the Yankees in 2004, so he was not with the team when that story came out. Good effort, good job. Who cares about facts when there is an opinion needs to be proven correct?
But remember this, too, about that Nice Guy premium Pettitte is getting vs. A-Rod: Contrary to the bitterness Knoblauch expressed on Twitter on Monday about Pettitte's kid-glove treatment by the Yanks, the Yankees actually have treated Pettitte poorly in the past.
Oh, so the Yankees ARE giving Pettitte a Nice Guy discount now? Previously in this column they weren't doing this, but now they are. But it's okay for him to get the Nice Guy discount because the Yankees were mean to Pettitte one time, so that means...umm...well, actually I'm not sure what the hell it has to do with the present discussion about how Pettitte isn't like A-Rod for reasons that supposedly have nothing to do with Pettitte being a nice guy.
It hasn't been all rainbows and syrupy sentimentalism.
But two facts remain that Pettitte is being given a plaque in Monument Park and he did use PED's. So the fact his relationship with the Yankees hasn't been all rainbows and syrupy sentimentalism has nothing to do with the difference in how he and A-Rod are treated.
In 2003, the team let Pettitte walk off to Houston years before his PED use ever surfaced.
Johnette Howard moves those goal posts again. She doesn't seem to know when the Caminiti story came out in "Sports Illustrated" and then describes the Yankees as having let Pettitte go to Houston "years" before his PED use ever surfaced. Let's pretend for a second that there is an even playing field. Pettitte went to Houston in 2003 which was "years" from his being found out for using PED's in December 2007. A-Rod started playing for the Yankees in 2004 and his PED use came to light originally in July 2007, but proof of his PED use wasn't public until February 2009.
So Howard thinks four years is "years" before Pettitte's PED use surfaced, while being kind and saying Jose Canseco's suggestion A-Rod used PED's served as proof at the time, it was three years before A-Rod's PED use surfaced. In reality, it was five years. So Howard thinks the Yankees should have known about A-Rod's PED use three years before it became public when trading for him, despite the fact he had never used PED's while a member of the Yankees until that point, but gives the Yankees credit for getting rid of Pettitte because it was "years" before his PED surfaced. Of course Howard doesn't expect the Yankees should have known Pettitte used PED's while a member of the Yankees team. Naturally. The Yankees should have been on to a guy who didn't even play for them as a PED user, but how would they ever know one of their current players had used PED's? Three years prior to information becoming public means that information should have been known in the case of A-Rod, while four years is "years" in the case of Pettitte. She just keeps moving the goal posts all around the field.
Pettitte had just won 21 games and already had a clutch reputation. Yet the Yankees asked him to take a pay cut -- a pay cut! -- from $11.5 million to $10 million a year. George Steinbrenner was still around and vital then, and The Boss personally negotiated deals with career-long bad boys like David Wells and Sheffield. Yet Pettitte didn't hear from the Yanks for six weeks after their initial offer.
Johnette Howard can try to muddy the water all she wants. The bottom line is that Pettitte has a plaque in Monument Park and he used PED's. He's being treated differently from A-Rod and most of it has to do with his reputation versus A-Rod's reputation. She can deny this all she wants, but the only differences in A-Rod and Pettitte are their reputations, their supposed intent for taking PED's, and A-Rod has been busted twice not once. They both used PED's. She can mealy-mouth around it all she wants, but Pettitte has a better reputation as a nice guy and that helps him tremendously.
Even their final offer asked him to accept $5.1 million less in guaranteed money to stay with them rather than go home to play for Houston -- a risk he wasn't willing to take.
In short, the Yanks gave Pettitte the same unsentimental treatment that Giambi and A-Rod got when the team explored voiding the millions left on their ill-gotten contracts, and that Joe Torre got with the one-year contract extension offer that left him so "insulted" he left to manage the Dodgers.
Only a person with an agenda could really write with a straight face that offering a new contract to a pitcher that involves taking $5.1 million less in guaranteed money than another team is offering is the same thing as a team trying to void $61 million of another player's contract. These are two completely different things. The Yankees were offering Pettitte a contract with $5.1 million less money, while they were trying to take $61 million away from A-Rod. Ignoring they offered a contract to one player and was voiding a contract from another, I think the difference of $55.9 million in the money (attempting to be) voided from A-Rod's contract shows the difference in these two situations. Again, Johnette Howard is trying so hard to differentiate and it's not working.
Even Jeter was publicly told to "smoke the reality pipe" by an unnamed Yankees official during his last contract talks.
People forget.
Keep moving those goal posts. The issue isn't whether the Yankees have ever been mean to Andy Pettitte. The issue is whether A-Rod and Andy Pettitte, both PED users, are being treated the same way by the Yankees organization. The answer is they are not. What has been said in contract negotiations is irrelevant. What is relevant is that Pettitte and A-Rod admitted to using PED's and Pettitte is getting a plaque while A-Rod is fighting to avoid his contract from getting voided.
All of it is also influenced by the fact that Pettitte and A-Rod are dramatically different men and they handled being caught as PED users in significantly different ways.
Remember that Howard insists Pettitte isn't getting a Nice Guy discount when she discusses how each man handled being caught as PED users.
Pettitte held a news conference to make a blanket apology, and sat there till every last question was asked. Then he made the rounds for weeks behind the scenes, personally repeating his apology to one person after another after another. His behavior was impeccable before and since, even when Clemens called him a liar. He didn't cook up some phony lawsuit against the Yanks' team doctor, as A-Rod did, or lie again and again on national TV, smear the reporter who unearthed his PED use, sell out a cousin who is now suing him, or backslide into PED use, as far as anyone knows.
So Pettitte is getting a Nice Guy discount. He apologized correctly and to everyone involved. I get it. His behavior was impeccable and he took responsibility for what he did, except for the fact he's never really taking responsibility for why he took HGH. He's hidden behind the whole "I was trying to help the team and took HGH to recover from injury" reasoning, as if this is more noble than simply taking PED's to improve one's performance. Good for him, I bear no ill will that he uses this reasoning. Pettitte has only come as clean as he's needed to come clean and as much as the media has made him come clean. Pettitte claimed after the Mitchell Report came out that he took PED's for a couple of days in 2002. Then when he was in front of Congress and they provided examples of his additional PED use, he admitted while under oath that he used them again in 2004. So he didn't lie, unless you want to count withholding information as lying. He didn't cook up a phony lawsuit, despite the fact he consistently has hidden behind a phony story that plays on the media's need to show him as a good guy. He did use PED's to help the team and come back from injury, while A-Rod used PED's to improve his performance. Six of one, half dozen of the other.
People sometimes do make grievous mistakes in life. Pettitte's story, until proved otherwise, is he cheated, then asked for forgiveness, and earned it with his actions. Meanwhile, A-Rod keeps setting himself up to be seen as an incorrigible fraud.
I understand one of the differences is that A-Rod has been busted twice for PED use. Of course, Pettitte admits to using PED's twice himself, but really only got busted once. Maybe A-Rod hasn't earned forgiveness, but the media and MLB didn't come at Andy Pettitte as hard as they have come after A-Rod. So Howard takes offense to the idea A-Rod and Pettitte should be treated the same, but not because Pettitte is seen as a nice guy, but because of Pettitte's nice guy actions. No wonder she likes Pettitte so much, she's his target audience for the "I used HGH to help the team, not myself" excuse. She wants to believe Pettitte was pure of heart in his actions.
