Underdog Millionaire

Cheater. Adulterer. Diva. Narcisist. Selfish. While these five words have been thrown around profusely as of late to describe Yankees third baseman Alex Rodriguez, here's a label I'm ready to place on A-Rod: Underdog. Due to a neverending saga that has surrounded arguably the greatest ballplayer to ever live, I'll admit that I've come full circle on A-Rod. When he first started out with Seattle in the late 90's, I was a huge follower because, like many children, I wanted to be able to witness greatness. A-Rod was the goods. The man had more tools than Home Depot. His 40-40 season in 1998 solidified his status as Baseball's Next Big Thing.....then he signed a $250 million deal with the Rangers, and everyone outside of Texas turned on him. You see, the American baseball public loves to do two things: fake outrage and become purists when the mood strikes. Suddenly, the man who we were willing to give the keys to the world, a man who was being heralded as baseball's savior, was overrated. Overpaid. Selfish. Greedy. So while everyone would have loved to entrench A-Rod in the middle of their lineup at the turn of the century, suddenly he was too rich for us.

Naturally, $250 million for 6 months of work draws quite the large bulls-eye on your back. After the Rangers struggled to make the playoffs, let alone win a title, with A-Rod, we looked for new adjectives for the Bill Gates of Baseball. Choke artist. Not clutch. Self-absorbed. A look at A-Rod's numbers shows that he kept his end of the bargain. He led the AL in homers all three seasons in Texas, led in RBIs in 2002 and stole double digit bases all but once. His career average as a Ranger was .305 and won the MVP once and finished 2nd the year before that(though he should have beaten out Miguel Tejada in 2002 and he definitely should have gotten the MVP over Juan Gonzalez in '96, which was his first full season). The numbers meant nothing, especially while rival Derek Jeter was winning pennants in New York, which added more pressure on A-Rod to come up big in Texas. As luck would have it, A-Rod would be traded to New York to unite with Jeter in what was supposed to be the second coming of Murderer's Row.

In the Big Apple, A-Rod would meet the person that ultimately caused his downfall. It wasn't Jeter, whom the NY media kept trying to coax into a rivalry with Rodriguez. It wasn't the Yankee fans, who despise A-Rod for his large contracts and small production in October. No, A-Rod's downward spiral would be caused by a beatwriter named Selena Roberts. Roberts dropped the bombshell this past spring that A-Rod used steroids during his playing days in Texas, which was yet another dagger the baseball world would jab into A-Rod's chest. While A-Rod's name as a steroid user was a brow raiser, it was hardly the death to baseball that the media and fans made it to be. For one, during the 80's and 90's, EVERYONE did steroids. Your favorite slugger. Your rotation ace. Hell, your manager was probably juicing. The fact that A-Rod was a juicer was as surprising as saying people in the 70's wore bellbottoms. Like A-Rod said when he eventually came clean, it was the culture then. Once the A-Rod steroid fiasco started to die down, Roberts(in an amazing ploy at marketing her A-Rod book, which is where all these bombshells can be found) dropped another tidbit that A-Rod may or may not have juiced in high school and while he was a Yankee. Oh, and he helped opposing hitters during blowouts by tipping pitches. Oh, and he may or may not have organized 9/11. Oh, and he kidnapped Lindbergh's baby. And did I mention he was a member of the Third Reich?

Whether Roberts' claims are substantiated or not(her info comes from the same unnamed sources that made Ed Werder famous), the timing of Robert's second course of controversy made things seem a bit fishy. The fact that Roberts chose to move up the release of her book to coincide with A-Rod's return from hip surgery rubs me the wrong way. There's reporting the truth and then there's trying to sell books. The newest drama surrounding A-Rod is why I've come full circle. You see, nobody's above criticism, but there is something to be said about piling on a beaten man. Roberts' bush league gimmick to leak stories at certian times to generate the best possible interest in a tell-all book that has no authorization from the subject of the book and whose info comes from dubious "inside sources" trying to turn a buck has changed all the momentum from making A-Rod a selfish cheater to a victim in a clear example of an accomplished writer trying to make a name for herself by cutting down the very athletes she's paid to report upon.

Look, I'm not going to try to drum up sympathy for Alex Rodriguez. It's hard to feel sorry for a man sitting on half a billion dollars in baseball money, who was so insecure about the physical gifts that he was oversaturated with that he felt the need to cheat baseball and its fans. However, even if a man deserves to get beat down, you don't kick him while he lies on the floor. You can't paint the man as a greedy corner-cutter when you, yourself, are burning the codes of ethics so you can have some face time and look all nice and shiny for your five good minutes on PTI. A-Rod's a cheater. So's everyone on Wall Street. A-Rod's a liar. So is every politician. A-Rod's a man who felt like he needed an edge to compete with other cheaters. Did he need to? No, but there isn't a man alive who could tell me that they wouldn't do whatever it took to achieve stardom and fame, even at the cost of their own reputation.

Especially not Selena Roberts.

Signing off,

Your Favorite Blogger's Favorite Blogger....Dave Leonardis.