Well ... A-Rod is officially a Yankee again: Report

Yankees fans don't have a lot of reasons to be happy about the World Series officially putting a bow on the 2014 MLB season. Besides the realization that Derek Jeter will never play in pinstripes again, there's also that uneasy feeling of knowing Alex Rodriguez is officially back on the team once again.

Well ... at least A-Rod is celebrating.

When Pablo Sandoval caught the final out of Game 7 Wednesday night, he effectively activated Alex Rodriguez from his season-long suspension. More ironic now when you think that there is a distinct possibility that the soon-to-be free agent Sandoval could have the 39-year-old Rodriguez as his occasional backup at third base on the Yankees next year.

With end of playoffs, A-Rod becomes a reinstated player and is now back on #Yankees roster
— Joel Sherman (@Joelsherman1) October 30, 2014

The second Panda caught the final out, Rodriguez completed his season-long doping ban — a punishment that outgoing Major League Baseball commissioner Bud Selig handed down on Aug. 5, 2013, nearly 15 months ago.

Although he served his ban for violating MLB’s collective bargaining agreement and joint drug agreement, A-Rod appealed the original 211-game ban which was reduced to 162 games by an independent arbitrator. So the embattled player may not be out of the woods concerning possible future legal woes.

Yankees manager Joe Girardi has said that the reinstated Rodriguez will be the starting third baseman if he proves healthy in spring training and demonstrates that he still has the skills to play. 

There has also been discussion speculating Rodriguez could possibly play first base.

A-Rod has two surgically repaired hips, turns 40 in July and hasn’t played organized baseball in a year. He’s owed $61 million by the Yankees for the three years left on his deal.

I don't hear any cheers in the Bronx.

Mike Francesa says A-Rod might be to blame for split from YES

Mike Francesa confirmed Monday that he is leaving the YES Network after 12 years of simulcasting his afternoon show.

And, the Sports Pope says, his old pal Alex Rodriguez might be to blame.

"Was A-Rod an issue? I'm sure he was, at some level; I guarantee he was," Francesa said on the air Monday, a reference to the in-studio interview last month in which Rodriguez gave his side in his ongoing dispute with Major League Baseball over his 211-game suspension.

Francesa has had several notable interviews with the Yankees third baseman, the most controversial coming after A-Rod stormed out of the MLB hearing on his suspension appeal and right into Francesa's studio on Nov. 20.

During that interview, Rodriguez slammed Major League Baseball Commissioner Bud Selig and said he wasn't happy with the Yankees.

Rodriguez and the Yankees, which own the network, have been on shaky terms as A-Rod has battled allegations of performance-enhancing drug violations.

Although he praised YES for being "great partners in every way" since 2002, he suggested YES and/or the Yankees eventually used money and editorial content to hasten his exit.

"It never is one reason," he said. "You'll see [reported] that economics is an issue . . . Economics is always an issue; that's just the way it is. Is it the only issue? No, it's not the only issue. There are other issues.

"Editorial control is definitely an issue; it always has been an issue. It's always been a touchy issue. It almost ended the show a couple of times through the years . . . It's always been an issue. If they tell you it's not an issue, they're not telling you the truth."

Francesa said he has known since the summer that YES would not renew its contract with his show. He said he hasn't started looking for a new home for his TV simulcast.

A-Rod and Bud Selig nearly cross paths at memorial service for Michael Weiner: Report

Out of the hundreds of mourners attending the memorial service of Michael Weiner, the late executive director of baseball's Player's Association who died at age 51 from a brain tumor, were the two central characters in the midst of MLB's highly-charged grievance hearings — Alex Rodriguez and Bud Selig — newly sworn enemies who almost awkwardly ran into each other at a Paramus, N.J. chapel.

Selig left the chapel ahead of Rodriguez, ensuring there would be no bitter exchange between the two, who are embroiled in a nasty arbitration battle over the 211-game drug suspension Selig handed the three-time MVP on Aug. 5. A-Rod’s arbitration hearing ended Thursday, but the slugger abruptly left those proceedings Wednesday after independent arbitrator Fredric Horowitz ruled that Selig did not have to testify as a witness in the matter. Rodriguez took to the airwaves Wednesday afternoon to deny using performance-enhancing drugs and to castigate Selig. Horowitz will now render his verdict, which is expected sometime in the next month or possibly in January.

Rodriguez, who has sued Selig and MLB and has threatened to even take the union to the courts if the arbitrator’s ruling isn’t acceptable to him, had also taken issue with statements Weiner made in August, when he said he recommended a negotiated settlement for a certain length that he claimed Major League Baseball did not offer.

Dozens of prominent names from all areas of baseball were in attendance and, although many former players were on hand at the chapel, Rodriguez was the only active player to pay his respects, and the only member of the New York Yankees organization to attend.