And now, all of that has determined how each man is treated?
Good.
It should.
But the bottom line is that they are both PED users, while Pettitte is being forgiven because he's a nice guy who apologized the right way. He's getting a plaque in Monument Park even though he admitted to using PED's. There is no other reason other than him being a nice guy and the media wanting to believe him that he is treated as he is treated compared to other PED users. I have to wonder if A-Rod had written his letter of apology after the first time he was busted for using PED's if he would be treated the same as Pettitte. I think I know the answer.
The debate this week that the Yankees and everybody else should treat Andy Pettitte no differently than Alex Rodriguez because both players were admitted performance-enhancing drug users is so absurd it makes my head hurt.
It's absurd because they both took PED's and there shouldn't even be a discussion based on that. One guy is nice and the other is an asshole. That's mostly how I feel that the media views the difference in Pettitte and A-Rod, no matter how often they protest otherwise.
There is no disconnect at work here. Saying Pettitte and Rodriguez are the same is a false equivalency.
A false equivalency is defined as, "a situation where there is a logical and apparent equivalence, but when in fact there is none." It's based on measuring different information the exact same way and oversimplification of this information. Pettitte was busted one time for PED use and is seen as good guy. A-Rod was busted twice for PED use and is an asshole. The difference in these two situations are that one player got busted once more than the other player and is seen as an asshole. I'm not sure that means the end result, that both players cheated and should be treated the same way, is a false equivalency or not. Nelson Cruz got busted one time for PED's and he's a pretty nice guy from all appearances. So should he be treated in the same manner that Andy Pettitte is treated, like a nice guy who just a made a mistake? If so, someone alert the media they are treating Cruz as a PED user when they shouldn't be.
Pettitte isn't just getting a Nice Guy discount because the Yankees announced a few days ago that they're retiring his number and giving him a plaque in Monument Park, two honors that A-Rod will never experience in New York.
A-Rod's habitual PED recidivism, lying and character assassination attempts against his accusers make Pettitte's PED use look like a fender bender.
Pettitte isn't getting a Nice Guy discount, it's just A-Rod is so much more of an asshole compared to Pettitte that he should be treated more harshly than Pettitte is treated. Got it. There's no Nice Guy discount because it's called something else. It's not like Pettitte had conflicting testimony when brought up on the stand to accuse his friend Roger Clemens of HGH use. If A-Rod would only misremember some things then maybe he wouldn't assassinate so many people's character.
Pettitte's actions aren't totally excusable, but again, they hardly rise to the level of what A-Rod finally admitted to, or how he's continued to exacerbate his problems with clumsy grabs for the forgiveness Pettitte has enjoyed because of how he behaved before and after he was exposed.
But remember, Pettitte is not getting a Nice Guy discount. Not at all. His actions regarding the use of PED's gets some forgiveness from the media because Pettitte acted kindly before and after he was exposed. Again, it's not a Nice Guy discount if you just call it something else.
A-Rod's latest stunt, the handwritten apology letter he released Tuesday, instantly led to photos of mock letters being posted on Twitter with handwritten lines like, "Sorry! I got caught!"
An apology is only as sincere as the audience wants it to be. People want to believe Pettitte, so they do believe he is sincere.
Yankees management is giving Pettitte a pass for his PED use, which Pettitte has always insisted was a one-time mistake. He's said he did it only to rehab an injury so he could hurry back to help the team, and you can choose to accept that or not.
And intent apparently matters now. Pettitte was trying to enhance his performance to help the team, while A-Rod enhanced his performance to help himself hit home runs, none of which counted as helping the Yankees team in any way. This is a kind of funny argument since intent really shouldn't matter and either way the player helps the team by helping himself. The only difference is how the media wants to shade the apology and the reason given in the apology.
But let's be completely frank and grown-up here.
Oh, it's super-serious time. I'll put my Serious Face on when talking about the Nice Guy discount that doesn't exist by the name "Nice Guy discount."
The decision to not disqualify Pettitte because of his PED use isn't really an enormous shift for the team.
The Yankees profited greatly from employing a large cast of other PED users during the steroid era such as Roger Clemens, Gary Sheffield, Jason Giambi, Chuck Knoblauch, and Mike Stanton. The Mitchell report and BALCO trials revealed that.
Regardless of whether it is an enormous shift in how the team works or not, none of these players are represented in Monument Park like Andy Pettitte will be. No matter how hard Johnette Howard tries to differentiate Pettitte from A-Rod or claim that Pettitte isn't being treated differently despite being a PED user, the facts simply don't represent Pettitte as being as different as she claims him to be.
The Yankees profited from PED users, but Pettitte is the only one in Monument Park. Pettitte used PED's "to help the team," but his intent shouldn't matter, because A-Rod's PED use helped the team as well. It's just he doesn't hide behind the "it's for others, not me, because I felt a huge obligation to help my teammates out" excuse. The sports media wouldn't buy it anyway when this excuse came from A-Rod.
The Yankees' ethical squishiness on PED use is nothing new. Nor was it unique in baseball during the steroid era. Or since.
Oh, so now everyone was doing it, so it's not such a big deal if Pettitte took part as well. I guess everyone quit using PED's around the time A-Rod started using them. That's just like A-Rod, he's so detached from reality that he doesn't know it isn't cool to use PED's anymore.
The Yanks signed Giambi -- McGwire's and Jose Canseco's former training pal with the Oakland A's -- to a $120 million contract seven months before Caminiti's tell-all.
Is Jason Giambi in Monument Park? He isn't? So how is Pettitte not being treated differently from other PED users again? He was a Yankee for a longer span of time than Clemens and is closely tied to the organization, but Johnette Howard is trying to draw a firm line as to why Pettitte isn't being treated differently as a PED user for any other reason than he's a nice guy. She's only going to prove the point that he is treated a little differently, because every other PED user she has mentioned is being treated differently by the media and the Yankees than Pettitte has been treated.
Yet when asked directly at Giambi's mea culpa news conference if possible steroid use by Giambi was ever part of discussions about whether to sign him to such an enormous deal, Yankees general manager Brian Cashman said no, no, the issue "wasn't in the winds" back then.
So really, it is the fault of the Yankees organization that Pettitte used PED's. They created an atmosphere where taking PED's was acceptable, so naturally
A-Rod, who played with Caminiti in Texas in 2001, one of several Rangers teams that might've had one of the greatest collections of juicers of all time (Juan Gonzalez, Rafael Palmeiro, Ivan Rodriguez, et al.), was already with the Yanks for one season when Caminiti's SI story came out. But that didn't stop the Yanks from buying the storyline that A-Rod was the exception, The Last Natural, when they first traded for him, or when they re-signed him to the $275 million deal they're now stuck with.
