ALEX RODRIGUEZ AND Gene Orza are having lunch at a restaurant in midtown Manhattan on a bright mid-September day. They make an odd couple: one’s the sculpted, six-foot-three, 225-pound third baseman wearing wraparound sunglasses and a practiced look of nonchalance, the other’s the short and rumpled union leader with reading glasses, a quick wit, and a mischievous smile. The two have known each other since 1993, when Orza, the union’s contract compliance officer, found a way out of the bad deal Alex signed soon after Seattle drafted him No. 1 overall.
Rodriguez, then barely 18 and the son of a single mother, was grateful for Orza’s help, and the two men have grown friendly over the years. They had a spat last December, when Orza sat with Alex and his wife Cynthia at MLBPA headquarters and explained why the union was blocking a deal that would send the Rangers shortstop to Boston. The Red Sox would only make the trade if A-Rod took a $28 million pay cut—terms Rodriguez was ready to accept—but the union refused to permit such an arrangement.
“It’s a precedent that will affect every other player,” Orza told Rodriguez, who bolted from the room. Alex soon got over it, especially when he became a Yankee a few months later.
But this is not a social call, Orza tells his young friend as soon as they order—not this time. There’s a problem with his 2003 drug test, and he wants Rodriguez to listen carefully.
“The government is in possession of documentation from which it might conclude that you have tested positive for steroids,” Orza says. It’s the same message Orza’s delivered to David Ortiz, David Segui, and others on the list of 104 players who tested positive in 2003, a list that has been split between him, Michael Weiner, and Steve Fehr. “Understand that I am not telling you that you have tested positive for steroids, because I don’t know. But I cannot guarantee what the government thinks.”
But Rodriguez can. He knows he took testosterone and Primobolan last season, just as he had in each of the two seasons before that. He had wondered if his name was on the list when he received the memo about the government seizure back in April, but he’s been able to push the thought out of his mind.
Besides, there have been plenty of distractions in his first season playing for George Steinbrenner, though thankfully, the Boss has not really been one of them. Everyone around here whispers that Steinbrenner hasn’t been the same since he collapsed at Otto Graham’s funeral, even if he still pounds on Cashman after every loss. Either way, Rodriguez hasn’t been a target, even when he expected to be. Rodriguez heard nothing from the Boss after July 24, when he and Red Sox catcher Jason Varitek got into a shoving match that led to a brawl and cost Alex a four-game suspension. Nothing’s been said about his season-long trouble hitting with men in scoring position (he only recently pushed above .200). And not a word about the cold war Jeter is still waging against him. Alex has praised Derek all season—“He’s the heartbeat of this team,” Rodriguez has said time and again—but his ex-friend is well known for holding a grudge, and this one is airtight. Their teammates have been forced to choose sides, and that’s hardly been a contest, leaving Alex on an island all his own.
But what will Steinbrenner say about the news Orza just delivered if it ever becomes public?
Orza assures Rodriguez only a handful of people involved with the drug testing program have seen the list. Don Fehr hasn’t seen it, and neither has Bud Selig—both by choice, just as the program was designed. No owner has seen it, either. But that could change, depending on what the government does. Prosecutors have already defied orders from two federal judges to return the list, so it’s hard to know what will happen next.
“You will want to consult with counsel and consider your options,” Orza tells Rodriguez. “You might not want to give urine anymore if you think it is going to be seized by the government.”
I haven’t been tested this year, Rodriguez says.
You’ll be tested sometime in the next two weeks, Orza tells him, stating what should be obvious. There are little more than two weeks left in the regular season, and the drug agreement clearly states that every player will be tested before the season ends. “Talk to your lawyer before you decide what you want to do,” Orza says.
It is not a productive two weeks for Rodriguez, who—like every other player contacted by the union—decides to take his drug test. He hits .245 and strikes out 14 times in 14 games. But he plays for a winner now, and Rodriguez finally gets to celebrate on September 30, when Bernie Williams slugs a walk-off two-run homer to beat AL Central champ Minnesota, 6–4, clinching the Yankees’ ninth straight AL East title.
