Trouble-plagued Yankees slugger Alex Rodriquez was caught juicing during his 2003 MVP season, and was later tipped off that future drug tests were coming, according to a shocking report.
Bomber brass were scrambling to deal with yet another A-Rod scandal yesterday after Sports Illustrated said four independent sources revealed the shortstop tested positive for two anabolic steroids.
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“It’s always a circus,” a Yankee official said. “If it’s not this, it’s something else.”
Rodriguez was a Texas Ranger that season, but even his team manager said he was in the dark on drug use.
“We were not aware of any test results,” Buck Showalter told The Post. “But in the locker room . . . a lot of stuff gets talked about. It would not be completely honest to say you don’t ask questions about players.”
When asked if he wondered about A-Rod, Showalter said, “You have a curiosity about all players. You want to manage them properly. But with guys like Alex, you get caught up in the athletic ability.”
A-Rod’s tested positive for Primobolan, a steroid that builds lean muscle, and testosterone, which adds muscle mass. He was among 104 players whose urine showed traces of performance-enhancing drugs in 2003. In April 2004, federal authorities investigating the BALCO scandal seized that list from the California lab that did the testing.
Rodriguez was apparently alerted by players-union official Gene Orza that he was going to be tested again in September 2004, during his first season with the Yankees, according to SI.
Scott Boras, A-Rod’s agent, declined to comment on the allegations, but said steroids wouldn’t have helped his client.
“I am absolutely vehement that you do not want to put on bulk,” Boras told The Post.
Rodriguez’s teammate Johnny Damon was already bracing for the crush of media attention surrounding A-Rod’s newest woe.
“We are grown men and we know how to deal with certain things,” the outfielder said.
“Questions will be asked and Alex will answer them the best he can.”
When confronted by a Sports Illustrated reporter Thursday, All-Star third-baseman Rodriguez referred questions to the union. “I’m not saying anything,” he said.
Although MLB has banned the use of nonprescribed steroids since 1991, it did not institute penalties or random drug-testing until 2004.
In 2007, A-Rod flatly denied using performance-enhancing substances, telling 60 Minutes: “I’ve never felt overmatched on the baseball field.”
MLB yesterday would not confirm or deny the steroid claims against A-Rod, but said allegations that players were tipped off to drug tests were a “grave concern.”
The embattled, egocentric slugger has 553 career homers, and could break the all-time record. But he has been called “A-Fraud” by teammates, and his marriage broke up last year, not long after he was photographed hanging out with a stripper, and then Madonna.
Additional reporting by Julie Kay and Tori Richards
jfanelli@nypost.com