MLB

Yanks hope latest A-Rod drug link provides contract escape

This was a few years ago during yet another all-too-frequent Alex Rodriguez tempest. He was taking batting practice, that bemused/perma-smile look on his face, a now-familiar shield against the redundant attacks on his behavior, decision making and temperament.

A Yankees official watched and, without provocation, summed up the most most-polarizing player in the sport in one word:

“Reckless.”

Eight letters, two syllables, one man.

This has been Rodriguez too frequently in deeds, words and, particularly, associations. And since his acquisition in 2004, Rodriguez’s reckless bent has not only damaged him, but the Yankees as well in terms of reputation, clubhouse tension and a general halo of negativity. Until now, that is.

Privately, the Yankees are thrilled with this latest mess. For if the allegations first made yesterday in the Miami New Times that detail Rodriguez purchasing banned performance enhancers from 2009-12 turn out to be accurate — or worse — then a portal has been opened for the Yankees to accomplish a goal as large as winning the 2013 World Series because of what it means to their present and near future: Severing ties with Rodriguez and saving as much of the $114 million they owe him over the next five years as possible.

Now let’s not mislead anyone. The Yankees will need a Hail Mary to succeed. After all, we thought baseball had Ryan Braun with no wiggle room, and Braun escaped. We thought the feds had Barry Bonds and Roger Clemens, and how did that turn out? The union may not love A-Rod, but its history is to fight like heck for its members and when the Players Association fights it generally wins.

Still, this is a Hail Mary the Yankees will be happy to attempt, as opposed to, say, when they threatened to go after the contracts of Bubba Trammell, Carl Pavano and Jason Giambi for various forms of alleged malfeasance — and then didn’t.

Because they already know Rodriguez is going to miss at least half this season following hip surgery. More importantly, they understand it is inevitable that they will have to release Rodriguez well short of his contract’s 2017 finish line.

So if he is not going to play for three months this year and perhaps not play at all in, say, 2016-17, then what do the Yankees have to lose at this point going after Rodriguez? It is not as if they would be casting out the MVP who signed the 10-year extension following the 2007 campaign. The Yankees want a diminished player and major distraction to vanish.

Mainly, they want to save as much money as possible, especially because they have eyes on getting under the $189 million luxury tax threshold next year. And the $27.5 million they are charged annually for A-Rod weighs down those efforts.

By the Collective Bargaining Agreement only the commissioner can punish a player for a violation of the sport’s drug provisions. So the Yankees will have to wait until the investigation concludes (months from now) and then see if there were a way to, for example, sue A-Rod for fraud claiming something like they entered into this contract without him telling the truth about his drug history or they sent him into an operating room with him providing false medical information.

That would be a very difficult case to win — a Hail Mary. But maybe the mere threat of more info arising from a court case would move Rodriguez to agree to a buyout, say half of the $114 million, and that lowered total would count toward the tax (can’t see the union ever accepting that). Or maybe a sensitive sort will not want to endure the public humiliation that will come with his appearances and retire claiming an inability to recover from a second hip surgery in four years. In that scenario, the Yankees might be able to recoup 70-85 percent of his contract in insurance.

And there is this: If these charges are true, does Rodriguez even believe he can play in the majors without a drug boost?

For now, though, Rodriguez is out saying the charges are untrue, protecting himself with high-powered Miami lawyer Roy Black. He is portraying himself not as Lance Armstrong — a serial liar about long-term PED abuse — but more Manti Te’o, ensnared in someone else’s elaborate fantasy of events. It doesn’t feel likely, but a few weeks ago neither did the idea of someone having a long-term fake girlfriend.

But Rodriguez’s claims of truth are about to be tested by media entities much bigger than the Miami New Times and by major league investigators already motivated because they feel A-Rod was not forthright the last time he talked to them about PED ties. Rodriguez has prided himself on being the baseball workout Pied Piper of South Florida, bringing youngsters such as Melky Cabrera, Cesar Carillo and Yasmani Grandal under his wing, and now they and others are implicated in this story, too.

Who knows what they will say or what may be revealed by so many of the shady figures that go in and out of A-Rod’s reckless life?