Playing days over, Rodriguez insists
Alex Rodriguez keeps a baseball bat in his office, but he no longer needs a baseball bat for work. The 41-year-old confirmed Tuesday at the New York Yankees spring training camp that his playing career is over, saying he has “zero” interest in returning to the field after finishing his career Aug. 12, a night the club honored the end of his tenure in pinstripes.
Rodriguez said he heard from other teams after leaving the Yankees roster, but he did not so much as take batting practice this offseason and never seriously considered returning to the sport as a player despite standing four home runs shy of 700 for his career. The bat’s just for moments of contemplation.
“If you hit .200, you wouldn’t pick up a bat either,” Rodriguez said in reference to his struggles at the plate during his final season. “I do have one in my locker — I’m sorry, not my locker — in my office, and every once in a while when I need to think better, I just grab that thing.”
Rodriguez earned 14 All-Star nods during a major league career that spanned 22 years and included countless controversies, from odd on-the-field behavior to public romances with celebrities to multiple forays into performance-enhancing drug use and the ensuing legal battles that culminated in a season-long suspension in 2014.
But for a man once widely rumored to have a painting of himself as a centaur in his home, Rodriguez announced the end of his playing days with little pomp and no circumstance, merely answering in the affirmative when a reporter asked if he was retired.
Rodriguez instead spent most of his news conference Tuesday expressing gratitude to the Yankees organization and deferring attention to the importance of preparing the club’s cadre of promising young players for the particulars of playing in New York.
“I’m definitely grateful for what I get to be doing now, to be around the young kids and talk about what’s expected here,” he said. “I’m in a unique position from all the things I’ve done in this game, both good and bad, and I learned my biggest lessons with some of my mistakes.
“There’s so much that’s expected in New York, and it’s so difficult to play in New York, that as staff and mentors, the best thing we can do is get them ready for what’s expected from them. Because it is a handful.”
Rodriguez, who’s filming a pilot for a CNBC show in which he’ll try to provide financial guidance for broke former athletes, will remain in Yankees camp as a guest instructor through Thursday and will return for at least one more three-day stint in the spring. And although Yankees manager Joe Girardi praised Rodriguez’s knowledge of the game — “You didn’t see Alex making mental mistakes,” Girardi said — the three-time MVP said he had no interest in becoming a manager anytime soon.
“No aspirations to manage,” said Rodriguez, who served as a pregame and postgame analyst for Fox during the last two postseasons. “I’m trying to manage my daughters, and most of the time they manage me. So, no.”
“No aspirations to manage. I’m trying to manage my daughters, and most of the time they manage me. So, no.” Alex Rodriguez