This is some revisionist history right here. There was nothing tying A-Rod to PED's prior to his being traded to the Yankees. That Caminiti story from "SI" came out in 2002 according to the "Sports Illustrated" site. A-Rod joined the Yankees in 2004, so he was not with the team when that story came out. Good effort, good job. Who cares about facts when there is an opinion needs to be proven correct?
But remember this, too, about that Nice Guy premium Pettitte is getting vs. A-Rod: Contrary to the bitterness Knoblauch expressed on Twitter on Monday about Pettitte's kid-glove treatment by the Yanks, the Yankees actually have treated Pettitte poorly in the past.
Oh, so the Yankees ARE giving Pettitte a Nice Guy discount now? Previously in this column they weren't doing this, but now they are. But it's okay for him to get the Nice Guy discount because the Yankees were mean to Pettitte one time, so that means...umm...well, actually I'm not sure what the hell it has to do with the present discussion about how Pettitte isn't like A-Rod for reasons that supposedly have nothing to do with Pettitte being a nice guy.
It hasn't been all rainbows and syrupy sentimentalism.
But two facts remain that Pettitte is being given a plaque in Monument Park and he did use PED's. So the fact his relationship with the Yankees hasn't been all rainbows and syrupy sentimentalism has nothing to do with the difference in how he and A-Rod are treated.
In 2003, the team let Pettitte walk off to Houston years before his PED use ever surfaced.
Johnette Howard moves those goal posts again. She doesn't seem to know when the Caminiti story came out in "Sports Illustrated" and then describes the Yankees as having let Pettitte go to Houston "years" before his PED use ever surfaced. Let's pretend for a second that there is an even playing field. Pettitte went to Houston in 2003 which was "years" from his being found out for using PED's in December 2007. A-Rod started playing for the Yankees in 2004 and his PED use came to light originally in July 2007, but proof of his PED use wasn't public until February 2009.
So Howard thinks four years is "years" before Pettitte's PED use surfaced, while being kind and saying Jose Canseco's suggestion A-Rod used PED's served as proof at the time, it was three years before A-Rod's PED use surfaced. In reality, it was five years. So Howard thinks the Yankees should have known about A-Rod's PED use three years before it became public when trading for him, despite the fact he had never used PED's while a member of the Yankees until that point, but gives the Yankees credit for getting rid of Pettitte because it was "years" before his PED surfaced. Of course Howard doesn't expect the Yankees should have known Pettitte used PED's while a member of the Yankees team. Naturally. The Yankees should have been on to a guy who didn't even play for them as a PED user, but how would they ever know one of their current players had used PED's? Three years prior to information becoming public means that information should have been known in the case of A-Rod, while four years is "years" in the case of Pettitte. She just keeps moving the goal posts all around the field.
Pettitte had just won 21 games and already had a clutch reputation. Yet the Yankees asked him to take a pay cut -- a pay cut! -- from $11.5 million to $10 million a year. George Steinbrenner was still around and vital then, and The Boss personally negotiated deals with career-long bad boys like David Wells and Sheffield. Yet Pettitte didn't hear from the Yanks for six weeks after their initial offer.
Johnette Howard can try to muddy the water all she wants. The bottom line is that Pettitte has a plaque in Monument Park and he used PED's. He's being treated differently from A-Rod and most of it has to do with his reputation versus A-Rod's reputation. She can deny this all she wants, but the only differences in A-Rod and Pettitte are their reputations, their supposed intent for taking PED's, and A-Rod has been busted twice not once. They both used PED's. She can mealy-mouth around it all she wants, but Pettitte has a better reputation as a nice guy and that helps him tremendously.
Even their final offer asked him to accept $5.1 million less in guaranteed money to stay with them rather than go home to play for Houston -- a risk he wasn't willing to take.
In short, the Yanks gave Pettitte the same unsentimental treatment that Giambi and A-Rod got when the team explored voiding the millions left on their ill-gotten contracts, and that Joe Torre got with the one-year contract extension offer that left him so "insulted" he left to manage the Dodgers.
Only a person with an agenda could really write with a straight face that offering a new contract to a pitcher that involves taking $5.1 million less in guaranteed money than another team is offering is the same thing as a team trying to void $61 million of another player's contract. These are two completely different things. The Yankees were offering Pettitte a contract with $5.1 million less money, while they were trying to take $61 million away from A-Rod. Ignoring they offered a contract to one player and was voiding a contract from another, I think the difference of $55.9 million in the money (attempting to be) voided from A-Rod's contract shows the difference in these two situations. Again, Johnette Howard is trying so hard to differentiate and it's not working.
Even Jeter was publicly told to "smoke the reality pipe" by an unnamed Yankees official during his last contract talks.
People forget.
Keep moving those goal posts. The issue isn't whether the Yankees have ever been mean to Andy Pettitte. The issue is whether A-Rod and Andy Pettitte, both PED users, are being treated the same way by the Yankees organization. The answer is they are not. What has been said in contract negotiations is irrelevant. What is relevant is that Pettitte and A-Rod admitted to using PED's and Pettitte is getting a plaque while A-Rod is fighting to avoid his contract from getting voided.
All of it is also influenced by the fact that Pettitte and A-Rod are dramatically different men and they handled being caught as PED users in significantly different ways.
Remember that Howard insists Pettitte isn't getting a Nice Guy discount when she discusses how each man handled being caught as PED users.
Pettitte held a news conference to make a blanket apology, and sat there till every last question was asked. Then he made the rounds for weeks behind the scenes, personally repeating his apology to one person after another after another. His behavior was impeccable before and since, even when Clemens called him a liar. He didn't cook up some phony lawsuit against the Yanks' team doctor, as A-Rod did, or lie again and again on national TV, smear the reporter who unearthed his PED use, sell out a cousin who is now suing him, or backslide into PED use, as far as anyone knows.
So Pettitte is getting a Nice Guy discount. He apologized correctly and to everyone involved. I get it. His behavior was impeccable and he took responsibility for what he did, except for the fact he's never really taking responsibility for why he took HGH. He's hidden behind the whole "I was trying to help the team and took HGH to recover from injury" reasoning, as if this is more noble than simply taking PED's to improve one's performance. Good for him, I bear no ill will that he uses this reasoning. Pettitte has only come as clean as he's needed to come clean and as much as the media has made him come clean. Pettitte claimed after the Mitchell Report came out that he took PED's for a couple of days in 2002. Then when he was in front of Congress and they provided examples of his additional PED use, he admitted while under oath that he used them again in 2004. So he didn't lie, unless you want to count withholding information as lying. He didn't cook up a phony lawsuit, despite the fact he consistently has hidden behind a phony story that plays on the media's need to show him as a good guy. He did use PED's to help the team and come back from injury, while A-Rod used PED's to improve his performance. Six of one, half dozen of the other.
People sometimes do make grievous mistakes in life. Pettitte's story, until proved otherwise, is he cheated, then asked for forgiveness, and earned it with his actions. Meanwhile, A-Rod keeps setting himself up to be seen as an incorrigible fraud.
