Alex Rodriguez and Mike Trout shared the field last night at Yankee Stadium, but if it were up to the Angels’ 22-year-old phenom, Rodriguez would not have been allowed in the lineup.
The reigning AL Rookie of the Year, who held a mini-media tour yesterday in New York, began the morning telling WFAN he thinks players who are caught using performance-enhancing drugs should be banned from baseball.
“To me, personally, I think you should be out of the game if you get caught,” Trout said. “It takes away from the guys that are working hard every day and doing it all natural.
“Some people just are just trying to find that extra edge. It’s tough as a guy that goes out there and plays hard every day and puts [in] 110 percent effort every time to wake up the next day and see there’s a list of guys [in trouble for PED use].”
While Rodriguez had battled injuries and played in just six games this season — now appealing a 211-game Biogenesis suspension — Trout has followed up one of the best rookie campaigns ever with a sophomore season even more remarkable. After going 1-for-3 with a walk, the outfielder is second in the AL with a .330 batting average and .425 on-base percentage, along with 20 home runs and 26 stolen bases.
In the midst of another MVP-worthy season, Trout is frustrated with how the scandals have affected baseball, but he is hoping it’s the beginning of the end of doping.
“MLB is moving in the right direction with all the PED use,” Trout said after an appearance at the Empire State Building, where he was honored by his high school in Millville, N.J., which has decided to name its baseball field for him, after he and sports drink company BODYARMOR made donations to refurbish the field. “I just go out there and play my game. Everything is 100-percent natural.”
As it once was with Rodriguez.
The three-time MVP’s career, which began in Seattle, started just like Trout’s. Both played in the AL West and turned 21 in the middle of their first full seasons, which rank as two of the best individual seasons in history.
They each finished second in MVP voting, Rodriguez in 1996 and Trout in 2012, but held legitimate claims to the award, displaying rare combinations of power and speed along with outstanding defense at premier positions.
Trout’s father, Jeff, has reminded him there is no reason to go down a similar path as Rodriguez, who admitted to using PEDs while playing for the Rangers and now has been enmeshed in another drug mess.
“We have sat down and talked to him about that, saying, ‘Listen, please don’t ever be tempted to do that,’ ” Jeff said. “You don’t need to do that. Work hard, work out, he can do it naturally. Just do it naturally. Not that he’s had to have the lecture, but he’s gotten it.
“I think he takes pride in being part of a generation of players that are rebelling against that. They’ve had enough. Why should [he] have to compete against this guy if he’s juicing? [He’s] competing for a batting title or stolen bases or whatever. Why should [he] have to face this guy who threw 86 [mph] one year and a few years later he’s throwing 96?”
Though Trout’s father still sees Mike as “just a little kid from New Jersey,” one who still talks to his mother, Debbie, every day and comes home in the offseason, he is confident his son will not make the mistakes that superstars of the previous generation did.
“He is a role model, he knows he’s a role model and he has to behave as such,” Jeff said. “I think he appreciates the game and respects the game enough that he’s never going to embarrass the game or embarrass himself.”