TRENTON, N.J. — If this was how it ends, it was with a base on balls, a lumbering scurry to second base on a wild pitch, a jog to third on a single and an eighth-inning departure.
Here at a minor league ballpark, where most young ballplayers dream and one old ballplayer denied.
“Yeah, I’m flying to Chicago,” Alex Rodriguez said late last night, and then he repeated it, as if that would make it more real: “I’m flying to Chicago.”
A-Rod very well might fly to Chicago later today, but it likely will have been a wasted trip. His long-awaited suspension by Major League Baseball is coming tomorrow, and it’s hard to envision commissioner Bud Selig — just one of the beleaguered third baseman’s myriad powerful nemeses — allowing A-Rod to take the field in a Yankees uniform as a suspended player.
So this might have been it — two games at Arm & Hammer Park in a Trenton Thunder uniform. If Selig bans Rodriguez through next season by using the “best interests of the game” clause in the Basic Agreement in addition to the Joint Drug Agreement, he can keep A-Rod off the field until his appeal is heard. And if arbitrator Fredric Horowitz upholds baseball’s punishment, would A-Rod, with two surgically repaired hips and a stomach full of anger toward the Yankees, really try a comeback in 2015 when a qualified doctor could disqualify him and allow an insurance company to pay most of the money he will be owed?
These are questions we can’t yet answer. Shoot, for all of the venom that has been exchanged lately between both A-Rod and MLB and A-Rod and the Yankees, it wouldn’t shock us if Rodriguez and MLB settled on a sentence today (150 games?) as baseball officials would love to avoid the risks of an arbitration hearing.
All we know for now is that today, A-Rod will work out, apparently in Trenton, and then, as he said, he will be off to Chicago. Who knows what else his day will feature?
Yesterday, according to multiple sources, before he even arrived at work, he reached out to the Yankees to discuss a possible settlement of the roughly $96 million they owe him. The Yankees, knowing nothing could be done on that front until the discipline issue is clear, ended the conversation quickly.
Asked last night whether he reached out to the Yankees, Rodriguez said: “No. As far as any of that stuff, I’m going to let those guys take care of what they need to take care of. I’m not going to address anything like that.”
Those words typify A-Rod’s behavior for the last month in particular: An odd mix of denial and obfuscation.
It would have been fascinating to see what A-Rod could have given the Yankees right now. If he looks nothing resembling his prime self, he at least seems like a guy who could provide a boost to an offense-starved team.
“I was surprised how good he looked at the plate,” one scout in attendance both nights said, on the condition of anonymity. “He definitely could help.”
“He’d hit some home runs,” a second scout at the game said. “He still has that power swing.”
A-Rod played seven innings last night and drew four walks in four plate appearances. Reading, a Phillies affiliate, displayed extreme respect for the slugger after watching him crush a towering home run to left field on Friday night.
In 42 minor league at-bats this season, A-Rod has three home runs. That ratio of one homer every 14 at-bats is a tick above his major league ratio of one homer for every 14.9 at-bats. None of the 2013 Yankees has a power rate anywhere as good.
He played sub-par defense, but his strong throwing arm compensates somewhat for his lack of lateral movement. Running the bases? Eh.
“I’m even more excited about Monday,” he said. “I feel like I can’t wait to see my teammates. I feel like I can help us win. I can help us be a better team. I haven’t seen a lot of my brothers in a long time.”
He might have a while to go still. His brief news conference concluded with a question about what Rodriguez, suspected of purchasing illegal performance-enhancing drugs and then obstructing the investigation, would tell his two daughters if they asked him whether he cheated.
“I plan to sit my girls down with [ex-wife] Cynthia, and we’re going to have a lengthy conversation,” A-Rod said. “And I’ll have an opportunity to tell it all at some point. I’ll have that platform. And when the time is right, I’ll tell my full story. Thanks, guys.”
Then one of baseball’s greatest players ever took off into the night. If this was it, it was quiet, weird and even a little sad.