Like the Yankees themselves, the low point of Alex Rodriguez's season came on May 22, during a 9-5 loss at Fenway to open a series with the Red Sux, immediately after the injury-plagued Bombers dropped three of four at Shea. Yeah, he homered in that game, but it came in the ninth inning of a blowout, a contest put out of reach (again) by Manny Ramirez and David Ortiz. Same old, same old.
It was a home run that inspired ridicule — even I, usually a staunch defender of the man I consider the most talented Yankee since Mickey Mantle, admitted to chuckling over it — and that's the plight of A-Rod in 2006: he can homer two batters after Derek Jeter grounds out, and he's the one who gets joked about.
Since May 22, the Yankees have won seven of eight, winning two of three from MLB's worst (the Royals) and a perfect 5-0 against two of New York's strongest competitors for the postseason, the Red Sux and Tigers. I like to call them "big games."
Since May 22, A-Rod has raised his batting average 27 points, from .276 to .303. He's gotten a hit and either scored or driven in a run in all eight games. Of course, he played them all, because he always plays them all. (He missed seven games in 2004, none since.) Some players who missed at least one of those games: Damon, Jeter, Sheffield, Giambi ... you get the idea.
A-Rod eight-game log: 32 AB, 14 H, 3 HR, 10 R, 12 RBI, 5 BB.
He's had such an impactful week that even the folks over at ESPN.com's Page 2 — a place that seems to devote entire edit meetings to catering to the "Yankees suck!" audience of imbeciles — took notice. And so, I must give a shout out to D.J. Gallo for lauding A-Rod, in Page 2's tongue-in-cheek "An Embarrassing Week for A-Rod," perhaps the most Yankees-friendly piece that's ever appeared on the site.
And this was before Rodriguez went 3-for-4, with a walk, a triple, a run scored and 2 RBIs last night. A-Rod leads the league in runs, by the way, which means a lot of his notorious "RBIs when the Yankees are already winning" come when he's the one who put them in a position to get that lead. But why mention that when you can make fun of his purple lips?
Gallo is probably getting a lot of hate mail from Bill Simmons' acolytes, who write the Survivor/Sopranos/Godfather/Karate Kid/American Idol (and Sports!) Guy to get his pearls of wisdom on everything from The O.C. to urination etiquette — yep, those are his readers! Good luck to D.J. in avoiding some kind of atomic wedgie, which I imagine is the cost for defending a Yankee from Bristol.
(As for the picture selection, I couldn't pass up an opportunity to mention how no one looks like more of a bitch, when brushed off the plate, than A-Rod. Let me preface this by saying I would absolutely crap my pants if a 95-m.p.h. heater came within 10 feet of me, but I've seen this guy spin away like a car just blew up on CHiPS. It's really funny to watch. And this picture can have only one caption: "Ewwwwwwwwwwwwwwwwww!" — in the voice of Howard Stern in Private Parts, when he knocked over all those records at WCCC.)
