September 20, 2006
Alex Encouraged
There's an article on ESPN.com about an article that is going to appear in Sports Illustrated about Alex Rodriguez's teammates "criticizing" him during his slump. Alex says the story is true, but it really seems like the Yankees were trying to snap him out of his slump rather than making him look bad.
Alex of course, digs himself a hole.
"[Mike] Mussina doesn't get hammered at all," he told SI. "He's making a boatload of money. Giambi's making [$20.4 million], which is fine and dandy, but it seems those guys get a pass. When people write [bad things] about me, I don't know if it's [because] I'm good-looking, I'm biracial, I make the most money, I play on the most popular team ..."
Winning in the playoffs again will make that all go away, of course.
Update: Josh found the link to the full SI piece. I'll read it after my show.
Posted by David Pinto at
06:09 PM
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I found the entire article pretty positive for A-Rod. I just was watching ESPN and they were trying to spin it like you said that he was being ripped apart by his teammates. It's also a very fair point he brings up about his salary. I'm sure a lot of the boo-birds think he's the highest labor liability for the Yankees.
ESPN is merely trying to whip up a story. Utterly disgusting by the media. Apparently Tony Kornheiser was dissing A-Rod -- without have read the story. I wonder how many others commenting on it are in the same position.
It is really a non issue of a great player having an "off" year.
Actually the story was from SI, ESPN was just reporting it...
The responsible parties include those who gave interviews to a baseball writer (in this case one from SI). ESPN put up a headline about the story referencing 'unhappy family.' Of course they're going to put the most negative light on the story, no matter what. They'd go out of business if they did anything else.
A-rod is the king of killing himsefl with his own words.
ESPN was whipping up a (n at most) mildly negative story into some sort of Bronx Zoo atmosphere in the Yankees clubhouse. That was utterly irresponsible. BBTN was a joke last night.
I agree that the ESPN spin is "turmoil in the clubhouse" and it seems like arrant nonsense. I think that garbage plays well in the media, but Verducci's article does not indicate that the team is divided or that A-Rod is divisive.
In other words, ESPN (and the NY papers to some degree) are using the Verducci article to make A-Rod look like the next Bonds. That shoe don't fit.
