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Saturday, June 20, 2015

Do we celebrate Alex Rodriguez's 3000th hit?

Alex Rodriguez hit his 3000th hit last night.  With all the turmoil around this guy in respect to his steroid use the question of how we view him getting his 3000th hit is an interesting one.  It is even more complicated by the good season he is having.  Before the season everyone wanted A-Rod to just go away.  The Yankees didn't expect anything from him and didn't want to pay him the $22M owed to him this year.  After all the negative press stemming from last year's suspension who could blame them. 

Then the season starts and A-Rod is doing everything right.  He says the right things and he is putting very good numbers that could put him around 27 homers and 80 ribbies if he stays healthy and keeps his current pace.  He has been a non-story except for his good hitting.  Now he gets hit number 3000.  With his steroid history there is no way we can celebrate this like we have past greats.  Still I do think you have to look at this as an accomplishment.  Yes many of his hits have been aided by his steroid use but you still have to have the talent to hit the ball.  To that end I still think this is a pretty big accomplishment. 

I have not been, and am not, an Alex Rodriguez fan..  This said, it is hard to look at any player from any era and believe they have never either cheated, gained an advantage by "gaming the rules", or taken some type of substance to give them an advantage.  There is too much out there now to say anyone is clean no matter what we think of that player.  This doesn't absolve anyone but I think you have to look MLB history as a whole , good or bad, and put it in perspective.  My bottom line is you don't have to like A-Rod or legitimize anything he has done but I do think we have to at least look at it for what it is. 

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