I understand one of the differences is that A-Rod has been busted twice for PED use. Of course, Pettitte admits to using PED's twice himself, but really only got busted once. Maybe A-Rod hasn't earned forgiveness, but the media and MLB didn't come at Andy Pettitte as hard as they have come after A-Rod. So Howard takes offense to the idea A-Rod and Pettitte should be treated the same, but not because Pettitte is seen as a nice guy, but because of Pettitte's nice guy actions. No wonder she likes Pettitte so much, she's his target audience for the "I used HGH to help the team, not myself" excuse. She wants to believe Pettitte was pure of heart in his actions.
And now, all of that has determined how each man is treated?
Good.
It should.
But the bottom line is that they are both PED users, while Pettitte is being forgiven because he's a nice guy who apologized the right way. He's getting a plaque in Monument Park even though he admitted to using PED's. There is no other reason other than him being a nice guy and the media wanting to believe him that he is treated as he is treated compared to other PED users. I have to wonder if A-Rod had written his letter of apology after the first time he was busted for using PED's if he would be treated the same as Pettitte. I think I know the answer.
Monday, April 20, 2015
1 comments What A-Rod Has Done Wrong Today: He's Close to Breaking MLB Records, So He's Making Things Awkward for the Yankees
Alex Rodriguez is currently in the process of doing something very rude. He's making things awkward for the Yankees by continuing to play fairly well and coming close to breaking MLB records, including Willie Mays' home run record of 660. One would think the Yankees would be happy to have a contributing player like A-Rod, but for legal and financial reasons they are not acknowledging A-Rod's achievements. But don't think Dan Shaughnessy and Bob Raissman haven't noticed that A-Rod is stealing the spotlight by breaking records and don't think they don't see this as another strike against A-Rod. If he had any morality then he would play poorly and not break any records so Shaughnessy and Raissman could rip him for being a complete waste of money. Instead, they don't even get to take cheap shots at A-Rod, so they have to work to find something he's done wrong.
I'll start first with Dan Shaughnessy, who thinks A-Rod is making things awkward for the Yankees playing well and trying to break records. Why does A-Rod insist on the Yankees making things awkward by not recognizing his achievements so they don't have to pay him bonuses for breaking MLB records?
Alex Rodriguez is approaching Willie Mays on the all-time home run list and his own team won’t acknowledge this fact.
For legal and financial reasons. They don't want to pay him when he breaks records, so they want to show they didn't publicize A-Rod breaking records and hope they don't have to pay him.
A-Rod is baseball’s pariah. He is the bubonic plague. Hating on A-Rod is one of America’s favorite parlor games. Even in his own organization.
He's seen as a pariah mostly within his own organization, outside of the Yankees players of course. I've not read anything from a source on the Yankees actual team (it's usually a source in the organization, not the players) that says negative things about A-Rod. Who cares though? Because sportswriters like hating on A-Rod, this means most of America hates him. Dan Shaughnessy speaks for us all.
It’s weird to see him in uniform again. It’s weird to see him in the Yankee locker room, where he dresses next to Jacoby Ellsbury, a tremendous talent who never gets particularly close to his teammates.
I'm sorry not sorry that it's weird. No one cares how you feel, Dan.
The beloved Yankee stars are all gone. Bernie Williams. Andy Pettitte. Jorge Posada. Mariano Rivera. Finally, Derek Jeter. But A-Rod is back. He is back because the Yankees still owe him a giant bag of money ($61 million through 2017). He is back because he served his one-year suspension. He is back because he’s got nowhere else to go.
He is back because, despite all of his cheating and transgressions, he is wanting to help the Yankees win baseball games without making a huge deal about it. A-Rod has not searched out controversy or tried to defend any of his actions. I think the media resents this in a way. They don't want a silent A-Rod, because they can't rip on a silent A-Rod for things he says.
A-Rod wasn’t available for interviews before Friday’s marathon. He bolted past his clubhouse stall once, but couldn’t say anything because his mouth was full of mouthwash.
“That’s his new trick,’’ said a Yankee beat writer. “He’s got the mouthwash going and can’t say anything when he brushes past you.’’
If A-Rod doesn't want to talk to reporters then he doesn't have to. Sorry, that's life. If he wants to do a "trick" by having mouthwash in, that's fine, because he's not obligated to talk to the media after the game. In fact, if I were A-Rod then I would make it a point to not speak with the media that clearly doesn't like me and clearly is going to try and twist my words to mean something they don't or mangle them in such a fashion to where that sportswriter can get a column bashing me out of it.
It is awkward for Hal and Hank Steinbrenner (this is one of those times we could really use Boss George’s bombast).
It's the "If only George Steinbrenner were alive then he would fix everything that's wrong with the Yankees" pining. It's cute and fun, but I don't seem to recall George Steinbrenner always doing a heck of a lot to fix what's wrong with the Yankees and often he was the source of the organization's problems. Revisionist history is something sportswriters love to participate in when they are discussing the Yankees and George Steinbrenner. He has become a symbol for something that he really wasn't when he was actually alive.
It is awkward for Yankee GM Brian Cashman and manager Joe Girardi. It is awkward for A-Rod’s teammates. And it is awkward for the Yankee PR staff, one of the best in the business. They don’t quite know how to acknowledge A-Rod without appearing to celebrate his deeds.
It sucks it's awkward, but the only ones who are making it awkward is the Yankees organization who refuses to acknowledge A-Rod's achievements. They could end the awkwardness and just bite the bullet to celebrate him, but they won't do it.
There was a time when the Yankees were hoping A-Rod would become the all-time home run king. He was like Tiger Woods marching toward Jack Nicklaus’s 18 major titles. A-Rod had a chance to be the first 800-homer guy. And he would do it as a Yankee.
But that was before he got caught cheating and lied. And cheated again. And lied again. And sued everybody, including his own union.
A-Rod did sue his own union. He also was sort of right to do that. MLB used the Biogenesis lawsuit as a way to collect documents and not redress any sort of injury that was alleged in the basis of the lawsuit. That's my view at least. MLB gathered evidence behind the illusion of the Biogenesis lawsuit and MLB also violated confidentiality with leaks in the case. A-Rod doesn't think the union sufficiently defended him in this situation. Saying, "he sued his own union" is a much more salacious way of saying that A-Rod didn't think his rights as a member of the union were being protected like they should be. If your employer was using what you perceived to be bogus means to collect evidence against you, then wouldn't you probably be a little salty if you believe your union didn't protect you sufficiently and defend you against your employer? I know I would.
Now there is no club-sanctioned celebration when he hits a home run. There is embarrassment.
So now there is complaining that A-Rod has done something wrong when he hits a home run.
And it’s going to be really embarrassing sometime soon when he hits his seventh home run of the season and passes Mays for fourth on the all-time list.
This is the same Willie Mays who was a team source for amphetamines, right?
Willie Mays is a baseball treasure, but I always laugh at how the greenie use of the previous generation of baseball players is glossed over. Hank Aaron was passed by Barry Bonds for the home run record. I think we are past the point of being embarrassed when older generation greats have their records passed by players tied to PED's.
A-Rod is owed a $6 million bonus every time he passes these magic markers. It is believed that the Yankees intend to withhold the bonus and take the matter to arbitration.
The Yankees believe that if it can be proven that the milestones are not marketable because they are tainted, the ball club will not have to pay the bonuses.
