Effectively Wild: A FanGraphs Baseball Podcast - Effectively Wild Episode 363: Yankees Beat Writer Andy McCullough on Alex Rodriguez, Again

Episode Date: January 13, 2014

Ben and Sam talk to Andy McCullough about the latest legal developments in the Alex Rodriguez saga, the A-Rod episode of 60 Minutes, and more.

Good morning and welcome to episode 363 of Effectively Wild, the daily podcast from BaseballPerspectives.com. I am Ben Lindberg, joined by Sam Miller, and today we are welcoming back mccullough who covers the yankees for the new york star ledger and we last had you on in late july to talk about the absurdity that was alex rodriguez at the time uh and we are welcoming you back today to discuss the same topic it has been a while but the the topic has grown no less absurd it maybe has grown more absurd since then. I don't remember exactly what point in the saga that was, but there were some new developments on Sunday night. Just as you had probably recovered from the Scott Sizemore news, you had to recenter yourself and report on the 60-minute interview with Tony Bosch and Bud Selig and Rob Manfred and A-Rod's attorney, Joe Takapina.

And there were several statements released before and after that program. released before and after that program. So we wanted to bring you on to get your thoughts on the show since you were entertainingly tweeting about it. Yeah, that's pretty much all I do. It's really my only value. So I guess, do you have any big takeaways from this as far as, I guess, what the motivations of C-League or I guess all of the various parties who were on the show?

Was there an agenda that each of them was sort of pushing to your eyes? Well, yeah. I mean, it's pretty clear baseball kind of wanted a touchdown spike. And I think to make a horrible metaphor, I think it's pretty clear they've been flagged for excessive celebration. I think that was pretty good. Not bad. On the fly.

Literally, I write for a living. Anyway, as you're watching this, the only thing I could think of was, like, why did baseball want to do this? I mean, like, because, you know, Tony Bosh, who's the guy who they're basically saying, you know, this is the guy who you need to believe. You know, this is the guy who's telling the truth. You know, this guy is, you know, he's the reason why we're able to bring down A-Rod. He gave us the evidence, da-da-da-da.

He's the guy who's saying to scott pelly yeah everyone in baseball does steroids man like come on my i mean the third baseman in the field is on steroids the pitcher's on steroids it's just like such a you know for a sport that's been trying so hard to kind of you know get away from that you know that stain it's just it looks so so bad like it just seemed like i mean didn't it seem like to you like it was pretty clear you know baseball wanted to drive the point home, and if anything, it just kind of made them look silly in the process? Maybe I'm wrong, but that was my immediate takeaway. Like, why would baseball want to do this? Right. Some of the reactions I read, like, I was reading

something that Jesse Spector wrote about how, you know, Bud Selig wanted to sort of cement his legacy with this and be the commissioner who was strong anti-steroids guy as he sort of rides off into the sunset one of these years. But right, the revelation that A-Rod passed 12 drug tests while he was taking these things and that Bosch thinks that everyone is taking these things supposedly doesn't really make it look like the sport is is cleaned up right yeah and and by all accounts i mean they you know i can imagine if you're you know someone in the union who's been pretty you

know some of the players who've been really really vocal about you know you know making the this testing policy tougher you know trying to increase penalties you know all this you know you just to increase penalties, you know, all this. You know, you're looking and you just want to, like, smack your head against the desk. Like, what? You feel like, why is our sort of management, why is Major League Baseball, like, you know, consenting to a sort of program that makes us look like buffoons, makes us all look like cheaters, you know?

You know, Tony Bosch basically went out there and said, you know, that everyone in baseball is cheating. And it just, you know, Tony Bosch basically went out there and said, you know, that everyone in baseball was cheating. And it just, you know, it just looks so bad, I think. And again, I just keep coming back to, like, why? I mean, there's so many, there's so many interesting, you know, like, humorous things. I got some of the questions from Bosch were hilarious. My favorite, of course, was when he was asked why you didn't tell these players or why you didn't tell your clients to not do this. He looked at him and said, like, you know, like these players or why you didn't tell your clients to not do this.

And he looked at him and said, you know, like I'm a drug dealer, right? Like, you know, like I've admitted that. I just told you, you know, the whole thing was, you know, there was points of comedy, but like when you really step back from that, it's kind of like, man, you know, it seems like a Pyrrhic victory, if anything, you know, it just kind of does not look good for the sport.

