Alex Rodriguez just can’t stop giving people something to talk about.
Major League Baseball quickly cleared ARod of wrongdoing in relation to his cousin Yuri Sucart’s presence at the hotel where the New York Yankees were staying this week. Sucart, who supplied Rodriguez with steroids during his years with the Texas Rangers, was banned by both MLB and the Yankees from the team’s facilities, which apparently doesn’t include hotels housing the team on road trips. But just because Sucart isn’t barred from the team hotel doesn’t mean he should be hanging out there either.
For the record, I don’t think ARod is back to doing steroids, although I have nothing to back up that assertion, other than believing that unlike Manny Ramirez, Rodriguez isn’t stupid enough to go down that road again. Somewhere in ARod’s mind, he probably still believes he can cement his legacy with a place in Cooperstown at the Baseball Hall of Fame if he stays out of trouble and keeps padding his stats. I don’t think he would take the risk of being busted using performance-enhancing drugs again.
But if ARod is clean, why is he inviting trouble by hanging out with his supplier? Perhaps he feels bad that Sucart took so much heat for his steroid use and is trying to make things up to him. Or maybe for ARod, family is family and he just wanted his cousin to hang out with him on a long road trip. That type of familial loyalty is normally something to be admired, but in this situation just seems foolish. Brian Cashman seems to understand that family pull, but don’t think he won’t privately pull ARod aside or through his agent let him know that Sucart’s presence is unwelcome and that ARod is just creating unnecessary grief for himself.
ARod has always been his own worst enemy due to his poor judgment and propensity to say the wrong thing. But I’m really surprised he would open the door to a fresh round of steroid talk.
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