“We are very, very careful in not marketing these milestones,’’ said a high-ranking Yankee official.
But if the Yankees are admitting they aren't marketing these achievements and they have a clear motive to save money by not marketing these achievements, then why should A-Rod not get his $6 million? Simply because the organization chooses not to market A-Rod's achievement, well that's not his problem. The Yankees signed a contract and if they choose not to market A-Rod, that's great, but it doesn't mean he isn't entitled to the $6 million as designated in his contract.
Again, we have all done things wrong. Maybe even done things wrong twice, but if you put yourself in A-Rod's shoes for a minute then it's easy to get why he wouldn't be happy the Yankees are going to withhold money from his contract for achievements. If my employer withheld money from me after I believe I did my time for a wrongdoing, then I would be unhappy. I understand the Yankees' point of view too. No team wants to market a false record. Well, some MLB teams do and that's their choice.
The only mention was in the daily notes where a small A-Rod section disclosed that he is fifth on the all-time homer list. There was no mention of A-Rod needing five to tie Mays.
A-Rod can no longer play shortstop or third base.
He can still play third base if he needed to. This is why he was practicing fielding ground balls at third base during spring training. Not to steal Chase Headley's job, but to be prepared to play the position if he was needed.
He’s a full-time DH who experimented at first base in spring training. He can’t run. He’s limited.
So, he's a full-time DH like other full-time DH's who can't really do much else outside of hit?
The Yanks have not hit the road yet, so A-Rod has heard a lot of cheers and not many boos.
Unless he's paid attention to the noises coming from the pressbox of course. Sportswriters who love being up on their pedestal are booing A-Rod every chance they get.
That will change Monday night when the Yankees play the Orioles at Camden Yards. The Yankees come to Boston on Friday, May 1. That should be good.
While also slightly ironic given the fact prominent Red Sox players haven't exactly been clean over the past decade.
Maybe that’ll be the weekend that A-Rod hits No. 661 to vault Mays.
I can see the Daily News headline now: “Pay Day Kid Passes Say Hey Kid; Nobody Notices’’.
"Pay Day Kid"? Dan Shaughnessy is calling A-Rod the "Pay Day Kid." Yeah, blame A-Rod for signing a contract that he and the Yankees agreed was his market value. It's all A-Rod's fault and we all know Dan Shaughnessy would never take more money from the "Boston Globe" if they offered it to him. Dan is too good for that, plus he may have already done that but his salary is private.
A-Rod is back. It’s a big bowl of awkward.
It is and it's because the Yankees are working hard to make it that way. I don't not blame A-Rod for his part, but the Yankees signed the contract, the contract hasn't been voided, and so if they don't choose to market A-Rod then that is their choosing. This would all just be easier if A-Rod would stop performing well enough to break MLB records. If A-Rod would just hit .150 and not have an extra base hit then there would be no awkwardness and the media could rip him for his lousy performance. That's what Dan Shaughnessy wants to do anyway.
Bob Raissman has also noticed that A-Rod has screwed everything up by insisting on not playing so poorly and daring to break MLB records. For Bob, he's a little confused that ESPN and Fox are paying so much attention to A-Rod. It's perfectly fine for Raissman to have written about A-Rod three times from March 14 to April 15, but it astounds him when other media outlets try to pay attention to A-Rod. They are just proving his marketability, which is a big no-no.
The lines were strikingly similar. Both were spoken while the camera was on Alex Rodriguez.
“I think there’s a PED fatigue among fans,” Tom Verducci, working with Harold Reynolds and Joe Buck, said Saturday during FS1’s Red Sox-Yankees telecast. “It’s not why they come to the ballpark.”
Less than 24 hours later, Curt Schilling attempted to explain why Yankee fans have quickly gravitated back to A-Rod’s corner. “Part of it too is fatigue. That (Biogenesis/PED) story was fatiguing,” Schilling said early in ESPN’s telecast of the Sunday night series finale. “I think everyone is tired of it. They want to move on, including Alex.”
I think that Tom Verducci and Curt Schilling are both correct. Of course, most sportswriters won't ever realize this because they are too busy taking hardline stances against PED use and continuing to beat the PED horse into the ground. Yes, PED's are an issue (which is why MLB has a drug policy), and yes, those players who take PED's are cheaters. After a while, it's exhausting to talk about it and debate it. This is part of the reason I post these "What A-Rod Has Done Wrong Today" posts, to show how these sportswriters dream of different things that A-Rod has done wrong in place of simply writing another column obliterating him for twice getting caught using PED's. There is PED fatigue and sportswriters try to talk around this fatigue by talking about how A-Rod is marketing poison or how he shows up at training camp early AND DOESN'T EVEN TELL THE YANKEES! All these things that A-Rod has done wrong goes back to his PED use, which I am betting the general public is tired of discussing. I know I am. So a villain becomes a sort of anti-hero.
During spring training, commissioner Rob Manfred called on MLB’s national TV partners to help market baseball’s young stars. Yet during the first weekend of the season, the spotlight was on a 39-year-old tainted drug abuser (who Manfred helped bust) returning from a season in exile.
I disagree the focus was on A-Rod. Maybe from the perspective of a sportswriter like Raissman who is paid to cover A-Rod, but as the fan of a team that isn't the Yankees I only heard about A-Rod when I went searching out information about him or read a column from a New York-based sportswriter.
It just wasn’t what the network voices had to say about him. It was what the cameras allowed us see. The coverage did not reach total Love-In status, but pretty close.
Yes, how dare MLB Network talk about A-Rod a lot and choose to keep the focus on what Rodriguez was doing. Don't they know it is the New York media's job to saturate the airwaves with coverage of A-Rod? The New York media are the only ones allowed to discuss A-Rod all the time and at length. It's fine for Bob Raissman to write about A-Rod three times in a month, but when MLB Network discusses A-Rod then they are simply giving the spotlight to someone who doesn't deserve it. Or is it that Raissman doesn't like any coverage of A-Rod that isn't negative coverage?
On Sunday night, a number of Yankees met with kids from the Harlem Little League but ESPN only showed A-Rod speaking with them and signing autographs.
This was an image-softening moment. Team A-Rod could not have orchestrated this heartwarming session any better.
ESPN should have shown A-Rod spitting in the face of these kids and then slipping his phone number to each child's mother in the hopes of having a quickie after the game was over. But NOOOOO, ESPN had to show A-Rod in a light that wasn't negative. That's not allowed.
There also were regular-guy shots of Rodriguez interacting with teammates in the dugout. On Saturday, Fox zoned in on A-Rod awkwardly attempting to play first base — another sympathetic sequence.
Except A-Rod was really being a regular guy in the dugout. It's not like Team A-Rod has forced his teammates to like him. And A-Rod playing first base is a story, like it or not. It seems that Raissman's real issue is any media coverage of A-Rod that isn't considered openly antagonistic or negative. That shows a bias in Raissman's coverage of A-Rod and that he seems to have a sort of an agenda.
It all was food for the “fatigued.” While Rodriguez came off clumsy playing first, Fox’s pictures also told a story of a guy who said he would do anything for his team actually backing up his words — and doing it while risking on-field embarrassment.
