Alex Rodriguez‘s spokesman issued a statement on Alex’s behalf about the tweet that enraged Brian Cashman:
“I will continue to work hard until my efforts get me back in pinstripes and help my team win. The tweet was pure excitement about Dr. Kelly’s prognosis.”
While it is easy to paint Alex as evil, it seems he really does love playing baseball. Over the last year, Rodriguez took a lot of abuse. I suspect many people, given the same health and wealth as Alex, would have packed it in and retired (which may be the point of the abuse in the first place). Instead, A-Rod underwent his surgery, worked hard in rehab and refused to feed the Biogenesis beast. When his doctor tells him he’s ready for games, shouldn’t that make him happy?
And in fact, why shouldn’t that make Brian Cashman and the Yankees happy? Yankees third basemen are terrible at the plate this year. If the Yankees really don’t want him back, then eat his contract and let him go. Truthfully, I think Cashman owes Alex an apology here.
Update: Will Leitch feels the same way I do.
Honestly, Cashman is out of line. The guy is happy because after an injury, surgery and rehab he is almost ready to start playing minor league games and thats a bad thing? Hey Cashman, you know who is to blame for the ridiculous long term contract AROD has….New York Yankees ownership..your bosses. Be mad at them
There’s a good piece on Sports on Earth about this:
http://www.sportsonearth.com/article/51816016/
I’m a Red Sox fan, and I think the amount of abuse that A-Rod gets is absolutely horrendous!
Sure, he’s done things that you wouldn’t see Nick Swisher or Brandon McCarthy do, but give him a bloody break already.
The flack Alex gets is absurd. I’ve got impingements in both of my hips and the feeling of bone on bone is, shall we say, unpleasant. Pain medication only works for so long until the nasty side effects take hold (all medication runs the risk of bad side effects, which is why I oppose PEDs.) PT has taken the pain away, but I can still feel bone on bone when practicing Aikido. It’s amazing that he’s been able to play at least defense at still a high level before the surgery.
This morning, I actually saw the tweet that Rodriguez sent. I can see why his boss doesn’t want him talking out of turn, but my gracious, that reaction was uncalled for.
Anyone who makes what Arod makes is going to be the target for abuse, especially when you get caught cheating or lying and underperform expectations.
The Yankees foolishly offered Arod far more than he could have got on the open market for far more years. That’s come back to haunt them since they have changed their business model to “cheap, cheap, cheap” and set an arbitrary spending cap on 2014, but they have nobody to blame but themselves.
Still think the main objection to his tweet was related to his insurance policy and the earliest date he can return with the Yankees getting paid for the time missed, but will wait for the so called hot shot reporters to break that,
They may not have the option of releasing him, unless those performance incentives are specifically worded to performance in a Yankee uniform. If they released him and ate his salary without that wording, any team that lacks a competent MLB level third baseman could pick him up for MLB minimum and play him until someone better came along, with A-Rod having the potential to hit enough HR to cost the Yankees tens of millions of dollars as fans all over MLB cackle in glee. If I was Cashman and wanted to neutralize A-Rod, I’d just leave him on the DL forever.