ESPN wants Alex Rodriguez
To quote the indomitable Don King, “Only in America.”
Remember when Alex Rodriguez was a pariah?
Admitted to using performance-enhancing drugs?
Suspended for 211 games back in 2014?
Sued by the Yankees over bonuses due with certain home run milestones?
Yeah, those days seem to be gone forever.
Rodriguez has been a TV revelation since retiring as a player, shining in the Fox Sports studio, first with Pete Rose and now with Frank Thomas and David Ortiz.
A-Rod has always been a smooth talker, but his ascension has been one of the biggest media stories.
In fact, he is so good that ESPN now wants to hire him as Aaron Boone’s replacement on “Sunday Night Baseball,” according to Michael McCarthy of the Sporting News — and it’s willing to share him.
“The Worldwide Leader” would love to snatch him from Fox Sports, but he’s under contract, so it’s pitching an A-Rod time share.
As a source told McCarthy that ESPN is going big here, but might come up empty. “ESPN wants A-Rod badly, but Fox, in general, is not good about sharing talent,” the source said.
While not unprecedented, there have been some instances where networks “lend” on-air talent to other productions. A recent example is ESPN allowing college basketball analyst Jay Bilas to work games during the NCAA tournament, whose rights are owned by CBS.
Boone, who had been with ESPN since 2010, broadcast Sunday night games with Dan Schulman and Jessica Mendoza for the past two seasons. He was hired as the Yankees manager in December. Schulman announced last year that he wouldn’t be returning in 2018, so ESPN is swinging for the fences.
Yankee fans will remember the delicious irony of Rodriguez potentially replacing Boone.
In 2003, after putting New York in the World Series with a pennant-winning 10th inning home run in Game 7 of the American League Championship Series over Boston, Boone blew out his knee playing basketball in the offseason.
The Yankees moved quickly to engineer a trade for Rodriguez.
In case there weren’t enough moving parts here, USA Today’s Ryan Glasspiege reports that A-Rod is demanding input on ESPN’s choice of who replaces Schulman. McCarthy has said Jon Sciambi is the leading candidate, but Glasspiegel reports that Rodriguez would prefer Matt Vasgersian, who works at Fox and the MLB Network.
Reading the tea leaves, one wonders: If A-Rod is already making demands of ESPN, are contract talks further along than reported?
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