"I thought it was a smart play."

whoops

point of which being: do we really believe that he would have run into Arroyo?

this pic says it all:
http://www.uweb.ucsb.edu/~scottfarrar/arodswat/arodswat01.jpg

From that article you have this ridiculous claim:

"Rodriguez's decision to skip the event indicates he and Jeter are indeed on separate paths now. He has equally distanced himself from Barry Bonds, despite having made a much-publicized appearance in New York with the Giants' slugger. For $7,500 apiece, fans were given the chance to chat privately with A-Rod and Bonds, netting the two nearly $2 million. The difference, however, is that A-Rod donated his proceeds to the Boys and Girls Club of Miami. Bonds reportedly used the cash to decorate his new home. Rodriguez now concedes he made a mistake appearing with Bonds."

The absurdity being that every single baseball player at their level makes an incredible amount of money (A-Rod $25.2M/yr., Bonds $18M/yr.) and both of these guys NEED to donate massive amounts of money to both public charities and to their private foundations as a shelter from the IRS. Bonds was one of two MLB players (the other: Hideki Matsui) that made donations to Tsunami Relief Funds, which happened right before the end of 2004.

You can look at it two ways: it's very nice of these rich baseball players to do all that charity work, but it's also a necessity for them to maximize all that money they make. A-Rod makes much more than Bonds (+39% more a year) and will make much more than Barry will ever make in his life. The reporter's claim is uneven and absurd in this particular context.

The full quote is quite telling:

"I thought it was a smart play, and we almost got away with it. We put an umpire in the position of having to turn over a call like that in Yankee Stadium. It gave us a shot. (Umpire) Jim Joyce told me, 'if you'd knocked the crap out of (Arroyo) it would've been legal because he was in your way.' So if I had a chance to do it again, I would've tried to run him over. Even though I probably would've hurt someone with my weight and velocity, dropping my shoulder down."

By claiming that they "almost got away with it", he's admitting that he cheated. And then goes on to *brag* about how it was an effective play because by god the Yanks might have won if the umps didn't have some serious cojones and overturn a call against the Yanks at home. I didn't think my opinion of ARod could get lower, but it just did.

Also, the "Arrojo was in your way" comment is total crap. Mintcwzxixczxwiz -- possibly. If Arroyo had missed the tag and ARod ran into Mintcwzxixczxwiz he may have been called safe. But Arroyo wasn't in the baseline -- he was nowhere close to it!! -- which is the whole reason behind the (correct) call which was eventually made.

He would have got tagged before he got to Mientcawietz (haha, i tried to spell that right!)

Rodriguez really comes off as a jerk in that article (no more than usual I guess.) That quote is just ridiculous too. How the hell was he gonna run over Arroyo?!?! Arroyo was nearly FREAKIN' behind him!!! If he had run backwards and stomped on Arroyo it wouldn't have been less illegal than slapping the ball out of the guy's mitt.

"(Umpire) Jim Joyce told me, 'if you'd knocked the had slap (Arroyo) about the face and kicked him repeatedly in the groin it would've been legal because he was in your way.' I swear he did say it. If I ever have the chance to hurt someone again I'm gonna do it. Fuck the Bible."

yeah, some serious purple prose TO GO WITH THOSE PURPLE LIPS

(although maybe this is an inappropriate comment to make)

I'm waiting for A-Rod to come out as the Co-Chair of the Flat Earth Society. And to go on a speaking tour about the evils inherent in teaching children about evolution.

It ain't cheating if you don't get caught. I've got no problem with A-Rod trying to 'cheat'/work the umps and now admitting it. (How he did it is another matter, the wuss.)

"cheating" = okay, sure, fine, whatever. "smart play," though, is just WRONG.

He definitely wasn't thinking of the children.