A-Rod

A-Rod has been my favorite Yankee for a while now. I guess the first time I fell in love with him was years ago at Cal Ripken’s last All-Star game, when he insisted on Rip playing short. An emotional moment; I’m a sucker for that shit. Then he came to the Yankees and he just produced. You didn’t hear a peep from him about moving to third out of respect to Jeter, even though the whole world knew he was a better shortstop. MVP in 2005. 10 rbis in one game off Colon. Then came last year – he struggled a little bit, and the world decided to pile on – bleacher bums booing his every move, radio show callers screaming that he was the worst ballplayer ever; I’m pretty sure someone found his image on the grassy knoll with a shotgun. Everyone who had ever played in the big leagues (including Brooks Robinson, who wasn’t a tenth of the hitter A-Rod is) “sitting Alex down”, trying to talk to him. And at no point did he ever lash out and say “fuck you, I am A-Rod, shut the fuck up.” I have never seen a town turn on an athlete so quickly and viciously. Ever. I don’t think people who don’t follow can even understand the vitriol directed towards him....this would be like Liverpool turning on the Beatles. It was unreal. To see him with each game, pressing more and more, desperately trying harder and harder. Mind you – this was the highest paid athlete in the history of team sports, a 2-time MVP, coulda told everyone to go fuck themselves, and he was being accused of trying too hard. While having the huge contract that everyone screamed about, the big rap was he tried too hard. Cadillacing? No. Aloof? Nyet. I remember my first boss, in Mississippi, after listening to me rant and rant about being taken advantage of by a client re: money, after hearing me bitch “godammit, I’m too nice!”, I remember him looking at me and saying “well...there’s worse things to be.” If the worst thing you can say about someone is he’s too nice or trying too hard, well then you’re lucky. A-Rod wasn’t cadillacing, he wasn’t veering off to the dugout during pop-outs...he was trying too hard to desperately please the people that blamed him for being rich and talented. I found myself with each at-bat praying, begging PLEASE don’t hit into a game-ending triple play!! I defended him, pleaded with him every at bat to get a hit......but the...you know what...I didn’t even plead with him to get a hit; I just begged god to NOT give the next days’ radio show callers something to scream about. It was a miserable season, capped by Papa Joe dropping him to 8th in the batting order for the final playoff game.

We all love Torre. But I will never, NEVER forgive him for batting A-Rod 8th in that playoff game. Never. Was a pure humiliation move. Just like as much as I love him, I will never forgive Jeter for leaving A-Rod out to dry so many times last year. Over and over, again and again, all it woulda taken was for Jeter to step in and say something, ANYthing, and it woulda made all the difference. But no. And I think I argued with Op for awhile that Jeter was right to not make a big deal of it, but I was wrong. He shoulda come out and said “we’re lucky to have the best player of our lifetime on our team, shut the fuck up.” But he never did. I started to think that Torre/Jeter and the other “real Yankees” got a laugh out of A-Rod’s misfortune, snickering like the cool kids at the lunch table.

So now A-Rod is having a season for the ages. ALLLLLLLLL of a sudden, he can do no wrong and everyone is popping hammys applauding him. I hope all is right and he’ll re-sign with the Yankees for next year. But there is an even bigger part of me that, after he hits 58 dingers and 160 rbis this year, hopes he tells us to go fuck ourselves and signs with the fucking Royals. Fuck you, have a good time next year cryyyyyyying on the fucking radio about how we let A-Rod get away. The Yankee fans deserve it, the way we treated him last year (and DESPERATELY wanted to get him in trouble this year with strip clubs/blondes bullshit.)

There’s a reason A-Rod is my favorite guy, and it has nothing to do with the homers, the inevitable Gold Glove etc. Over the years as I’ve been watching, I see things. I see that every time a Yankee, no matter whom, hits a home run who is right there to greet him, having some laughs in the dugout? A-Rod. He’s not in the video room obsessing over his swing or talking to Boras, he’s right there. And even more so throughout this year, when in the beginning the Yankees were bringing up a new 22-year old pitcher seemingly every day. Every day these kids (Clippard, DeSalvio etc) would get SHELLED and Torre comes out to get the ball, the last Yankee that would be on the mound giving them a pat on the ass was A-Rod. And to most fans that might not mean shit, but to me, I notice that stuff and it means a lot. To a 22-year old baseball player, A-Rod is a huge deal.

When I was a kid, Darryl Hammond was a GOD to me. A local legend – all state in football and basketball. When I was in 6th grade, it didn’t get any bigger than him...no matter what he did later, when I was 11 or 12 I used to listen to the games on the radio and just dream of being that good; DREAM of even being in his presence. Now, this was in a tiny town – when I look back, I’m pretty sure that if I stuck my head out of my house and shouted his name, he woulda come wandering up. A small-town hero. But two years later I found myself on the basketball court, practicing with the varsity even though I was only in the eighth grade, and in comes Darryl Hammond. We all stopped short; we all tried to act cool. It was Xmas and he was home from the University of Virginia (where he was an all-ACC safety) and he joined right in, scrimmaging with us. I don’t remember how many points I had that day, I don’t remember if we won. But I do remember a fight for the ball, we both went up, and I went down...spilling onto the floor; all prolly 140 pounds of me. I remember shaking the cobwebs off, looking up and...there was Darryl Hammond. Outstretched arm, helping me up. I couldn’t believe it. This was Darryl Hammond; I thought he’d be on the Purple Rain tour and then walking on with the Lakers. Helping me up. I don’t know if I got the board, I don’t know if I was fouled, but I will always remember Darryl helping me up, slapping me on the back and saying “good job, man.”

I remember these things, and I think of Darryl Hammond whenever I see A-Rod slapping another kid on the rear that YOU KNOW is thinking “shit....A-rod just gave me encouragement!!” That shit means a lot. To the fan, the spectator and even to the athlete. A-Rod's definitely more Mickey than Joe D. To me, the greatest compliment of all: a great teammate.