ESPN reports that Alex Rodriguez has admitted to Peter Gammons he took banned substances.
(ARod claim: He doesn’t know which banned substances he took)
His voice shaking at times, Alex Rodriguez met head-on allegations that he tested positive for steroids six years ago, telling ESPN on Monday that he did take performance-enhancing drugs while playing for the Texas Rangers during a three-year period beginning in 2001.
“When I arrived in Texas in 2001, I felt an enormous amount of pressure … I needed to perform, and perform at a high level every day,” Rodriguez told ESPN’s Peter Gammons in an interview in Miami Beach, Fla. “Back then, [baseball] was a different culture. It was very loose. I was young, I was stupid, I was naïve. I wanted to prove to everyone that I was worth being one of the greatest players of all time.
“I did take a banned substance. For that, I am very sorry and deeply regretful.”
Of course, Rodriguez doesn’t admit to the specifics of what he took, but we all have a pretty damn good idea.
Sources who know about the testing results told SI that Rodriguez tested positive for testosterone and Primobolan, an anabolic steroid. In his ESPN interview, Rodriguez said he did not know exactly which substance or substances he had taken. In 2003, there were no penalties for a positive result.
Rodriguez himself told Gammons, “To be quite honest, I don’t know exactly what substance I was guilty of using.”
Yeahright.
Nice job of catchup by ESPN after SI broke the story. Safe to assume ARod wasn’t going to give the admittance to SI after the publication outed him.
Of all the things that have happened to baseball regarding the suspected use of PEDs, this is by far the most significant development. And I’m not talking about how it affects Rodriguez.
I’ve got more on that later today…
3:12 pm on February 9th, 2009
I'm not surprised at all by this.
3:14 pm on February 9th, 2009
This ensures that next year, AL ballparks will be filled to the brim with "A-Roid" signs.
3:26 pm on February 9th, 2009
So now A-Rod's allowed to come back and cover NBA games on TNT, right?
3:29 pm on February 9th, 2009
Derek Jeter will never look at him the same again. He must be heartbroken A-Rod could lie like that.
3:42 pm on February 9th, 2009
Crazy thing is that A-Rod, like Bonds, could've ended up a first-ballot hall of famer without juicing at all. What do you think — will he still make it? Also, any chance he's still secretly taking something? The athletes are always a step ahead…I'm wondering too if this will affect A-Rod's participation with the Dominican Republic in the World Baseball Classic.
4:07 pm on February 9th, 2009
This article is the ONLY article besides our own - who has it right. Arod DOES NOT admit use of PEDs. Not once. Great Catch SBB.
Bob
5:52 pm on February 9th, 2009
I see I see….its easier to ask for forgiveness than permission. Josh-Couldnt agree more. Its like for 15 seconds we shared a brain
6:45 pm on February 9th, 2009
Who injects themselves with something they don't know what it is … Especially these characters that worship themselves.
Hey A-rod, try this! It's, er, (muffled from covering mouth).
7:43 pm on February 9th, 2009
Alex Rodriguez has admitted to taking performance enhancing drugs early in his career; so what? Is the public that naive and is MLB rules committees that unfair to believe that performance enhancing hasn’t been going on since the beginning of the sports? Do people really believe that even the earliest Olympic athletes weren’t taking some kind of ‘pick me up’? Our beloved Babe Ruth, that guy probably had a TWO medicine cabinets in his bathroom! Can a guy who partied like that man did play baseball without having a boatload of caffeine or maybe even a little snort of coke? Come on, don’t be such narrow minded fools on this subject. Ok, a couple pots of coffee isn’t the same as a little cocaine which, in turn, isn’t the same as steroids: but the whole idea has been going on for a long, long time; far longer than the “asterisk” era of baseball in the ‘90’s. It’s ok to have rules in place to deter the use of performance enhancing substances, but I don’t think it’s ok to punish retroactively. It’s like if I had a child who played catch in the house for years as a little kid then for some reason one day I made a new household rule that banned playing catch in the house and then I spanked my kid for every time that he played baseball in the house BEFORE I made the rule. I understand that there were rules in place already, but many weren’t specific to particular substances. Mark McGuire was using an over the counter substance that hadn’t been added to the list of banned substances but now is on the list. Do we retroactively punish Mark McGuire for using a substance that at the time was perfectly within the rules to use? I know that Major League Baseball wants to send a message that drugs are bad and that all the players should have a fair chance at achieving their athletic goals. And yes, steroids and cocaine and other performance enhancing drugs are very dangerous to your health. However, the issue of punishment should be based solely on the specific idea of breaking rules that were in place at the time of the violation. We, the public and Major League Baseball should not go witch hunting for all the athletes who may have misused substances that were until recently specified as illegal to their particular sport.
1:15 am on February 10th, 2009
If there is a silver-lining in all of this, it's that maybe now he'll be suicidal. An insecure, pathologically self-aware chimp like Alex doesnt have a long way to go before the voices in his head tell him to eat a bottle of valium.