In honor of the beloved Weiner’s penchant for wearing Chuck Taylor high-top sneakers, several of the mourners donned the famous basketball shoes for the service. Rabbi Mary Zamore even remarked that “Mike Weiner was known for his informality,” and encouraged the standing-room only crowd to sit on the floor if they wished.

After Rodriguez left Weiner’s service, he traveled to the La Marina restaurant in Washington Heights, which hosted an early Thanksgiving dinner for 300 seniors from upper Manhattan and Bronx nursing homes.

The Upper-Manhattan hot-spot is co-owned by Fernando Mateo, also the president of Hispanics Across America, the nonprofit group which drew dozens of A-Rod supporters to Park Avenue while Rodriguez’s arbitration unfolded. Rodriguez shook hands and visited with the seniors Sunday, but did not stop to talk with three reporters at the event.

A-Rod storms out of suspension hearing, calls process a 'farce'

Angry at what he considered the “absurdity and injustice” of the appeals process for his 211-game suspension, New York Yankees third baseman Alex Rodriguez stormed out of the grievance hearing on Wednesday and referred to the process as a “farce.”

The maneuver that set Rodriguez off, according to ESPN NewYork.com, was the decision of independent arbitrator Fredric Horowitz to not call Commissioner Bud Selig to testify in the hearing. The hearing had resumed on Monday after a month-long recess.

A person familiar with the session said that after Horowitz made his ruling, the New York Yankees third baseman slammed a table, uttered a profanity at MLB Chief Operating Officer Rob Manfred and left. The person spoke on condition of anonymity because what takes place at the hearing is supposed to be confidential.

After walking out, Rodriguez issued this statement through his spokesman:

"I am disgusted with this abusive process, designed to ensure that the player fails,” he said. “I have sat through 10 days of testimony by felons and liars, sitting quietly through every minute, trying to respect the league and the process.

"This morning, after Bud Selig refused to come in and testify about his rationale for the unprecedented and totally baseless punishment he hit me with, the arbitrator selected by MLB and the Players Association refused to order Selig to come in and face me.

“The absurdity and injustice just became too much. I walked out and will not participate any further in this farce."

The Yankees are desperate for a resolution in the hearing, which will decide the validity of Rodriguez's suspension for his role in the Biogenesis scandal. A resolution was expected to come by December.

Where it goes now is anyone's guess.

A-Rod calls in sick for Friday's MLB meeting

Alex Rodriguez's scheduled interview with Major League Baseball Friday was canceled after the Yankees third baseman told officials he was in California and too ill to travel.

A-Rod was to be interviewed by baseball officials at the Players’ Association’s Manhattan offices in advance of testifying in his arbitration hearing, which resumes Monday, according to the N.Y. Daily News.

Rodriguez was said to be recovering in California with no date set for the interview. The illness was not described as serious, but there was no indication if it would impact Monday's scheduled resumption of Rodriguez's appeal of his 211-game suspension. Rodriguez's legal team is expected to begin its presentation when the hearing reconvenes.

Baseball’s collective bargaining agreement governs any arbitration process, and it allows for baseball officials to question A-Rod about performance-enhancing drugs in the Biogenesis case.

That was supposed to happen on July 12, but when MLB’s Biogenesis investigators met with Rodriguez in Tampa, the slugger chose not to speak through a four-hour meeting, invoking the baseball equivalent of pleading the Fifth when MLB presented its case against him.

Rodriguez’s mandated pre-testimony interview, whenever it takes place, is not under oath, but if he is not truthful, he could be further punished by MLB if it determines he lied during the interview.

There were reports that A-Rod’s camp would call MLB and Yankee officials to testify. It was unclear if that would fly under the collective bargaining agreement since the CBA calls for MLB chief operating officer Rob Manfred to represent commissioner Bud Selig and other officials.

There was no immediate comment by Rodriguez's attorneys.

A-Rod tells MLB panel he was tricked into taking illegal drugs: Report

Alex Rodriguez said the only dope being taken was himself after claiming he was tricked into taking steroids by Biogenesis proprietor Anthony Bosch.

A-Rod —who is fighting a 211-game suspension by Major League Baseball — claims Bosch duped him into using the banned supplements at Tuesday's arbitration hearing.

According to the N.Y. Daily News, a source with knowledge of Rodriguez’s ongoing hearings in Manhattan, said the embattled Yankee and his lawyers have presented a case based partly on the idea that Rodriguez believed the substances he procured from the Biogenesis anti-aging clinic were innocent legal supplements.

That defense conflicts with the version told by Bosch — the founder and head honcho of the now-shuttered facility — who spent part of Monday and almost all of Tuesday testifying before the three-person panel that will decide on the appropriateness of the 211-game doping ban MLB commissioner Bud Selig imposed upon Rodriguez in August.