How dare Fox show A-Rod playing a position he doesn't normally play! Fox is showing A-Rod helping and this appeases the "fatigued"! Fox should not even have acknowledged who was playing first base.
It's ridiculous when these networks have agendas when covering players. Cover A-Rod in a negative fashion or don't cover him at all. The only agenda Fox should have is an agenda that Bob Raissman agrees with.
Yet all these pictures, all this bright spotlight, plays into another controversy rolling up fast on Rodriguez and the Yankees.
So the general argument being made by Raissman is that the media is on A-Rod's side? This is a real argument being made?
Fox’s MLB reporter Ken Rosenthal, twice on Saturday’s telecast and once on the pregame, detailed how Yankees suits “do not intend” to pay Rodriguez any of the $6 million HR milestone bonuses.
Oh no, look how the media is covering this story. Trying to make the public feel bad for A-Rod because the Yankees signed a contract stating he would get $6 million when he passed Willie Mays on the all-time home run list and now they are trying to renege on this deal. What's the point of mentioning this, other than to get the focus on A-Rod? It's not news, even though every other media outlet has reported it as news and Bob Raissman himself will discuss this story right now.
But the Yankees will contest the payments. In fact, they do not even include his pursuit in the press notes under the heading of “upcoming Yankee milestones.”
As Rosenthal said, they consider Rodriguez, after the PED use and the year ban, “an unmarketable player."
That's better. Feed that A-Rod is unmarketable and don't try to show him in a positive light. Much better.
Buck contradicted the Yankees’ assertion. “To me he is, by far, the most interesting player — good or bad — the Yankees have,” Buck said. “And an organization that has its own television network (Yankees Entertainment & Sports Network), well, people want to know what this guy does. ... Every A-Rod at-bat is an event, whether he’s hitting .300 or zero.”
And yet, Joe Buck insists on continuing to focus his attention on A-Rod. What's the obsession Fox has with Rodriguez? Okay, back to Bob Raissman talking about A-Rod at length.
John Kruk provided evidence after Schilling gushed about how good A-Rod looks and how wonderful it is seeing him back in competition. “Yeah, I’ll bet the Yankees are tickled about it too,” Kruk said sarcastically.
Except, A-Rod does look good after taking a year off from baseball. Raissman can call it "gushing" all he wants. A-Rod took a year off from baseball at the age of 38 and has come back to be a productive player (so far) at the age of 39. It's being acknowledged, regardless of whether Bob Raissman prefer the conversation to be solely a negative one.
And, more importantly, how might any future coverage, with A-Rod as the positive focal point, play into the bonus clause dispute if it ever goes to arbitration?
I like how Bob Raissman claims noticing A-Rod is hitting the ball well, showing him playing first base and saying that fans are tired of the PED discussion is "positive" coverage for A-Rod. Apparently observing his actions on the baseball field and commenting on them is seen as positive coverage, as opposed to being seen as the Fox baseball crew simply doing their job as analysts.
If A-Rod is so “unmarketable,” Dan Shulman, ESPN’s “Sunday Night Baseball” play-by-play voice wouldn’t say the “fans are back in his corner,” would he? Aren’t these fans the ones who would be purchasing Rodriguez milestone merchandise from the Yankees?
The Yankees are only saying he is unmarketable to stick it to him and save a few dollars. That's the only reason they call him unmarketable.
And if A-Rod was so “unmarketable” why would YES be airing promotional spots for the Orioles series featuring A-Rod at the plate?
If A-Rod were unmarketable, would Bob Raissman be talking about A-Rod at every possible opportunity?
And if he continues to drive the ball, how far could Rodriguez juice YES’ ratings, which are expected to take a hit in this Yankees season of ifs? Those numbers will help quantify his marketability, right?
Yes, the Yankees want to save $6 million, so they pretend A-Rod isn't marketable in some form or another. Bob Raissman has already acknowledged why the Yankees are trying to not pay attention to A-Rod breaking records, yet he seems to be confused as to why they aren't acknowledging A-Rod breaking records.
Then again, if his bat cools off, these networks, the ones would gave him such a rousing reception, may experience another form of Alex Rodriguez fatigue.
Which Bob Raissman would love because he doesn't like it when A-Rod gets any attention that isn't negative attention. Simply acknowledging A-Rod is about to break an MLB record or showing him on the field when he isn't failing miserably is seen as "positive" coverage of A-Rod. Raissman will only stand for negative coverage or no coverage of A-Rod at all.
I'll start first with Dan Shaughnessy, who thinks A-Rod is making things awkward for the Yankees playing well and trying to break records. Why does A-Rod insist on the Yankees making things awkward by not recognizing his achievements so they don't have to pay him bonuses for breaking MLB records?
Alex Rodriguez is approaching Willie Mays on the all-time home run list and his own team won’t acknowledge this fact.
For legal and financial reasons. They don't want to pay him when he breaks records, so they want to show they didn't publicize A-Rod breaking records and hope they don't have to pay him.
A-Rod is baseball’s pariah. He is the bubonic plague. Hating on A-Rod is one of America’s favorite parlor games. Even in his own organization.
He's seen as a pariah mostly within his own organization, outside of the Yankees players of course. I've not read anything from a source on the Yankees actual team (it's usually a source in the organization, not the players) that says negative things about A-Rod. Who cares though? Because sportswriters like hating on A-Rod, this means most of America hates him. Dan Shaughnessy speaks for us all.
It’s weird to see him in uniform again. It’s weird to see him in the Yankee locker room, where he dresses next to Jacoby Ellsbury, a tremendous talent who never gets particularly close to his teammates.
I'm sorry not sorry that it's weird. No one cares how you feel, Dan.
The beloved Yankee stars are all gone. Bernie Williams. Andy Pettitte. Jorge Posada. Mariano Rivera. Finally, Derek Jeter. But A-Rod is back. He is back because the Yankees still owe him a giant bag of money ($61 million through 2017). He is back because he served his one-year suspension. He is back because he’s got nowhere else to go.
He is back because, despite all of his cheating and transgressions, he is wanting to help the Yankees win baseball games without making a huge deal about it. A-Rod has not searched out controversy or tried to defend any of his actions. I think the media resents this in a way. They don't want a silent A-Rod, because they can't rip on a silent A-Rod for things he says.
A-Rod wasn’t available for interviews before Friday’s marathon. He bolted past his clubhouse stall once, but couldn’t say anything because his mouth was full of mouthwash.
“That’s his new trick,’’ said a Yankee beat writer. “He’s got the mouthwash going and can’t say anything when he brushes past you.’’
If A-Rod doesn't want to talk to reporters then he doesn't have to. Sorry, that's life. If he wants to do a "trick" by having mouthwash in, that's fine, because he's not obligated to talk to the media after the game. In fact, if I were A-Rod then I would make it a point to not speak with the media that clearly doesn't like me and clearly is going to try and twist my words to mean something they don't or mangle them in such a fashion to where that sportswriter can get a column bashing me out of it.
It is awkward for Hal and Hank Steinbrenner (this is one of those times we could really use Boss George’s bombast).
