what can be said, when his name, ALONE, sparks reaction...
it's been said in every great drama, there must be a great villain.
and...in the world of baseball, that villain has more-or-less been the New York Yankees...
and...where would the greatest villain of all of Major League Baseball just to happen to belong? but, of course, with the New York Yankees.
love him or hate him, cheater or prodigal son, Alex Rodriguez has defied many labels and expectations. perpetually elusive in all manners of life, he has confounded both critics and fans, alike, and never seemed personally impacted by any of it.
it was just some boring Monday in February and i was at work. my mind was nowhere near the subject of baseball and my boss blurted out to me (with a HUGE smile on his face), "HEYYYYY! I SEE THE YANKEES GOT AAAAAAAAROD....."
i guess part of me should have KNOWN why his emotive level was so high...but i distinctly remember thinking, "whoa. wait. that guy? why???..."
i gotta admit, in the beginning i was annoyed with all the Arod hype. i saw this guy out there, pretty much acting like a primadonna and i grew to endure his presence...much like the resignation a spouse might have in a loveless marriage...
i remained silent over confrontations from fans of other teams (or outright Yankee haters) and tried to hope he would simply find a way to either blend in or make his presence a good thing...
after several years of grit-your-teeth annoyance of his presence, i found myself stopped in my tracks one winter eve in 2007...
when i was crunching the career stats of Andruw Jones. for whatever reason my mind had returned to the postseason rivalries of the Braves and Yankees many years prior, and i found myself pouring over the accomplishments of Jones. i compared Jones to the greats...checking his numbers against players like Mickey Mantle and the Babe and thought "that's why players like Mickey Mantle and the Babe are who they are...wow..."
then...for GOD ONLY KNOWS WHAT reason, i decided to compare their numbers against Alex Rodriguez.
and that's when my mouth dropped.
i didn't know what to do with what i was looking at. had he really accomplished ALL THAT? how? when? every time i ever saw the guy in the box, he seemed to be GRINDING INTO DOUBLE PLAYS...
nonetheless, his number stood as a fact. an undeniable fact. the guy has truly accomplished the unimaginable compared to the majority of Major League Players, in their careers.
i guess the suspension and all that was one of those things that kinda stands out in my mind. it was what it was. did he cheat? sure. is he alone? no. does it matter? sure. what i do know is this, however: until MLB has more definitive and thorough testing in place for substance use, it's policy and findings are subject to criticism and seem to fuel a level of "politics" contributing toward WHO is caught and WHO is not...
and WHEN...
and...while the merry-go-round of PED use may continue within Major League Baseball....no one knows FOR SURE how broad it's use is, nor how politically-oriented it's objective is...
in other words: let he who is without sin cast the first fastball..
Selig.
my favorite Arod moment? hmmmm. dunno. clearly my emotions surrounding him have been many. however, i must recall that hit-by-pitch received by him at Fenway from the hands of Dempster.
i'll never forget the tone of that moment. and, truth be told, it wasn't enough that the Fenway faithful were boo-ing Arod and despising his very presence... it wasn't enough that the tension in the air couldn't even be cut with a chainsaw... the hatred... the overt desire of the masses to see Arod suffer...
and then, with the Red Sox leading by a score of 2-0 in the top of the second, bases empty, none out, Dempster hauls off and throws at Alex Rodriguez's left knee, to the delight and merriment of the masses...
caving in to the appetite of further pleasing the masses, Dempster showed his lack of character and respect for the Game by sealing the deal on ball four, delivering a solid hit-by-pitch to the left shoulder of Arod...while the masses chanted "You're a cheater."
i guess it was at THAT moment, watching how the Game, itself...the fans...the umpire...the media...how the PEOPLE who claim to LOVE and REPRESENT the Game...how they were setting an example... and example of disgusting degradation...of becoming Judge and Jury over this man... of how the "politics" of the Game were defining the direction the Game was being allowed to go...
and i hated Bud Selig all over again, afresh.
that inning left more of a negative impression on me than any other inning of Major League Baseball i have ever beheld. and i remember truly feeling like my heart was breaking...like that child i once was, who revered the Game, who spent years of winters yearning for the Game, was being confronted with a part of the Game i never imagined existed
and there it was. it had happened. and what had happened was acceptable. Dempster threw his first pitch at Arods knee and it was overlooked. three close-misses later, Dempster finally actually hits the guy and people are thrilled.
no thanks. my respect for what this kind of Game represents is officially gone. sure Arod may have cheated...or he did cheat. okay. so did Braun. and Bonds. and McGwire and Sosa and Selig and where does it stop? sincerely, where does "absolute blame" get assigned? jus sayin.
nonetheless, Alex Rodriguez found his way through that game with Dempster remaining on the mound, and clocked a solo shot off Dempster in the 6th inning, as well as going 3 for 4 and bringing in 2 RBI. the Yankees defeated the scumbag Red Sox on August 18, 2013 by a score of 9 to 6...
and Ryan Dempster's career would end ten games later. Alex Rodriguez would take 2014 off and return in 2015 with one of the best seasons he's played since 2009.
and something i got to learn through the career of Alex Rodriguez is this: the Game of baseball is not defined by it's players. neither is it confined by the sum of it's parts. the Game of baseball is greater, richer, grander, and far more surpassing than the errors, flaws, and even egregious mistakes of it's players. no one can limit this Game. no one.
and for that, i am grateful.
~kat