Bosch, who is cooperating with MLB, has spent much of that time validating a vast trove of Biogenesis documents as well as his own electronic communications with Rodriguez. The league believes the evidence reflects a deep dealer-source relationship. If the Biogenesis products were legitimate, MLB argues, why were they so expensive and why were the transactions so secretive?

Attorneys for Rodriguez will likely begin their cross-examination of Bosch on Wednesday, attacking his credibility during the closed-door hearing as they have for several months now — pointing out that MLB’s investigators paid Bosch for his evidence and offered to drop him from a lawsuit if he cooperated with their probe. They may also point out that Bosch is the subject of federal and state criminal investigations in Florida, and that he was fined $5,000 by the Florida Department of Health for holding himself out as a doctor.

By claiming that he was given banned drugs when he thought he was getting legal supplements, Rodriguez is tearing a page from the playbook that guided other tainted athletes. Barry Bonds told a grand jury in 2003 that he thought the creams he got from his BALCO-affiliated trainer, Greg Anderson, were something like flaxseed oil. Roger Clemens claimed he thought the intramuscular injections he got from his trainer, Brian McNamee, were shots of vitamin B-12 and lidocaine.

That sort of alibi got Clemens into trouble when he couldn’t explain why the injections took place during furtive visits to supply closets and an upper East Side apartment, and why he needed an unauthorized strength coach to give him shots instead of a team doctor.

Such claims have met minimal success in courtrooms, but they sometimes work in the confidential confines of a sport’s drug program. Olympic sports have the highest standard of what is loosely termed "strict liability," where an athlete is almost always held responsible for substances found in his or her specimen regardless of intent.

A-Rod's post-season hearing is expected to continue through this week but can't continue next week due to scheduling conflicts. They may pick up once again later this month or in November if necessary.

A-Rod supporters protest 211-game suspension outside MLB offices

Alex Rodriguez may be a pariah in almost every ball park in America after his involvement with the Biogenesis doping scandal became public — including at Yankee Stadium — but he had plenty of fans showing support outside the Manhattan offices of the commissioner of baseball during the first day his arbitration hearing Monday.

The beleaguered A-Rod has found some support in the baseball doping scandal from Hispanics Across America, whose members can be seen waving Dominican flags and sporting No. 13 T-shirts outside the league's Park Avenue offices.

Rodriguez, who is fighting a 211-game suspension handed down by Commissioner Bud Selig for allegedly violating the game's collectively bargained drug policy in an arbitration hearing this week, greeted a large group of supporters waving signs and Dominican flags as he arrived for the hearing Monday. And Tuesday he will be supported by HAA, which says it plans to send a message to Selig, arbitrator Fredric Horowitz and even Yankee President Randy Levine that they are responsible for what the group describes as an unfair suspension.

According to the group's press release, protests will continue through the week with a possible 24-hour vigil in front of the MLB's headquarters from Thursday into Friday.

"We want the arbitrators, MLB and the NY Yankees to hear us loud and clear. We are the fans, we are the people," HAA president Fernando Mateo said.

"The punishment does not fit the crime, said Mateo —who was hospitalized after an altercation with a security guard Tuesday morning. "A-Rod is innocent. If A-Rod is found guilty by association a 50-game suspension like every 1st time offender would be fair."

Selig once posed with fan wearing ominous 'A*Roid' T-shirt

Get a load of this photo taken a few years ago of baseball commissioner Bud Selig posing with a fan wearing an "A*ROID" T-shirt. Taken four years ago at an All-Star game event —and recently posted by Deadspin — it makes you wonder if the commish was oblivious to the intended message or he was smiling because he had a plan knowing one day he would hold Alex Rodriguez's future in his hands.

As the day of reckoning nears — and Selig considers invoking his power as commissioner to keep A-Rod off the field, maybe forever — the photo becomes funny in a twisted sort of way.

Mets looking to build Citi Field casino to recoup losses from Bernie Madoff scandal

The New York Mets owners are still reeling from the $162 million in losses they suffered in the Bernie Madoff scandal and, according to The New York Post, are betting that a casino built next to Citi Field would generate enough cash to recoup some of their money from the Ponzi-scheme mess.

Fred Wilpon and Saul Katz — who have been pretty stingy with signing ballplayers over the past few years — want to build a Las Vegas-style casino on a plot of land next to the stadium and even offered the City of New York $100 million for stretch of land.

That's more than the Mets' $93 million entire payroll this season.

Live-dealer casino gambling is currently illegal in the state of New York, except on tribal lands, but that won't stop Wilpon and his company, Sterling Equities, from throwing the dice on a proposal that aims at building a huge casino with gaming tables and slots, a 500-room, full-service hotel with 1.8 million square feet of retail with a lot of other amenities to the Queens site.