So anytime, though, you have like a sort of a body of authority, like you kind of have this delicate balance of trying to both amplify the fear of danger while also demonstrating that you're the best person to deal with the danger. So, you know, you see this with like the government and like the threat of terror and you see it with cops and like, you know, crime and, you know, you sort of want to get everybody afraid of crime and you sort of want to hype it while also sort of showing that you're doing things. And it's a tough balance to pull. Do you think that's what baseball was doing? Do they have any reason to convince us that we need to give them even more power? Or do you just get the sense that the message got away from them and they didn't expect

Bosh to kind of say all this and be featured so prominently? Or was it just sort of out of their control? You know, that's a good question. And, you know, one of the things that sort of A-Rod's attorneys, you know, Joe Tacopina had another blistering statement released tonight, late tonight. This is something they brought up. A-Rod brought it up in his own statement. This is Major League Baseball's next step into making harsher penalties for first-time offenders, etc., etc., etc.,

and making it sort of more draconian and more, you know, giving less control, I guess, to the players or less sort of fairness to the players. So, you know, I don't know if that's what the motivation is, but that certainly seems like a fear that's at least being, you know, it could be rhetoric, it could be whatever, but that's, you know, a fear that's at least being sort of put out there by A-Rod and those people that this is kind of baseball's way of, you know, increasing the penalty and making it, you know, more and more, just making it less sort of, just a less tolerant environment,

I guess. It even, it seems like even more than increasing the penalties, maybe what they're trying to do is increase what they can penalize you for. I mean, they seem to sort of be acknowledging that the drug testing program, you know, does some stuff, but they're sort of acknowledging that it doesn't catch these. And it's like they want to, you know, I don't know, cast a wider net for how they can implicate players and what can qualify as a positive test.

Right. And I mean, more than the threat of more than the length of penalty, it seems like the threat of certainty of penalty is what's going to give them greater power in stopping it. Right, yeah, that's a good point. And then, you know, sort of the idea, obviously, you know, that it's important, like this is a non-analytic, you know, positive. So, yeah, it seems like, I mean, and I guess it kind of depends on how you feel about your performance in drugs. And if you're really, really sort of, you know, you want to get them out of the game at all costs,

if you're that sort of rhetorical person who just is so anti-performance-dancing drugs, well, it's going to brush up into cases like this because you're going to have to be relying on non-analytic positives because, you know, so often the drugs will be ahead of the test. So it's something you really have to think about. You know, if you really, really want, you know, the game to go after hard, you know, sort of people who are, they suspect using performance-advancing drugs, you're going to have similar cases like this where it's basically the word of, you know, potentially, you know, the person who sold the drugs

and the person who, you know, allegedly took them because they just won't be testing. And, you know, that's kind of a, it's a gray area that I, you know, it seems like baseball's made their choice for which way they want to go on it. But, you know, it makes it seem like maybe cases like this will only increase in the future. So there were three statements released, right? There was the Players Association statement. There was MLB's response to that statement. And then there was Takapina's statement, which was longer

than both of the other statements put together. How bad is the blood, do you think, between these parties at this point? Like, are we getting to the point where it's going to spill over into other issues, where it's not going to be just about A-Rod in this one case, but, you know, the bad blood that's built up throughout this case and throughout this war of words is going to spill into the next negotiations? You know, I believe that. I think Ken Rosenthal wrote about that today, that it's kind of, you know, this is kind of the drumbeat of maybe, you know, something, you know, we've had labor peace for so long, but this is kind of the start of potentially something calamitous. I mean, it's a great question, you know.

It certainly does seem like it's such a complicated issue because players feel, you know, some players want, you know, all the drugs, you know, all drugs out of the game, do anything you can, you know, to get them out, and others are thinking about the rights and, you know, sort of their, you know, if they themselves are an opportunity like this where, you know, they sort of, you know, they had a pharmacist who was giving them real supplements, regular supplements, and all of a sudden he went rogue on them and they fired him, you know, what's preventing him from potentially getting them suspended for all this time? You know, so there's so many different scenarios.

But I think it's certainly going to be, you know, it seems it's setting up for, you know, the next round of bargaining to be more contentious than maybe it had been in years past. But frankly, I'm not tied in well enough. I'm not sourced well enough in that community to really have any clue. But it certainly does seem like a more charged atmosphere than it had been at least in the most recent sessions. Well, I would miss Takapina if he goes away at some point. Was he not wearing makeup on the show? Because he made a comment about other people wearing makeup, just casually tossed in that Bosch and Manfred were wearing makeup

while they were making their appearance. Yeah, he compared it to the Salem witch trials. He's something. He's a linguistic gem. He really brings it. He does not give away at bats. You know what I mean? He brings it every time, so you've got to respect that.