It's the "If only George Steinbrenner were alive then he would fix everything that's wrong with the Yankees" pining. It's cute and fun, but I don't seem to recall George Steinbrenner always doing a heck of a lot to fix what's wrong with the Yankees and often he was the source of the organization's problems. Revisionist history is something sportswriters love to participate in when they are discussing the Yankees and George Steinbrenner. He has become a symbol for something that he really wasn't when he was actually alive.
It is awkward for Yankee GM Brian Cashman and manager Joe Girardi. It is awkward for A-Rod’s teammates. And it is awkward for the Yankee PR staff, one of the best in the business. They don’t quite know how to acknowledge A-Rod without appearing to celebrate his deeds.
It sucks it's awkward, but the only ones who are making it awkward is the Yankees organization who refuses to acknowledge A-Rod's achievements. They could end the awkwardness and just bite the bullet to celebrate him, but they won't do it.
There was a time when the Yankees were hoping A-Rod would become the all-time home run king. He was like Tiger Woods marching toward Jack Nicklaus’s 18 major titles. A-Rod had a chance to be the first 800-homer guy. And he would do it as a Yankee.
But that was before he got caught cheating and lied. And cheated again. And lied again. And sued everybody, including his own union.
A-Rod did sue his own union. He also was sort of right to do that. MLB used the Biogenesis lawsuit as a way to collect documents and not redress any sort of injury that was alleged in the basis of the lawsuit. That's my view at least. MLB gathered evidence behind the illusion of the Biogenesis lawsuit and MLB also violated confidentiality with leaks in the case. A-Rod doesn't think the union sufficiently defended him in this situation. Saying, "he sued his own union" is a much more salacious way of saying that A-Rod didn't think his rights as a member of the union were being protected like they should be. If your employer was using what you perceived to be bogus means to collect evidence against you, then wouldn't you probably be a little salty if you believe your union didn't protect you sufficiently and defend you against your employer? I know I would.
Now there is no club-sanctioned celebration when he hits a home run. There is embarrassment.
So now there is complaining that A-Rod has done something wrong when he hits a home run.
And it’s going to be really embarrassing sometime soon when he hits his seventh home run of the season and passes Mays for fourth on the all-time list.
This is the same Willie Mays who was a team source for amphetamines, right?
Willie Mays is a baseball treasure, but I always laugh at how the greenie use of the previous generation of baseball players is glossed over. Hank Aaron was passed by Barry Bonds for the home run record. I think we are past the point of being embarrassed when older generation greats have their records passed by players tied to PED's.
A-Rod is owed a $6 million bonus every time he passes these magic markers. It is believed that the Yankees intend to withhold the bonus and take the matter to arbitration.
The Yankees believe that if it can be proven that the milestones are not marketable because they are tainted, the ball club will not have to pay the bonuses.
“We are very, very careful in not marketing these milestones,’’ said a high-ranking Yankee official.
But if the Yankees are admitting they aren't marketing these achievements and they have a clear motive to save money by not marketing these achievements, then why should A-Rod not get his $6 million? Simply because the organization chooses not to market A-Rod's achievement, well that's not his problem. The Yankees signed a contract and if they choose not to market A-Rod, that's great, but it doesn't mean he isn't entitled to the $6 million as designated in his contract.
Again, we have all done things wrong. Maybe even done things wrong twice, but if you put yourself in A-Rod's shoes for a minute then it's easy to get why he wouldn't be happy the Yankees are going to withhold money from his contract for achievements. If my employer withheld money from me after I believe I did my time for a wrongdoing, then I would be unhappy. I understand the Yankees' point of view too. No team wants to market a false record. Well, some MLB teams do and that's their choice.
The only mention was in the daily notes where a small A-Rod section disclosed that he is fifth on the all-time homer list. There was no mention of A-Rod needing five to tie Mays.
A-Rod can no longer play shortstop or third base.
He can still play third base if he needed to. This is why he was practicing fielding ground balls at third base during spring training. Not to steal Chase Headley's job, but to be prepared to play the position if he was needed.
He’s a full-time DH who experimented at first base in spring training. He can’t run. He’s limited.
So, he's a full-time DH like other full-time DH's who can't really do much else outside of hit?
The Yanks have not hit the road yet, so A-Rod has heard a lot of cheers and not many boos.
Unless he's paid attention to the noises coming from the pressbox of course. Sportswriters who love being up on their pedestal are booing A-Rod every chance they get.
That will change Monday night when the Yankees play the Orioles at Camden Yards. The Yankees come to Boston on Friday, May 1. That should be good.
While also slightly ironic given the fact prominent Red Sox players haven't exactly been clean over the past decade.
Maybe that’ll be the weekend that A-Rod hits No. 661 to vault Mays.
I can see the Daily News headline now: “Pay Day Kid Passes Say Hey Kid; Nobody Notices’’.
"Pay Day Kid"? Dan Shaughnessy is calling A-Rod the "Pay Day Kid." Yeah, blame A-Rod for signing a contract that he and the Yankees agreed was his market value. It's all A-Rod's fault and we all know Dan Shaughnessy would never take more money from the "Boston Globe" if they offered it to him. Dan is too good for that, plus he may have already done that but his salary is private.
A-Rod is back. It’s a big bowl of awkward.
It is and it's because the Yankees are working hard to make it that way. I don't not blame A-Rod for his part, but the Yankees signed the contract, the contract hasn't been voided, and so if they don't choose to market A-Rod then that is their choosing. This would all just be easier if A-Rod would stop performing well enough to break MLB records. If A-Rod would just hit .150 and not have an extra base hit then there would be no awkwardness and the media could rip him for his lousy performance. That's what Dan Shaughnessy wants to do anyway.
Bob Raissman has also noticed that A-Rod has screwed everything up by insisting on not playing so poorly and daring to break MLB records. For Bob, he's a little confused that ESPN and Fox are paying so much attention to A-Rod. It's perfectly fine for Raissman to have written about A-Rod three times from March 14 to April 15, but it astounds him when other media outlets try to pay attention to A-Rod. They are just proving his marketability, which is a big no-no.
The lines were strikingly similar. Both were spoken while the camera was on Alex Rodriguez.
“I think there’s a PED fatigue among fans,” Tom Verducci, working with Harold Reynolds and Joe Buck, said Saturday during FS1’s Red Sox-Yankees telecast. “It’s not why they come to the ballpark.”
Less than 24 hours later, Curt Schilling attempted to explain why Yankee fans have quickly gravitated back to A-Rod’s corner. “Part of it too is fatigue. That (Biogenesis/PED) story was fatiguing,” Schilling said early in ESPN’s telecast of the Sunday night series finale. “I think everyone is tired of it. They want to move on, including Alex.”
I think that Tom Verducci and Curt Schilling are both correct. Of course, most sportswriters won't ever realize this because they are too busy taking hardline stances against PED use and continuing to beat the PED horse into the ground. Yes, PED's are an issue (which is why MLB has a drug policy), and yes, those players who take PED's are cheaters. After a while, it's exhausting to talk about it and debate it. This is part of the reason I post these "What A-Rod Has Done Wrong Today" posts, to show how these sportswriters dream of different things that A-Rod has done wrong in place of simply writing another column obliterating him for twice getting caught using PED's. There is PED fatigue and sportswriters try to talk around this fatigue by talking about how A-Rod is marketing poison or how he shows up at training camp early AND DOESN'T EVEN TELL THE YANKEES! All these things that A-Rod has done wrong goes back to his PED use, which I am betting the general public is tired of discussing. I know I am. So a villain becomes a sort of anti-hero.
