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New York Yankees Editorial: Yankees Hit a New Low in Settlement With A-Rod

By Jess Coleman |

Initially, the announcement that the Yankees and Alex Rodriguez finally came to a settlement over the disputed marketing agreement seems like a victory-for-all. The Yankees will pay $3.5 million to various charities. A-Rod will continue his resurgent season without any more roadblocks. Everybody wins.

But beneath the victorious headlines is an unfortunate story. While both sides avoided another battle in the media – a battle neither side has any appetite for – the way this dispute panned out confirms everyone’s most cynical predictions over the past few seasons. It seems, after all, that the Yankees really have just been trying to stick it to A-Rod.

When this dispute first began, after A-Rod hit his 660th home run, the Yankees were adamant about their refusal to pay the $6 million bonus granted under A-Rod’s contract. “We’re going to follow the contract, as we follow all contracts, so there is no dispute, from our perspective,” Brian Cashman said. “We’re going to honor our responsibility of the contract. We have the right, but not the obligation, to do something.”

That contract, according to media reports, has the stipulation that it is “the sole discretion of the New York Yankees to determine whether each of these milestones is commercially marketable as the home run chase. … The Yankees have the right, but not the obligation, to determine whether it’s a commercially marketable milestone.”

So initially, this was a dispute over the language of A-Rod’s contract. It was a legal matter. The Yankees believed that A-Rod’s use of performance-enhancing drugs, along with his season-long suspension, had created so much doubt surrounding his career that it had nullified parts of his contract.

But now it seems that was never the case. The Yankees, it appears, were never concerned about the money. While they have saved a few million dollars by paying $3.5 million instead of $6 million, it is hard to imagine that the Yankees were so willing to pick this fight over what really amounts to chump-change in the eyes of New York. It is far more likely that they were just trying to avoid paying that money to Alex Rodriguez.

Which brings up two issues. First, it means the Yankees are conducting themselves in quite a shady manner. It’s one thing to deny $6 million dollars to a player like A-Rod, who is currently in the midst of one of the largest contracts in sports history. But if I’m a young player negotiating a contract with the Yankees, this episode will not make me feel as if the Yankees have my best interests in mind.

Second, this signals that the Yankees really do have a personal vendetta against A-Rod. We will never know if all of A-Rod’s claims were true – that the Yankees tried to sabotage him, that they deliberately tried to keep him off the field – but we do know they at least tried to avoid paying him simply because they don’t like him. After all, if they really believed they did not owe him the money and would have prevailed in arbitration, why didn’t they go that route?

The Yankees can now only hope that this saga has not damaged their reputation – there is unfortunately nothing they can do in that regard. But they can start treating A-Rod – a player that has hit over 300 home runs, won 2 MVPs, and generated incalculable amounts of revenue as a Yankee – the way he deserves to be treated. Enough is enough.

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