In the words of Tony Soprano, "Whatever happened to Gary Cooper?"...The quintessential western hero, Cooper's marshal displayed a laconic stoicism in "High Noon" that has lingered in the consciousness of the American male for decades. Will Kane was a tight-lipped, grim-faced warrior who only privately considered the odds against him when preparing for his end-of-film showdown with Frank Miller and his gang.
Derek Jeter is the baseball equivalent of Kane...Alex Rodriguez is the baseball equivalent of Oprah Winfrey. I feel for A-Rod but I'm sick of hearing his bogus stiff-upper-lip equivocations...and comparing himself to the over-rated John Elway just happens to be the last nail in the coffin for me. The Yankees pitching staff is not at all representative of a team with a payroll of $200 million...in fact, it's a joke...but A-Rod's act has become tiresome and his departure would be welcome. Gary Cooper is alive and well and playing shortstop for the Yankees...he needs some teammates with similar grit and determination. - jtf]
October 8, 2006
BERGEN COUNTY RECORD
DETROIT -- Where am I going to do this, were the words Alex Rodriguez mumbled to himself as he walked into the middle of the visiting clubhouse, searching for an open space to give his State of A-Rod Address. In his meticulous, polished way, he had clearly been preparing his concession speech standing out at third base, the loneliest Yankee knowing that the summer and autumn of his unrest threaten to turn into the winter of his New York demise.
The Yankees' collapse was colossal, complete, but Rodriguez knew where the blame goes now, where getting dropped to sixth in the order, and then eighth, and hitting .071 for the American League Division Series gets him: On a rail, getting run out of town. Twenty innings across three games without a run for a lineup that people were calling the best ever, punctuated with a humiliating 8-3 loss to the Tigers on Saturday, didn't sit solitarily on A-Rod's shoulders, but he was the face of the collapse.
In three out of five years now, the American League East champions didn't get out of the division series. Joe Torre should survive this disaster, but he should return with an ultimatum next season of October success or bust. The bottom line: Torre stays, A-Rod goes.
The sheer fact that he takes up too much of the air, suffocating this franchise, himself, with the grandness of his burden, the monumental nature of his frailties, his insecurities, is enough reason for the Yankees to find a trade for him this winter. Even if A-Rod ever produces again in October, it is no longer worth the soap opera that comes with him getting there. He flattered himself, insisting that he finds "inspiration" in the championship chase of John Elway.
"My commitment is 100 percent unconditional," Rodriguez said. "I want to be a Yankee. I don't want to go anywhere else. I hope they don't want to trade me because I don't want to go anywhere.
"I've never ran from problems."
Well, he did run out of Texas, taking the $252 million and discarding last place. Nevertheless, he would repeat his Yankees devotional over and over, but it was hard to tell where the sincerity started and the strategic spin ended. With A-Rod, you always wonder the agenda, the angle.
After all, if he thinks the Yankees want to trade him -- and you'd better believe that his agent, Scott Boras, would have a pulse on it -- Rodriguez can make the case that he is categorically against it.
This way, no one can ever say that A-Rod wanted out because he believed he couldn't process the pressure in his tortured mind. This way, no one could ever call him a quitter. Still, here's the bottom line: A-Rod has a no-trade clause.
The Yankees can't send him anywhere.
This ends the discussion, right?
"If they're dying to get rid of me," A-Rod said, leaving open the possibility that he would agree to a trade. What he was suggesting was that, well, if they're dying to get rid of me, I guess I wouldn't stay where I'm unwanted. There's his out. A-Rod could've insisted that he would never, ever waive his no-trade, but he didn't.
He didn't need to finish his thought. If they're dying to get rid of me, well, you know the rest. A-Rod will go along with it. This is how A-Rod saves face on going hitless in his last 12 playoff at-bats to the Tigers, going 4-for-41 (.098) without an RBI in his last dozen postseason games. He was so unnerved on Saturday, he would boot a two-out grounder, compounding it with a bad throw to first base, an error that would lead to a 4-0 deficit in the third inning.
A-Rod was endemic of a complete Yankees collapse, but he wasn't alone. If people want to fire Torre and replace him with the best manager out of work, Lou Piniella, consider the consequences: The Yankees would be replacing Derek Jeter's guy with A-Rod's guy and it would isolate the captain, promising to polarize the clubhouse.
And make no mistake: Torre has no use for A-Rod. In a most emasculating move on Saturday, the manager dropped A-Rod to eighth in the order. In some ways, it almost looked like a preemptive way for Torre to shift blame away from himself, and thrust it on the lightning rod.
"I've got no one to blame but myself," Rodriguez said. "You've got to look in the mirror and address that. Obviously, I've got to find the success in the postseason. There's a lot to be learned from guys like [Derek] Jeter, [Jorge] Posada and Bernie [Williams] -- the guys who have done it. It seems like they play so relaxed."
Unlike A-Rod, who is a jittery mess. Torre has had it with that, and knows that A-Rod has the potential to pollute his program. Clearly, Torre has picked his spots to embellish his slights of A-Rod. Before Game 1, the manager dropped him to sixth in the batting order. Before Game 3, Torre suggested that A-Rod's mouth invites the trouble that comes his way. And before Game 4, Torre totally emasculated Rodriguez, dropping him to eighth in the order.
If the Yankees had managed to force a Game 5, A-Rod would've been brewing his boss' green tea.
Rodriguez is exhausting this franchise. And he's exhausting himself. If A-Rod comes back next year, the Yankees are inviting this never-ending soap opera to gather steam to the point where it won't just suffocate A-Rod, but the clubhouse. Rodriguez was busy patting himself on the back for persevering the "toughest season of my career," where he says he had to "endure some unbelievable things."
If Jeter was listening, he would've wanted to punch A-Rod in the mouth. More than he ordinarily does, anyway. The Yankees had lost, been embarrassed, and somehow A-Rod had made it all about A-Rod. He's proud he's still standing? That's the kind of self-congratulatory garbage that makes them loathe Rodriguez.
So, the Yankees' season imploded at Comerica Park, the reputed greatest hitting lineup in history turning out to be a bigger October bust than the $252 million man who nearly dropped out of the bottom of it by the ALDS' end. Alex Rodriguez wants to stay a Yankee, he says. He could've ended the discussion by insisting that he would never, ever waive his no-trade clause.
A-Rod wouldn't do it.
He played his final game as a Yankee on Saturday, and no one -- no one anywhere -- deep down was more relieved than him.
E-mail: wojnarowski@northjersey.com
No comments:
Post a Comment