The Southampton-based Shinnecock Indian Nation signed on tho operate the casino, according to the  development team's proposal, which was first obtained by project opponents Willets Point United and NYC Park Advocates, reports The Post.

"This will be a place about fun — for families, sports fans and thrill seekers alike," read the proposal.

"It will attract millions of visitors from the New York area and around the world."

Fun and visitors — two things that have been in short supply at Citi Field in recent years.

Wilpon has a long way to go before anyone gets to double-down or punch a slot button on the city-owned patch of junkyard land — even if the idea has Mayor Bloomberg's blessing.

Although Sterling Equities wouldn't directly build or operate the casino, you can bet Major League Baseball — with its tough anti-gambling policies — will be keeping a keen eye on the project.

A MLB spokesman said that they would "need to get all the details of the agreement" and it would ultimately be Commissioner Bud Selig's call.

Selig and Wilpon are longtime friends.

I wonder how the Shinnecock operators will feel when the Atlanta Braves come to town.

Mets' Citi Field lands 2013 All-Star game

First the good news for New York Mets fans— there will be a lot All-Stars coming to Citi Field next year.  Now the bad— they'll only be there a couple of nights.

In what had to the worst kept secret in New York over the past few days, MLB announced that the 2013 All-Star game will be hosted by the New York Mets at Citi Field on July 16.

The announcement was made at a news conference at City Hall with commissioner Bud Selig, Mets owner Fred Wilpon and Mayor Michael Bloomberg in attendance.  Even Mr. Met was there to share in the fun.

The Mets last hosted the annual event in 1964 at Shea Stadium— the year the old Flushing ballpark was opened.  In 2008, the New York Yankees hosted the game— the final season of the old Yankee Stadium.

While MLB decided over four years ago that the Mets would get to host the game at their new ballpark, they held off the announcement until agreements with city agencies for the main event and related services like the FanFest could be reached.  Selig said the Mets' financial problems caused by the Bernie Madoff Ponzi scheme had no bearing on the delay.

"I have great faith in the Wilpons and the family," said Selig. "And I was very confident they would work things out, and they have.  I had no trepidation at all."

Mets fans cringed at the remark.

Bloomberg then pulled out an old script he uses at every Mets or Yankees presser and said, "I'm counting on a Subway Series this year."

Yankees fans laughed at that remark.

This year, Kansas City will host the game and the 2014 game is expected to be played at Minnesota's Target Field.

A-Rod Under Investigation By MLB For Underground Poker Party and Brawl

For the second time in recent years,  New York Yankees star, Alex Rodriguez is at the center of an underground poker scandal. This time things supposedly got violent.

MLB Commissioner, Bud Selig, has ordered the third baseman to appear before investigators over allegations-- published in Star Magazine-- that Rodriguez took part in illegal Texas Hold 'Em games where cocaine was used and a fight erupted.

According to ESPN, MLB is looking into the allegations and taking them very seriously.

A-Rod is currently on the DL, recovering from knee surgery, and is expected to rejoin the Yankees within the next two weeks.

The games were allegedly held at the Beverly Hills mansion of record executive Cody Leibel with the host losing as much as a half-million dollars one night.  The brawl was attributed to his refusal to pay.

Derek Jeter Spends All-Star Break in South Beach With Minka Kelly

The 82nd All-Star Game is over and the New York Yankees first 3,000-hit Club member, Derek Jeter,  didn't make a surprise appearance at Chase Field as many had rumored.  Instead, Jeter skipped the mid-summer classic to rest his strained calf and relieve the pressure of getting the milestone hit with his long-time girlfriend Minka Kelly.

Jeter was spotted hanging out in Miami with the 31 year-old actress this week.  The couple was seen having lunch and cuddling in the trendy South Beach area, only a baseball toss away from where Kelly is filming the new "Charlie's Angels" television series.

What better way to relieve pressure than for Jeter to opt for snuggling with a Hollywood angel over facing the Los Angeles baseball kind like Jered Weaver.

Jeter hasn't made too many comments regarding his controversial snub of the All-Star Game, after getting his historic 3,000th hit,  but plenty of others have come to the elected All-Star's defense.

"I have no problem with Derek Jeter," said Commissioner Bud Selig, according to the New York Post.  "I've known him for 15 years; he's always done the right thing.  I completely understand the situation.  And to tell you the truth, I probably would have done the same thing myself."

Jeter's teammate, Curtis Granderson echoed the sentiment.

"We understand where he is coming from," said the All-Star centerfielder.  "The most important goal is for the team, to go ahead and be healthy for the later part of the season, which is obviously the most important, which is what the  fans want to see."

Jeter picked up his 3,000th hit with a dramatic home-run on Saturday and there was speculation the twelve-time All-Star would still make it to last night's celebration, even if it was only to throw out the first ball. 

Now we know the Yankees Captain instead headed to Florida for some love during the three day break.