I know that many of you are not going to like this opinion, but I contest that even if he doesn’t play another game (and quite frankly, I hope he doesn’t), Alex Rodriquez deserves to be in the Hall of Fame. In not even paying attention to what is going on with him right now and I don’t think that it factors in at all. Lawyers and criminals and back room deals have little to do with on-field performance and how a player impacted the game.
It has been such a long time since Rodriguez hasn’t been in the news for something or other, that we start to forget how truly great he was. And let’s make it abundantly clear; he was one of the all-time greats. Three MVP Awards, two Gold Gloves at shortstop, 10 Silver Sluggers and 14 all-star games prove that point. If you need more; even though he hasn’t sniffed .300 in half a decade, ARod still has a lifetime batting average of .299. Throw in his 654 home runs and 1,969 RBI’s, and you can start to remember how special he was in his prime.
I chose to remember that version of Rodriguez and not the one who has been splashed all over the tabloids since his game started to diminish.
I understand that writing a piece is nearly pointless because there is no way that the Baseball Writers of America will ever let Alex into the Hall, but I feel like it is worth pointing out how impressive he was.
