The facts are this in my view… AROD is arguably the BEST all around player in the game. The Yankees are lucky to have him for the bargain price we pay. The guys has his flaws, maybe he thinks too much. Anyway you put he is a great player for which we will not get equal value for. He will be one of the great Yankees.

Alex will be fine and I fully expect – and hope – that he will end his career a Yankee and a beloved Yankee at that with the all time home run record under his belt. Personally, I have seen nothing of him that makes me think that he is anything other than a decent guy.

He’s going to catch a lot of stupid nonsense for this stuff with this coach, etc. but hopefully, it just strengthens him.

The fact that the evidence in my opinion, proves he’s a bitch and a pre-madonna, I am not surprised that he uses this coach. Alex is paying for wanting to win so bad, so bad that he was willing to change his position from SS to 3B (putting stats aside and losing the tag as the best hitting shortstop in the history of the game).
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Am I the only one that thinks these two sentences contradict each other?

Wow. Thanks for sharing this story.

I had the chance to have dinner with a professional Major League Umpire, Jim Reynolds, after a Yankees Rangers game in 2001 when Alex was with the Rangers.

The entire dinner, Jim was more than happy to answer all of my questions about the inside fraternity of baseball. After the usual questions – Who’s ball moves the most “Maddux” Who is the nicest catcher “Einer Diaz” I asked him who was the biggest bitch in the MLB.

You guessed it, the answer was Alex Rodriguez. It came as a huge surprise to me, since I was a naive freshman in high school. However, I do trust what Reynolds said. He called A-Rod, “a whining bitch,” and said that every call was scrutinized by Alex after every pitch. He also claimed that A-Rod was the, “most hated player” in the game because of the way he treated other players.

Because of this information, and the way A-Rod slapped at that ball in the 2004 ALCS, I have always felt that he is a big pussy. This doesn’t mean that I don’t cheer for him and want him to succeed, it just means that I don’t expect him to run in from his position and slug a Baltimore Oriole in the face like my main man Daryl Strawberry (Varitek owned him in that scuffle in Boston).

The fact that the evidence in my opinion, proves he’s a bitch and a pre-madonna, I am not surprised that he uses this coach. He needs to do what works for him and thats just it. Alex is paying for wanting to win so bad, so bad that he was willing to change his position from SS to 3B (putting stats aside and losing the tag as the best hitting shortstop in the history of the game). If this stress is the aftermath of his wish to win, then so be it. He dug his own grave

I don’t care one way or the other on A-Rod using this guy, but I think it’s kind of funny that he said “His attitude has never wavered. I’ve never heard him talk in a negative way. Ever. He has been an all-night supermarket of encouragement…”

A-Rod, the guy is not paid to be negative. His job is to fell your head with cheesy platitudes. Now go get em tiger.

festus – I’m not even talking production here, with A-Rod. It’s more a coping-thing. If he needs help to play here and be happy, and if the team and the fans are unhappy with him, then why keep doing it?
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It seems to work for him; he’s been using this guy since 1996, when he was with the M’s

I don’t know if it’s an issue of playing here and being happy, I think it’s an issue of comfort.

Like I said in the other page, a lot of people are using therapy and counseling. So it doesn’t seem like that big a deal. Everyone has their “thing” I suppose this is Rodriguez’s.

I’m not going to read very much into Alex’s MP coach. Presumably it helps him focus on playing the game and not being distracted by anything else. It’s something he’s been doing the last nine years (1560 games) so it goes back to Seattle days, it is not “now obvious,” it helped him become one of the top 2-3 players in the game. And I don’t think he was too happy playing with the Rangers.

Lots of athletes use mental coaches. They help the athletes visualize what they are going to do in there performance, such as in downhill skiing.

And the entire KC Royals team isn’t worth A-Rod. Terrence Long, maybe. But not Alex.

festus – I’m not even talking production here, with A-Rod. It’s more a coping-thing. If he needs help to play here and be happy, and if the team and the fans are unhappy with him, then why keep doing it?

Nick – thanks. No sweat.

Raf – check the stats on these guys. Whitson was near average – and then tanked in NY – and then did better when he left. Ditto Harrah. There’s no question in my mind that there’s more pressure playing in NY than places like Texas and SD (Jay Witasick anyone?).
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Whitson became a full-time SP in 1979 with the Giants. He put up a -5 RSAA. He alternated between positive and negative RSAA from 1979-1985, which was his first year with the Yanks. The wheels fell off in 1986, and he was traded to the Padres, where he also put up a negative RSAA. Negative in 1987 & 1988. If it was an issue of pitching in NY, he would’ve done well after he was traded to SD, if not in ’86, then ’87. He didn’t have an effective year until 1989. Then he had another one in 1990. ’91 he had a bad year, and retired (during or after, I do not remember). He saw postseason action with the Padres in 1984, FWIW.

Toby Harrah had 48 RCAA in 1982, dropped to -2 in 1983. Traded to the Yanks (for Otis Nixon, HA!) he put up a -6 RCAA. The Rangers acquired him, he had a good and bad year with them (22 & -6) and he was done after the second season with the Rangers.

And Jay Witasick had a negative RSAA from 1996-2000.