Former Yankees slugger Alex Rodriguez said he was a ‘jackass’ for taking performance-enhancing drugs, it was reported on Saturday.
Rodriguez said he felt compelled to take PEDs because he felt a ‘responsibility’ to quickly recover from injuries particularly after the Yankees awarded him a $275million contract.
The former shortstop said he paid a hefty price for admitting that he cheated. He said it cost him his reputation and perhaps a shot at the Hall of Fame.
‘There’s so many frustrating things when you look back at that,’ Rodriguez tells sportscaster Joe Buck in an excerpt from a new AT&T show Undeniable, which airs on October 18.
‘Number one, you have a guaranteed contract for hundreds of millions of dollars. Literally, you can sit on the couch and get fat. Right, how stupid can you be? … This thing cost me over $40 million. And it cost me my reputation, and it may have cost me the Hall of Fame and a number of other things.
Former Yankees slugger Alex Rodriguez said he was a ‘jackass’ for taking performance-enhancing drugs
‘There’s so many frustrating things when you look back at that,’ Rodriguez tells sportscaster Joe Buck (left) in an excerpt from a new AT&T show Undeniable, which airs on October 18
‘And I remember sitting there at night at maybe 4 or 5 o’clock in the morning – I probably did this a hundred nights – and I would look up with tears and say, “How the eff did I get myself in this position?”
‘I’m the only jackass that has pocket aces and figures out a way to lose the hand.’
A-Rod says that undergoing two hip surgeries made him ‘want to get back on the field and give the Yankees their money’s worth.’
‘I just needed to do anything… It was my responsibility to the fan base, to management, to ownership to get out there and play,’ he said.
Rodriguez (seen above in 2007) has numbers that rank among the best in history, but has also seen his reputation tarnished by PEDs. He missed the entire 2014 season due to a doping suspension, the second doping offense in his 22-year Major League Baseball career
‘I was in too much pain. I couldn’t play. That doesn’t give you an excuse to break the rules.’
‘I made a mistake and I paid a penalty,’ said A-Rod.
Rodriguez recalled how the most difficult thing for him to do was to admit that he cheated to his two young daughters.
‘I had to admit to Natasha and Ella the mistakes that I made, my daughters.
‘And I needed [ex-wife Cynthia Scurtis] to be part of that. I told Cynthia, “When I sit down with the girls, they’re gonna be listening to me, but they’re gonna be looking at you, and chances are I’m not gonna make it past first base because I’m gonna start breaking down.”
‘And sure enough, I almost didn’t get out of home plate.
‘And doing that, admitting that to them, and then having them embrace me and hug me, and to a degree forgive me, as I look forward, Joe, I think about I never want to put myself in a position that I have to explain myself to my daughters ever again.’
Rodriguez has numbers that rank among the best in history, but has also seen his reputation tarnished by performance-enhancing drugs.
He missed the entire 2014 season due to a doping suspension, the second doping offense in his 22-year Major League Baseball career.
The Yankees signed A-Rod to a 10-year, $275 million contract that ran through 2017.
At the time, it was the sport’s largest ever deal.
Rodriguez brought a combination of speed, power and defensive mastery to the shortstop position when he broke into baseball with the Mariners, who selected him as the first overall pick of the 1993 draft.
He switched to third base after signing with the Yankees, who already had their now-retired captain Derek Jeter at shortstop.
Rodriguez was limited to playing designated hitter during his last two seasons.
He signed what was then the richest contract in baseball when he joined the Texas Rangers in 2001 and was traded to the Yankees, joining the team in 2004 and playing on its 2009 World Series Championship team.