A-Rod comfortable as anti-hero
Alex Rodriguez’s time with the New York Yankees will be remembered for one World Series title, two MVP awards and countless controversies.
And for him not being Derek Jeter.
“When I’m among Yankee fans and the conversation turns to him, he’s not held with great fondness,” said Marty Appel, author of
“There was just something about the way he related to people over the years that fell short of a warm embrace, whether it was body language or dating celebrities,” said Appel, a former Yankees media relations director. “The lunch-box-carrying people just never really took to him.”
The most talented and most notorious player of his generation, Rodriguez is set to play his final game for the Yankees on Friday night at home against Tampa Bay.
New York plans to release him after the game, even though the team must pay him about $7 million for the rest of this season and $20 million next year.
“I think it’s going to be a crazy, electric stadium. I think there will be plenty of applause and there will be plenty of boos because people love to hate him,” said Vinny Milano of the Yankee Stadium ‘Bleacher Creatures’, who became an A-Rod fan after meeting him at a charity event.
“There are always going to be Yankees fans who hate the guy, no matter what his on-field accomplishments were, no matter how great of a player he was on the field. But he was OK with that. He understood it.”
In 2013, Mariano Rivera got a sendoff tour, leaving the Yankee Stadium mound for the final time in tears, accompanied by Jeter and Andy Pettitte, setting off a four-minute standing ovation.
Jeter, like Rivera a five-time World Series champion, got another league-wide farewell and hit a game-winning single against Baltimore on his final swing at Yankee Stadium in September 2014, raising both arms in triumph.
Rodriguez has been told pretty much to hit the road quickly with his .199 average as the Yankees turn to youth.
He is being given a position as an adviser to mentor prospects next year, and his goodbye takes place with an undertone of good riddance.
“My job description does not entail a farewell tour,” manager Joe Girardi said on Wednesday, when he left A-Rod out of the lineup.
Rodriguez, who turned 41 last month, has hit .283 with 351 homers and 1,096 RBIs for the Yankees, helping lead them to their 27 th Series title in 2009 but often failing in other postseasons.
But for some fans, he will never be in the same category as Babe Ruth, Lou Gehrig, Joe DiMaggio, Mickey Mantle and Jeter.
A-Rod’s career was tainted by his 2009 admission that he used performance-enhancing drugs while with Texas from 2001-03 and his season-long suspension in 2014 for violations of MLBs drug agreement and labor contract.
He hit .365 with six homers and 18 RBIs in the 2009 playoffs and had 13 consecutive seasons with at least 30 home runs and 100 RBIs — seven of those years in New York.
The majority of his 696 homers and 1,578 of his 3,114 hits came as a Yankee.
A-Rod was a 14-time AllStar, a two-time Gold Glove shortstop and the 1996 AL batting champion. He trails only Barry Bonds (762), Hank Aaron (755) and Babe Ruth (714) in homers, and his 2,085 RBIs are second to Aaron’s 2,297 since RBIs became an official statistic.
But Rodriguez was never just about baseball. He stoked his anti-hero status by making headlines for dating Madonna, Kate Hudson, Cameron Diaz and Torrie Wilson. He was photographed with strippers and gamblers.
Then there were his lawsuits, later dropped, against Major League Baseball, the players association and the Yankees head team physician.
“Who brought more shame to the franchise? How many Yankee immortals sued the team doctor? said former ESPN broadcaster Keith Olbermann,
“Reggie Jackson got to three World Series in five seasons. Billy Martin? Seven in 15, right? Alex’s era with the Yankees is one of the most barren in franchise history. There will be no reason for fans to recall him fondly or even positively.”