A-Rod Will Disappoint Eventually
I know it sounds like I only bring up baseball here to knock the Yankees. I'm sure some portray me as one of those stereotypical, unimaginative blind Yankee-haters. Not true. I don't hate the Yankees. Mainly, I hate their (mostly) obnoxious fans, who I have to deal with at just about every minute of the day. There's no escaping them 'round these parts.
But I feel it is necessary to temper the excitement (or curb the enthusiasm, if you will) of Yankee fans who are starting to drool over the prospect of an 80-home run season from Alex Rodriguez this year. Here's what bugs me most -- dude has been in New York for years, and most of that time he's spent getting antagonized and shredded by everybody. But now, like the ugly chick who ditches the paint-stained overalls and box glasses, everyone in New York thinks that they're tight with A-Rod. They request curtain calls, they scream when he comes to the plate, they forget the fact that they've treated him like shit (sometimes deservedly so) over the years. For Yankee fans, it's easy to forget A-Rod's past transgressions because of his recent performance. But will it be so easy for A-Rod to forget the fanbase that has constantly spurned him until now? I think not.
To diverge from my point, for a moment: I hate this "he's on pace...." game. It happens every year, in every sport, and it sucks. Those scenarios are only brought up when a player is in a peak or a valley, and for a second just about everybody forgets that eventually it will all fall back to the middle. A-Rod isn't going to hit 100 home runs this year, he's going to hit 50ish, like he does every year. Which means there's gonna be a stretch of, say, a month where he goes 0-for and commits five errors. And Yankee fans will turn on him again. Which brings me back to my original point.
Every home run A-Rod is hitting now...they're not for Yankee fans. Those shots are for the benefit of A-Rod. He's collecting all of the clutch performances this year, he's going to pack them up, and he's going to Anaheim (or another MLB city) next year. You better believe that the cantankerous A-Rod, who had the post-game locker-room personality of a piece of paper even after hitting a walk-off home run against Cleveland last week, is going to walk at the end of the year. Now Yankee fans are ready to accept him and, to him, it's too late. He's going to get another big contract, he's going to play in a city that will make him happy, and Yankee fans are finally going to be the ones spurned instead of the ones doing the spurning.
And you know what? I'm never one to side with A-Rod, but in this case, I wouldn't blame him a bit.