So we had an article at BP on Friday by Eugene Friedman, who didn't know at the time that the decision was about to be released, but he wrote about what he thought would happen if the decision went against A-Rod and if he appealed. And basically, he thinks that there's no chance that this appeal would ever be upheld or that anything would come of it. Is that basically your sense that this is just sort of the flailing of a drowning man at this point? Well, yeah, but, you know, that doesn't mean it's going to go away necessarily. I mean, basically, you know, it seems like from everything I've heard and from the people who I've talked to

and from what pretty much everyone else has written, he's been covering this is that it's, you know, it's considered pretty unlikely to get a judge to, you know, throw this out. I guess judges don't necessarily like to overrule arbitrators. It's, you know, so it seems like it'd be very difficult for it to be thrown out. So, yeah, it seems like it's going to stand, but that doesn't mean, you know, the fight's not going to stop. They're going to take it to the lawsuit against, you know, the lawsuit against Seelig and MLB.

You know, there's always potential for a lawsuit against the Yankees, although, you know, if they wanted to do a lawsuit against the Yankees. Although, you know, the, you know, they, if they wanted to do that, I guess they could have at this point,

you know, the Yankees sort of believe there's no evidence of anything for a lawsuit. Um, you know, there's potentially to have a lawsuit against the union. I mean, you know, he's as,

as, as Alex has shown in recent months, he's more than willing to engage in litigation. So, um, you know, I think, uh, it's going to be a good day, I guess, you know, for sort of his lawyers who are going to have plenty of work to do in the coming weeks, I think.

Is there a downside for him pursuing this further at this point? I mean, do you think he can rehabilitate himself in any way, or might he just keep going? Is he a cornered raccoon yeah i think he's i mean he's committed to it you know i i that's a great question you know like is there a way that alex rodriguez could repair his image and just kind of have this be a footnote instead of the lead in his you know career obituary so to speak i really don't know i mean i it just seems like he's committed i mean you heard it you know the career obituary, so to speak. I really don't know. I mean, it just seems like he's committed. I mean, you heard it, you know, the day of the suspension.

He was like, all right, well, I'm going to spring training. You know, like I was talking to, you know, someone, you know, who's familiar with the proverbial conversion, familiar with his thought process. And I said, you know, so just to be sure, Alex is, you know, planning to come back in 2015. And the person said, he's planning to play in 2014. You know, like he's gearing 2015. And the person said, he's planning to play in 2014, you know,

like he's, he's gearing up, he's ready to go. You know, he's expecting to take the field for the Yankees on opening day still. And that might be delusion. That might be, you know,

what else, whatever, but he's, he's chosen this road and, you know, he's going to go down it. So there's, you know,

he's, he's not, he's not going to change horses midstream, if that makes sense. Does he need permission from the team if he wants to play somewhere else, play an Indy ball or anywhere else while he is suspended? I believe so. I think it kind of depends league by league, you know, like the whatever,

the independent or the – there's a league out in California, I guess, where it's different. Uh, but I, I mean, I, I just don't see that scenario happening, him playing for,

you know, whoever the Newark bears or something. Um, but I, you know, there'll be plenty of stories written about it. I got an email from the Somerset Patriots of the Atlantic league saying they weren't interested in them, which is,

which is harsh. You know, the guy's all right. He still has some power. Right. And, I mean, how would you expect the spring training debacle to play out, trying to, I mean, we're just under a month away, I guess, from pitchers and catchers reporting.

So it's a fairly imminent thing. I mean. Jeez, Ben, he's neither of those things. Do you know anything about baseball? Good point, good point. But, I mean, would you expect him to report and just awkwardly, would the other Yankees beat him with socks? I mean, how will that work?

Well, I mean, I guess Jason Stark wrote something today that was just kind of like, you guys really think he's going to report to spring training? And, you know, Mike sort of responded, I have no idea what he's going to do. You know, it's always sort of a... There's no way of predicting how it would be. You know, it was somewhat

awkward. I think last year, you know, everyone made a big deal about, oh my gosh, Alex is going to be such a distraction. What a distraction. You know, it's just like, Lyle Overbay was getting in the batter's box and just being like, man, I just can't believe that I was through with that. Oh, man. You know, like, it's just professional baseball players. They can handle it.

It'll be awkward, I'm sure. And, you know, if he's there, you know, players will get sick of being asked about it. But at some point, you can't just, like, go up to Derek Jeter every day and be like, hey, Cap, you got a second to talk about Alex? At some point, you just can't. You just move on. The news cycle is so fast that you find something else to write about. So it would be strange.

It would be sort of a fantastic thing to cover because it'd be so ridiculous. And, you know, there's just so many goofy scenarios. And, you know, I read something today with, you know,

the coaches could refuse to hit him ground balls or something. Or like, you know, ESPN New York was writing that, you know, that they could refuse to let him take batting practice at the minor league complex. Or,

you know, like he's trying to get in and they're like, no, no, basically, it's got to take another round. So minor league complex. Or, you know, like he's trying to get in, and they're like, oh, no, Mason Williams has got to take another round, son. Sorry, Alex. You know, it's just, it's such a, you know, it's so preposterous. You know, it's hard to sort of fathom it actually happening.

But who knows? You know, who knows what will happen. But something is, I mean, something is going to happen. Like, something will. So predict it. Tell us what it happen. Like, something will. So predict it. Tell us what it is. Like, in general or in this case?

Like, just in life? Like, I mean, it seems like the most likely thing, just knowing human beings in general, seems like the most likely thing is that he'll stand down, right? He'll make a little bit of noise for a couple weeks, but he won't show up to spring training. And it'll be a fairly quiet off, uh, regular season.

And every once in a while we'll hear about some court filing that got, uh, thrown out or something like that. And then things will move on and then it'll get really crazy a year from now. Right. Uh, yeah. I mean,

yeah, I still think this year there will be the awesome couple of times when there's stories of, you know, sort of him, like, you know, just like helping out like in a youth league or something down in miami and there's just you know shots of him like with tons of kids around him you know like he sort of

plays a temperament for them and stuff like that and you know just talking about i love the game and you know all those sorts of things that will happen during the year but yeah i think that's the most you know likely scenario it's like uh It's like there's some sort of settlement or something where you're sort of dissuaded from coming down there. Because it just would be such a circus. But, you know, I don't know. I mean, also, it doesn't seem like there's a recourse for, you know, MLB or the Union or the Yankees to prevent it.

I mean, it's kind of a loophole, for lack of a better word. So, you know, there's no way of knowing what will happen. I really could foresee a scenario in which he's just hanging out at the minor league complex all spring long. You know, it's probably, you know, it's not probable, but it's possible. So who the heck knows? If that happens, we will probably want to talk to you daily i think we'll just have you on retainer there will be there will be guys just standing on the sidewalk you know at south hyams

uh having it who's just waiting for him every day you know the tabloid guys that have the manpower to send people down there they'll just be hanging out you know just on a rod watch yeah the the post writes articles about him when he goes to dinner. They just write about what he ate for dinner. So we'll be hearing something. It'll be something, all right. Yeah, it's been fascinating. There's no way of predicting.

That's the one thing I sort of came to embrace last year doing it. It's just, you know, will we play? Will we not play? How will we do? You know, just wait and see what happens, and there'll be something interesting, I'm sure. So what does this mean baseball-wise and payroll-wise for the Yankees?

Who will play third base? Is the 189 luxury tax threshold still in play at this point? Yeah, I mean, I think that's a possibility if they miss on Tanaka. But from all accounts, they're very, very interested in getting Tanaka. But if they can't get him, then they could fill in the gaps with whoever, sort of Joe Fifth Starter type. And then they could get on 1A9. But I think if they go after Tanaka, they're still probably going to go over.

And then as far as their base, you know, it seems like they're bringing in pretty much anyone who can maybe handle position, you know. They talked to Mark Reynolds. They talked to Mike Young. They signed Scott Seidmore today. They got Kelly Johnson. It looks like it'll just kind of be a hodgepodge, you know.

There's still, you know, at the beginning of the offseason, you know, I was thinking to myself, like, you know, well, what about, you know, like, wouldn't Steven Drew make a ton of sense? Like, have him play third base for a year and then replace, you know, replace Jeter at the shortstop for next year. And then, you know, it became pretty clear

Steven Drew's not, you know, going to play third base anywhere, you know, because sort of the way, you know, he and Scott Borch were going to market him as being the top shortstop on the market, but it's January. It just became January 13th, and Steven Bruce still doesn't have a team. That's an option that's

unlikely, but I still think it makes a ton of sense. It just happens in there. Sorry to interrupt. I didn't mean to be a jerk. I was rambling. It seems like if he's signed for a multi-year deal and the plan is to transition him back to shortstop anyway, then that would affect Drew's market value in the future. No, but I think it was more of like, why would you have a team that had Steven Drew and not

playing the shortstop? And that's a good point because he's better at shortstop than Derek Jeter is right now, you know, so that's kind of the same thing about A-Rod. We're racing, we're racing to it. There you go. I interrupted first. Oh, yeah, that's right. I would have interrupted first except I had already burned my interrupting goodwill. Oh, yeah. I guess, yeah, I guess he did move the third base.

Yeah, that doesn't make sense. I should write a story about that. Just get to the bottom of that. So the last time that we had you on, we finished by making a bet, or you and Sam made a bet. I think we actually finished by talking about brittany spears for a while yes that's right but before that there was a bet discussed do you recall the terms of that bet i believe it was uh like 30 to 1 for a

dollar if uh alex broke uh barry bond' home run record. Yes. So I'm just waiting. I'm willing to negotiate a 90 cent buyout at this point. I would double or nothing if you gave... I would still do it at 60. So I would get $2 and you would get $60? Is that how that works? No. I would get 90 and you would get $60. Is that how that works? No.

I would get $90 and you would get $2. Oh, no. No way. No way. I'm sticking to my $1. And you will get that. Yeah. What is the fee on a dollar via PayPal?

I don't have a PayPal account either. Of course not. I don't have PayPal or Skype. And I just recently ditched my BlackBerry. Can I Snapchat you a dollar? Is that a thing that kids do? I don't have that either. I've heard about it, though.

Did you ditch your BlackBerry because you were afraid that 60 Minutes would get a hold of your messages with Tony Bosch? I don't understand. Everyone's making fun of Alex having a BlackBerry. A BlackBerry's a great phone. I had it for a long time and really liked it. It took me a while to get used to typing on an iPhone. I don't understand the anti-BlackBerry

brigade. I don't know. I liked it. All right. Well, we thank you for coming on on short notice to talk to us about the latest developments. And the way this is going, it probably won't be the last time that we ask you to come on and give us the latest from the A-Rod beat. Yeah, there'll be something new, I'm sure.

You know, they're filing a federal injunction tomorrow morning, so that's something to look forward to. By the way, one time when I was at an Atlantic League game, just to give you a sense of the Atlantic League, I was sitting in the dugout interviewing the pitching coach. This was like four years ago. And I was sitting in the dugout, and all of a sudden the baseball just came whizzing in and almost like hit me in the head.

And I just looked at him, what the heck was that? And the pitching coach was, oh, yeah, that was Preston Wilson trying to play second base. And so, that's the level of sort of goofiness. And the Atlantic League's great entertainment, affordable entertainment, I don't want to rag on it that much, but

if you're saying we don't want A-Rod, that'd be the greatest thing ever. Well, there's a lot of leagues. Just because the Atlantic League is one doesn't mean there's another team that would take him. There are a lot of leagues, yeah. And there's all, you know, there's Japan and Korea and all those sorts of things,

which is, you know, maybe where, like, Kendry's Morales is going to end up playing at this point. Just to be in topical humor. Preston Wilson never did play a game in second base in the Atlantic League, unfortunately. He did play a game at center, but apparently they saw enough in practice. He hit.302,.344,.474, though. Yeah, Preston Wilson's an awesome baseball player, but that doesn't mean he almost didn't kill me once with a baseball.

Yeah, it looks like it was five years. Oh, no, it was only two years't kill me once in the baseball. Yeah, yeah. It looks like it was five years. Oh, no, it was only two years after his last game in the majors. Yeah, yeah. So that's my last Atlantic League point for the night. All right. Well, you can follow Andy at McCulloughSL on Twitter. You can read him at the Newark Star-Ledger where he writes about other things occasionally when A-Rod allows.

And please let us know if you see anyone eating gummies. You know what I like? I like that Preston – I like that he wanted to play second, that he didn't insist on playing short. I mean, he's Preston Wilson. He's like the only famous person in the league. He probably could have convinced him to let him take grounders at short before a game, but he's like, nah, I'm realistic. Second base will do for me.

He understood his limitations. I'll never forget that. The ball buzzed my left ear and just crashed. I was so scared. I was like 21, like two weeks out of college and no idea what I was doing and almost got killed by Preston Wilson it was great alright Andy your $12,000

envelope is in the mail okay well my dollar better be coming through PayPal soon too so okay alright thanks Andy we'll talk to you soon no problem guys have a good one did the words Ryan or Braun send once during that entire investigation?

This is like the best day in Ryan Braun's life.