During spring training, commissioner Rob Manfred called on MLB’s national TV partners to help market baseball’s young stars. Yet during the first weekend of the season, the spotlight was on a 39-year-old tainted drug abuser (who Manfred helped bust) returning from a season in exile.
I disagree the focus was on A-Rod. Maybe from the perspective of a sportswriter like Raissman who is paid to cover A-Rod, but as the fan of a team that isn't the Yankees I only heard about A-Rod when I went searching out information about him or read a column from a New York-based sportswriter.
It just wasn’t what the network voices had to say about him. It was what the cameras allowed us see. The coverage did not reach total Love-In status, but pretty close.
Yes, how dare MLB Network talk about A-Rod a lot and choose to keep the focus on what Rodriguez was doing. Don't they know it is the New York media's job to saturate the airwaves with coverage of A-Rod? The New York media are the only ones allowed to discuss A-Rod all the time and at length. It's fine for Bob Raissman to write about A-Rod three times in a month, but when MLB Network discusses A-Rod then they are simply giving the spotlight to someone who doesn't deserve it. Or is it that Raissman doesn't like any coverage of A-Rod that isn't negative coverage?
On Sunday night, a number of Yankees met with kids from the Harlem Little League but ESPN only showed A-Rod speaking with them and signing autographs.
This was an image-softening moment. Team A-Rod could not have orchestrated this heartwarming session any better.
ESPN should have shown A-Rod spitting in the face of these kids and then slipping his phone number to each child's mother in the hopes of having a quickie after the game was over. But NOOOOO, ESPN had to show A-Rod in a light that wasn't negative. That's not allowed.
There also were regular-guy shots of Rodriguez interacting with teammates in the dugout. On Saturday, Fox zoned in on A-Rod awkwardly attempting to play first base — another sympathetic sequence.
Except A-Rod was really being a regular guy in the dugout. It's not like Team A-Rod has forced his teammates to like him. And A-Rod playing first base is a story, like it or not. It seems that Raissman's real issue is any media coverage of A-Rod that isn't considered openly antagonistic or negative. That shows a bias in Raissman's coverage of A-Rod and that he seems to have a sort of an agenda.
It all was food for the “fatigued.” While Rodriguez came off clumsy playing first, Fox’s pictures also told a story of a guy who said he would do anything for his team actually backing up his words — and doing it while risking on-field embarrassment.
How dare Fox show A-Rod playing a position he doesn't normally play! Fox is showing A-Rod helping and this appeases the "fatigued"! Fox should not even have acknowledged who was playing first base.
It's ridiculous when these networks have agendas when covering players. Cover A-Rod in a negative fashion or don't cover him at all. The only agenda Fox should have is an agenda that Bob Raissman agrees with.
Yet all these pictures, all this bright spotlight, plays into another controversy rolling up fast on Rodriguez and the Yankees.
So the general argument being made by Raissman is that the media is on A-Rod's side? This is a real argument being made?
Fox’s MLB reporter Ken Rosenthal, twice on Saturday’s telecast and once on the pregame, detailed how Yankees suits “do not intend” to pay Rodriguez any of the $6 million HR milestone bonuses.
Oh no, look how the media is covering this story. Trying to make the public feel bad for A-Rod because the Yankees signed a contract stating he would get $6 million when he passed Willie Mays on the all-time home run list and now they are trying to renege on this deal. What's the point of mentioning this, other than to get the focus on A-Rod? It's not news, even though every other media outlet has reported it as news and Bob Raissman himself will discuss this story right now.
But the Yankees will contest the payments. In fact, they do not even include his pursuit in the press notes under the heading of “upcoming Yankee milestones.”
As Rosenthal said, they consider Rodriguez, after the PED use and the year ban, “an unmarketable player."
That's better. Feed that A-Rod is unmarketable and don't try to show him in a positive light. Much better.
Buck contradicted the Yankees’ assertion. “To me he is, by far, the most interesting player — good or bad — the Yankees have,” Buck said. “And an organization that has its own television network (Yankees Entertainment & Sports Network), well, people want to know what this guy does. ... Every A-Rod at-bat is an event, whether he’s hitting .300 or zero.”
And yet, Joe Buck insists on continuing to focus his attention on A-Rod. What's the obsession Fox has with Rodriguez? Okay, back to Bob Raissman talking about A-Rod at length.
John Kruk provided evidence after Schilling gushed about how good A-Rod looks and how wonderful it is seeing him back in competition. “Yeah, I’ll bet the Yankees are tickled about it too,” Kruk said sarcastically.
Except, A-Rod does look good after taking a year off from baseball. Raissman can call it "gushing" all he wants. A-Rod took a year off from baseball at the age of 38 and has come back to be a productive player (so far) at the age of 39. It's being acknowledged, regardless of whether Bob Raissman prefer the conversation to be solely a negative one.
And, more importantly, how might any future coverage, with A-Rod as the positive focal point, play into the bonus clause dispute if it ever goes to arbitration?
I like how Bob Raissman claims noticing A-Rod is hitting the ball well, showing him playing first base and saying that fans are tired of the PED discussion is "positive" coverage for A-Rod. Apparently observing his actions on the baseball field and commenting on them is seen as positive coverage, as opposed to being seen as the Fox baseball crew simply doing their job as analysts.
If A-Rod is so “unmarketable,” Dan Shulman, ESPN’s “Sunday Night Baseball” play-by-play voice wouldn’t say the “fans are back in his corner,” would he? Aren’t these fans the ones who would be purchasing Rodriguez milestone merchandise from the Yankees?
The Yankees are only saying he is unmarketable to stick it to him and save a few dollars. That's the only reason they call him unmarketable.
And if A-Rod was so “unmarketable” why would YES be airing promotional spots for the Orioles series featuring A-Rod at the plate?
If A-Rod were unmarketable, would Bob Raissman be talking about A-Rod at every possible opportunity?
And if he continues to drive the ball, how far could Rodriguez juice YES’ ratings, which are expected to take a hit in this Yankees season of ifs? Those numbers will help quantify his marketability, right?
Yes, the Yankees want to save $6 million, so they pretend A-Rod isn't marketable in some form or another. Bob Raissman has already acknowledged why the Yankees are trying to not pay attention to A-Rod breaking records, yet he seems to be confused as to why they aren't acknowledging A-Rod breaking records.
Then again, if his bat cools off, these networks, the ones would gave him such a rousing reception, may experience another form of Alex Rodriguez fatigue.
Which Bob Raissman would love because he doesn't like it when A-Rod gets any attention that isn't negative attention. Simply acknowledging A-Rod is about to break an MLB record or showing him on the field when he isn't failing miserably is seen as "positive" coverage of A-Rod. Raissman will only stand for negative coverage or no coverage of A-Rod at all.
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