by Kimberly Pena & Tyler Roaix
In 1994, an 18-year-old kid from Miami named Alex Rodriguez broke into spring camp with the Seattle Mariners in an attempt to make the team. Almost immediately after stepping onto a Major League Baseball field, he became a household name. Within two years, he was an All-Star; within five, a regular 40-homer player. By the turn of the century, many were already putting him into the Hall of Fame discussion.
On August 12, 2016, Rodriguez played his final game as a New York Yankee after an incredible 12 years in New York. Considering the 41-year-old’s lack of playing time and declining production after a resurgent effort in 2015, this may very well be the end of the A-Rod era entirely. For A-Rod, he was prepared to leave the game he fell in love with as a child.
“I do want to be remembered as someone who was madly in love with the game of baseball, someone who loves it at every level,” said Rodriguez. “Someone who loves to learn it, play it, teach it, coach it. And also, I’m going to be hopefully remembered as someone who tripped and fell a lot, but someone that kept getting up.”
Rodriguez has led a very controversial 22-year baseball career, his lowest moment being when he was infamously suspended for the entire 2014 season following the Biogenesis investigation — the longest suspension ever served in Major League Baseball history. But his story did not end there.
In his 2015 campaign, in an attempt to redeem himself and earn back the love from the fans of New York, A-Rod wrote his own Cinderella story. He smashed 33 home runs and had 86 runs batted in. He was the most consistent hitter for the Yankees all season long, helping the team reach the playoffs after a two-year-long absence. It seemed as though he knew that the theme of that season was his redemption, because that is exactly what he did. His incredible leadership and production seemed to make Yankees fans forget all of his wrongdoings, at least temporarily.
For each reason you list off as to why you loved him, it would be just as easy to throw out a reason on why you hated him. Alex Rodriguez was a great player, even one of the best ever, depending on who you ask. But no matter how many incredible stats he put up, his use of steroids will always question the legitimacy of his legacy in baseball.
Steroids were not the only instance where Rodriguez’s character was called into question. His wife divorced him in 2008 after he was seen entering a hotel room in Toronto with a stripper. During a game against the Blue Jays, he yelled “I got it,” while running by two Toronto players who were converging on a popup. Then, of course, the brawl of the century with former Red Sox’s catcher Jason Varitek. The list goes on and on.
But what will his lasting legacy be? For one of the most polarizing players in the history of sports, that is a very difficult question to answer. Will he be remembered for his unquestionable talent or for his lies?
It is funny to think about how different of an answer this would be if Rodriguez had not had a great season in 2015 after his year-long suspension.
From the perspective of a Yankees fan, it is hard not to respect just how good Alex Rodriguez was for the team. Since 2004, his first year with New York, A-Rod racked up 351 home runs and 1096 RBIs. Highlighted by two MVP Awards, Rodriguez has been nothing short of outstanding in terms of on the field play while wearing pinstripes.
That’s why for me, the story of Alex Rodriguez will always be that of untaught talent over the lies and the cheating. To put it simple, Alex Rodriguez is one of the most gifted baseball players we will ever see. It is very rare when a player comes along and can single-handedly change the way we think about a certain sport. Alex Rodriguez was that guy.
Rodriguez will always be in that dreaded category of players who maybe look like Hall-of-Famers on paper but cheated their way through the sport with the use of performance enhancing drugs. However, much like Barry Bonds, I would like to think that Rodriguez’s steroid use does not mask the fact that he was still incredibly talented on his own. It was obvious from the start that he was going to be someone special that you would never see again.
I will always think of Alex Rodriguez as the man who hit 696 career home runs — 18 homeruns shy of Babe Ruth’s home run record. The man who led the Yankees to the 2009 World Series championship, someone who loved the fans almost as much as he loved playing the game. That’s the Alex Rodriguez I will always remember.