Even though this is a football blog, I love to discuss all sports. And the hot story at the moment is none other than, Alex Rodriguez and his admittance to steroid use.

Let's be honest.... this story is big because it's A-Rod. The 1/2 billion dollar boy. If this was some backup catcher or a player on the Kansas City Royals, no one would care. But A-Rod was the highest paid player ever and has since become a NY Yankee. And everyone is all over this because of who it is and who he plays for. And now I'm jumping on the bandwagon (shoot why not?!).

Yesterday, A-Rod held a press conference explaining his reasons why he decided to take steroids. He advised that his cousin, which he didn't name, introduced him to them and at the time was at least 25 years old, stating that he was "young and naive" (I'm sorry, but at 25, you aren't that young and while being naive is possible, he knew exactly what he was doing.).


ESPN's Jayson Stark wrote an article regarding the press conference and concluded that A Rod wasn't totally honest because his story changed from the original story he told 9 days prior. This raises eyebrows, but nothing the American public wasn't already thinking.

Personally, while I think A-Rod may feel sorry about taking steroids, I hardly believe anything more than that. This has "PR patchwork job" written all over it, with him giving details on what allegedly happened between 2001-2003 as a Texas Ranger.



Because the stories have changed in such a short period of time, it leads me and a lot of the public to believe that these stories are exaggerated and the press conference was held simply to shut the media up.

I believe that A-Rod's a smart man. While he's a very rich man already, he knows that this could very well hurt his image, which has already taken blow from his MLB peers (he's been known throughout the league as a "diva"). He knows that , if the public eye isn't interested in him any longer, he loses out in endorsements, appearances and anything else that could stockpile his worth in the future. While he could probably quit baseball today and still be filthy rich until he dies, I truly believe he cares about the perception the public has of him and he wanted to make peace by coming up with a half true story regarding this whole ordeal.

The problem with that is, the media and the public aren't dumb. And we follow these types of stories a lot closer than folks think. So anytime we find a situation where the same story isn't told twice, we think someone is pulling a fast one on us.



In a Newsday poll asking what the public reaction was to the press conference, 36.2% of the voters said he's a cheater and nothing he says can change their minds. The second response with the most votes?? 22.7% saying he was too vague and they weren't impressed.

With the public mind already made up, A Rod's best defense should have been, "I made a terrible decision. I set high standards for myself to be the best and by doing so, I used steroids to help me achieve that goal. For that, I am deeply sorry" and left it alone. But it seems as though he was advised to do otherwise, and as of right now the public hasn't been totally receptive to his response.

He's a New York Yankee and will be for quite a while, so this will go away at some point. But not anytime soon. He's too much of a household name for folks to disregard right now.

Shame on you, A-Rod. This could have gone away much faster if you told the truth, or if you said nothing at all.