This is a tough day. “Saying goodbye is part of the job”. So Rodriguez gets the great Yankee treatment on Friday night. Entering Sunday, he was four short of 700 and just 18 behind Babe Ruth’s career total of 714. “I think the fans across the nation should be very proud of him”, Rod Harris said.
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But apparently, the Yankees had other plans for Alex “A-Rod” Rodriguez. Hall of Famer Frank Robinson chose to retire during the 1976 season just 14 homers away from becoming only the fourth player to reach 600 home runs. He’s a tireless worker and an astute student of the game. Rodriguez will play his last game Friday and will become a special adviser for the Yankees. He was voted to the All-Star Game 14 times and signed a $275 million contract with the Yankees in 2007 – then the richest deal in baseball history.
The 41-year-old Rodriguez, who sat out the 2014 season while serving a performance-enhancing drug suspension, will play against Tampa Bay at Yankee Stadium and then be released following Friday’s game.
Rodriguez has hit just.204 this season in 62 games.
After pitching really well for the Rays the last three seasons, Archer has struggled along with his team in 2016. “The steroids have taken a toll on certain parts of my body over the years so I have to make sure that I do not pull a Draymond Green on Snapchat in the clubhouse”. When he did return to the active roster, he never regained his form.
Rodriguez said Hal Steinbrenner initiated a series of conversations earlier this week to hammer out the terms of his release from the team.
While it may seem unusual for the Yankees to fork over all that money for someone that won’t even play, there are actually incentives built into Rodriguez’s contract that could cost the team even more.
In March, Rodriguez said he planned to retire at the end of next season.
A-Rod’s release will cap a legendary but contentious career with the Yankees which saw him repeatedly embroiled in controversy since arriving in NY in 2004 from the Texas Rangers.
The announcement Sunday was “the Yankee’s decision, and I’m at peace with it”, Rodriguez said.
Rodriguez said he asked for one more game in the Bronx, which is why he’ll play Friday.
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At the same time, Core added, “he did a lot for us”. In his 2015 comeback season, A-Rod hit 33 home runs and batted in 86 runs, but his numbers dropped notably this season, and last week, the Yankees informed him he was done for the rest of his contract. A decade later, A-Rod very almost became a member of the Red Sox, but the MLB Players Association nixed it. With the game a little less than a week away, Rodriguez will know that he will be facing Chris Archer in his final game.
