Saturday, March 27, 2010

Day of reckoning yet to come for ARod


So it turns out that Alex Rodriguez didn't meet with federal investigators in Buffalo yesterday. That’s just great. I thought Rodriguez would finally have his day of reckoning and the New York Yankees could move on. But the delay just drags out this mess even longer.

The lead in this New York Times story says it all. Brian Cashman is getting tired of having to answer questions about the latest ARod fiasco. Now, Cashman is also getting sick of the constant questioning about whether Joba Chamberlain should have been in the bullpen all along and whether Phil Hughes is ready to step up and be a credible, reliable fifth starter. But I'm sure Cashman would much rather answer these baseball-related questions than about ARod's legal quandary, mostly because he does not have a lot of answers. The team and Major League Baseball have made the right decision to wait until Rodriguez sits down with the feds before they ask him about his interactions with Dr. Galea.

The delayed meeting causes a number of problems for the Yankees. It keeps them from getting answers directly from Alex Rodriguez about why he didn't stick to the authorized treatment plan and why he felt he needed to see another doctor without the team's approval.

Most importantly, it risks the possibility that there will be no resolution before the New York Yankees play their first game Sunday, April 4. So instead of focusing on beating their archrival Boston Red Sox, they could have the ARod cloud still hanging over their heads. It's the last thing that Cashman & Co. want for a team about to defend a World Series title.
While I don't expect Derek Jeter and his fellow teammates to criticize or hang ARod out to dry (they probably would have done it already if that was the case), at a minimum it's an annoyance to have these questions continuing to swirl around the team and you figure at some point it’s going to lead to an inadvertent explosion by someone that just creates a new media firestorm.

I'm hoping Alex Rodriguez's day of reckoning will come soon for the team's sake. The sooner, the better.

Thanks to Randy Oostdyk via Wikipedia for the photo.

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