BOSTON — In 2009, with his hip and reputation damaged, Alex Rodriguez nevertheless delivered a few clarion calls that he was up to something special.
He homered on the very first pitch he saw after coming back from hip surgery in early May and — needing two homers and seven RBIs on the final day of the regular season to again reach 30 homers and 100 RBIs — Rodriguez jammed all of that into the sixth inning against the Rays; a three-run homer and a grand slam.
It spoke to a certain soundness not just of body, but mind that Rodriguez carried into that October; lifted him to the postseason of his life and pretty much the best of anyone’s life — ever. There was a calm around A-Rod, a grace under pressure that had escaped him in his previous Yankees days, even when he was winning MVP awards.
He emerged from a steroid admission and a career-threatening operation smiling through the champagne.
And that is the muscle memory he counts upon now in another season when his body and reputation have taken blows. He has played just four games since July 7. First his right knee needed surgery and now a sprained left thumb keeps him sidelined until at least tomorrow, but probably more likely Friday. These days he has to talk about his involvement in bygone poker games as much as his baseball games.
There will be no baseball miracle finish this year to allow him to extend what is now a major league record 13 straight years with 30 homers and 100 RBIs. He probably will go into the last game of the regular season needing about 12 homers and 35 RBIs, and because A.J. Burnett is his teammate not his opponent, we can safely assume he will fall short of his familiar standards.
So Rodriguez’s focus has shifted to what he believes he still can swing for; notably finalizing a Yankees playoff berth in September, doing more damage in October.
“I could put a stamp on my season by what I do the next two months,” Rodriguez said last night, standing near the third-base line about 45 minutes before the Yankees’ 5-2 victory over the Red Sox, a game in which he did not play. “This is New York, in the end it will be about winning. What is in front of us is what counts the most.”
Paul O’Neill used to say all the time that winning a championship allows everyone on a team to claim a positive year; to delineate the elements that helped bring ultimate victory. This is where Rodriguez is now. His left thumb is wrapped and he needed a cortisone shot Monday. He took groundballs last night and sees the “hidden message” that the extra time off is benefiting his surgically repaired leg.
He used the word “miserable” to describe sitting and watching so much, but yet in a private moment he calls this all just “a little bump in the road.”
And, really, in the big picture this is such an important factor for not just A-Rod, but the Yankees. He is 36 now and still has six years left on the largest contract in baseball history. Rodriguez insists his injuries this year are freak and not reflective of age, though he does concede that the healing took longer than in his iron-man youth.
“I really hope not,” Rodriguez said about his age being at the center of his problems. “I don’t think so. I think these are injuries that could happen to anyone.”
But, of course, they happened to the lightning rod of the game; a player whose mere name conjures controversy as readily as baseball exploits. This is his life and Rodriguez has grown more comfortable accepting it since 2009, moving through the slingshots that come with being him.
And this is where he puts his heart and beliefs now. That he is stronger mentally and the time off is making him stronger physically to do cleanup damage in the highest-profile games. He cannot go 30-100, and is running out of time for even regular-season dramatics. Yet he remains intrinsically tied to where the Yankees want to go.
“I am glad we are not pushing him to play right now,” Mark Teixeira said. “We may win a division without A-Rod, but it is going to be hard to win a World Series without him.”