I’m watching the Alex vs A-Rod 3-part series. Other than being a great ballplayer I really don’t know much about him. And I really didn’t follow his baseball career all that closely.
I just finished episode 2. He seems like a genuinely honest and humble man, but I may be drinking the Kool-Aid poured by the show’s writers and producers.
Is he? Or am I full of Kool-Aid? What do you think about the guy?
Steroids. That’s my thought about A-Rod.
I’ve just watched ep.1.
He had a tough early life. His Dad and him had an odd relationship.
So far the show seems to be on the up and up. Straight outta the gate they asked about the drug use.
He loved his Mom. Can’t be all bad.
He was a steroid cheat and often an asshole.
I don’t care about spin.
Acknowledging that I didn’t follow his career super-closely, but even before the steroids thing was known, the impression I always had was that he was an egotistical jerk, at least during his playing days.
I don’t know how much of this is him trying to make himself a better person, or him campaigning to improve his public image in an effort to get into the Baseball Hall of Fame – he’s entering his fifth year of eligibility, and has never gotten more than 37% of the vote (one needs 75% to be admitted).
No opinion either way. He was a solid baseball player who’s now campaigning/selling his brand for the HoF, but ultimately another out of touch near-billionaire, likely due to everyone telling him how “great” he is for the last 30 years or so.
This should answer your questions.
He was also known to yell “drop it, drop it!!” at opposing fielders waiting under a pop fly. Which most of us gave up doing by junior high.
I think it’s safe to say that he was something above “solid.”
Rodriguez later claimed to have begun taking PEDs in 2001 (his first year with the Rangers, after leaving the Mariners in free agency). While it’s not necessarily safe to assume that he was being truthful there (i.e., whether he started taking them prior to 2001), if you look at his career from 1994-2000, he had already won four Silver Slugger awards, hit .300+ four times, hit 30+ home runs four times, and had a Wins Above Replacement (WAR) score of 8+ three times (an 8+ WAR is an exceptional season). He was absolutely already one of the best players in MLB at that point, and he was only 24 years old.
From 2001 on, he had three MVP awards, five more seasons with an 8+ WAR, and 507 home runs…of course, it’s fair to question at least how much of that performance was thanks to PEDs.
As an athlete, he was great. As a personality, pretty dislikable. Although lately he has started to seem unusually down to earth while the previously-revered Jeter is starting to show a smarmy side.
That’s what I always think of when A-Rod comes up. He was an extremely gifted athlete, but he was a steroid cheat and a punk.
Well, now I gotta see the rest of this story. I was thinking of deleting the rest of the eps.
I found him to be a sorta normal phenom athlete. With a tough upbringing. But mostly it was boring.
Thank you for bringing back repressed memories of going to Mariners games back when the stadium was new with My Beloved and her sisters, the three of them making rude, crude, loud, and socially unacceptable comments about A-Rod’s perfect ass.
One of the best baseball players of all time. As a person he’s complicated. I think he’s done a lot of growing up after baseball. He could have gone down as the best overall shortstop of all time but he willingly put that aside when he came to the Yankees and moved over to 3rd. It wasn’t just for the money. There were multiple teams that would have made him fabulously wealthy as a shortstop.
Yes he deserves to be in the Hall of Fame.
I think you’ll like ep 2. Decidedly not boring, although for ep 1 I can see how some found it boring. I’m going to watch ep 3.
When ARod was drafted by the Mariners as the #1 pick, he and his agent Scott Boras (a jerk himself) purposefully made contract negotiations difficult including AholeRod enrolling at the University of Miami saying effectively, “I’m willing to not play for you.” That entire situation led me to think that he is a punk-ass and nothing he has done after that has changed my mind. If anything, his antics further convince me that I’m right about his (lack of) character.
If he’s actually becoming aware of his previous failings, and working to become a better person, good for him. I admit, I’m skeptical, especially due to the Hall of Fame voting, but people can change.
I do find it interesting that the second pro athlete who was dubbed with the ARod nickname – quarterback Aaron Rodgers – isn’t dissimilar: a generational talent, who is also a very difficult person. At this point, Rodgers’ personality arc is still pointing downwards, and he’s shown little sign of pulling his head out of his backside.
I have no problem with players having a much bigger voice in where they play. They have little or no input into where they are drafted, giving the teams all the control. Playing college ball is a real option and one of the few pieces of leverge the players have.
And Boras is only a jerk if he’s working against you. If he’s working for you, he’s the exact person you want driving the biggest deal possible. Players keep hiring him as their agent because he does what they want.
Great ballplayer and major league jerk.
He did contribute to one of the more memorable games played at Fenway.
I’m a Mariners fan, so I have sharply mixed feelings about the man.
2001 was a milestone year, and ARod falls neatly into my own personal Mariners “Lost Cause” myth. What if, against all logic, we could have had Ichiro, ARod, Junior, and The Big Unit all on the same team?
ARod wasn’t a spectacularly good human being in hist time with the M’s but I think it’s the last moment when I respected him as a ballplayer. His climb to fame and descent into infamy both really started in his term as a Yankee.
Also quite memorable:
