Alex Rodriguez is the man

I didn't post it yesterday, but there was an excellent article on Alex Rodriguez written by John Harper published in the Daily News (yes, you read that correctly - the NY Daily News published a good article). In it, A-Rod talks a bit about his maturation as a player and a person, about his regrets over the opt-out fiasco, and about his regrets over signing with the Rangers over the Mets in 2000. Some of the good stuff:

"I went for the contract when my true desire was to go play for the Mets," Rodriguez said of his decision to ink his $252 million deal with Texas eight years ago.

As A-Rod looked back on the events of the past offseason, he seemed haunted by the idea that in breaking free of the Yankees he could have made another decision based strictly on money and wound up as unhappy as he was in Texas for three years.

The three-time MVP says that at some point after his opt-out decision in October, he realized he could have been heading for a similar scenario, with Boras dictating his next destination.

"So to make the right decision just feels really good," Rodriguez said, "versus being taken down a road where I'm like, 'Oh, my God, where am I? Oh, $400 million to play in some place I hate? Great, I'll blow my --- head off.'

On finally relaxing in New York, he said the following:

Proud and happy, with no issues hanging over him for a change - unless Jose Canseco truly has some dirt to dish - A-Rod seems more at ease than ever as a Yankee. He says he learned to thrive in New York last year by no longer trying to please everyone, as well as no longer feeling compelled to react to everything said or written about him.

Derek Jeter even seems to be warming up to him again, engaging him more in clubhouse banter a year after A-Rod stopped pretending publicly that they were still best friends.

"Once you start letting go a little bit, things start coming to you a little easier," A-Rod said. "They did for me last year. In the past, I've always said, 'I have to do this and I have to do that,' mainly because of the expectations.

"Now I've come to a point where, if I get a hit with the bases loaded, cool, and if I don't, so what? Next at-bat. Or next game. People always want it to be about the .individual battle with me, but I just want to be part of this team, and I think that will help me get to where I want to go."

Many Yankee fans will never embrace him, and that's sad. They should be able to just sit back, watch the show, and enjoy the fact that they get to watch one of the best players in the history of the game - truly a once-in-a-generation talent - play for their team every day. And when all is said and done, Rodriguez will quite possibly capture the all-time home run record as a Yankee and will assuredly enter the Hall as a Yankee. Fellow fans, I emplore you...get off his back, ignore his faults, and enjoy what is quite possibly the best player you'll ever see.

Update: After I read wrote the above prose, I stumbled across this article, but Bob Klapisch, which is completely unreasonable. Determined to make an A-Rod story out of nothing, Klapisch theorizes that the Yankees will be unhappy with Rodriguez for saying that he regrets not signing with the Mets in 2000. In his own words: Imagine how the Yankees feel today knowing the cornerstone of the franchise, to whom they've committed $275 million, has been pining for the Mets all along.

Looking at A-Rod's statement, only an idiot would come to that conclusion. All that he is saying is that, while he was stuck losing in Texas, he wished that he had taken less money to play for the better team - the team for which he wanted to play. This is not at all a knock on the Yankees; Alex is not saying that he wishes he was with the Mets now or that he prefers the Mets to the Yankees. He was simply sharing with the rest of the world that his time in Texas tought him that money is not the only thing that matters. Wouldn't being stuck in baseball purgatory for three years, even with an absurd contract, make most competitive people regret not choosing the higher profile, more talented team. If the Yankees were trying to sign Rodriguez that offseason, I could see them being upset as it would be a sign that he might be a closet Mets fan. The Yankees, however, weren't in on the bidding. If they had been and he had chosen the Texas contract over the better team, I'm sure he'd be making similar statements about how he wished he had signed with the Yankees. Or, for that matter, any hypothetical good team that may have been in the hunt.

In this case, there is no smoke and there is no fire. Klapisch is, in grand Mike Lupica style, trying to portray Rodriguez in a negative light even when there is no reason too. The fact that, to this point, no other memebers of the media have run with this story is very telling. The jackals are usually overanalyze every statement out of A-Rod's mouth, and the fact that they haven't jumped all over this one shows just how foolish and absurd Klapisch's article is. If I were Bob, I'd be embarassed to be mentioned in the same breath as Lupica, who writes the same article every single week during baseball season, with a few different adjectives and some of the words rearranged.