Big thing are expected after the Yankees win a league-best 101 games, hit a team-record 242 home runs, and draw 3.8 million fans, another team record. And all goes well for the first seven games of the postseason. Rodriguez rediscovers his stroke in the ALDS against the Twins, hitting .421 and scoring the series-clinching run on a wild pitch in Game 4. And he and his teammates are brilliant in the first three games against Boston in the ALCS—all New York victories, including a 19–8 rout in Game 3 at Fenway that prompted several Red Sox to congratulate the Yankees on their 40th AL pennant.
But everything changes in the 9th inning of Game 4. Mariano Rivera is protecting a 4–3 lead when he walks leadoff hitter Kevin Millar. Boston manager Terry Francona inserts pinch runner Dave Roberts, who promptly steals second. Bill Mueller follows with a line-drive single, driving in Roberts as Rivera swings his right arm in disgust. Three innings later, David Ortiz hits a two-run home run, and Boston has its first win of the series.
The Red Sox come from behind again in Game 5 and win on an RBI single by Ortiz in the 14th. Boston momentum shifts to New York panic when the Red Sox cruise to a 4–2 win in Game 6 to even the series. And when Kevin Brown opens Game 7 by giving up a two-run homer to Ortiz in the 1st, then Javier Vazquez gives up a grand slam to Johnny Damon an inning later, the Yankees’ epic collapse is all but complete.
Steinbrenner watches all this from his box, and he is still there watching the postgame show when he turns to Cashman. It’s been a long, strange season. They traded for the best player in baseball and spent close to $200 million in payroll, which will cost them $30 million in luxury taxes on top of their $60 million revenue sharing bill. In baseball history, 25 teams have taken a 3–0 lead in postseason series, and every one of them advanced to the World Series. Until now.
A year ago, Steinbrenner threatened Cashman’s job on a regular basis, humiliated him by holding him out of the Winter Meetings, then exercised the GM’s option for 2005 out of spite, never bothering to tell Brian himself. But now, an hour after the biggest collapse in baseball history, he has a different message.
“Your job is safe,” George tells Cashman. “Be prepared to get after it this winter.”
There will be no interviews, either. Rubenstein puts together the last media release of the season and hands it to his boss, who gives his approval. Minutes later Rubenstein dutifully delivers it to the media.
“I congratulate the Boston Red Sox on their great victory, and I want to thank our loyal fans for their enormous support,” the statement said. “Of course I am disappointed, because I wanted a championship for them and for our city. You can be assured we will get to work and produce a great team next year.”
The Curse officially ends on October 27, when four Red Sox pitchers shut down the Cardinals, 3–0, to complete a four-game World Series sweep. After 86 years of near misses, broken dreams, and endless heartache, the Red Sox are World Champions for the first time since a young left-hander pitched Boston’s favorite team to the title in 1918. One year later that pitcher—Babe Ruth—was traded to the New York Yankees, the deal the Red Sox and their fans have been cursing ever since.
“It’s an overwhelming sense of joy and relief,” says Boston majority owner John Henry, who just three years ago was the owner of the small market Florida Marlins. Now he’s standing in the middle of the Red Sox clubhouse, watching the players he paid $127 million this season—a payroll second only to the Yankees—douse each other with Champagne. “It’s vindication for all the frustration,” Henry says. “All the waiting has finally paid off.”
But as historic as this postseason has been, it can’t drown out the sport’s steroids story. On October 10, Gary Sheffield told Sports Illustrated he did not know the substances he received and used from Balco were steroids. On October 16, the San Francisco Chronicle reported that it has a tape of Bonds’ trainer Greg Anderson telling a friend that Bonds took an undetectable steroid and that Anderson expected to be tipped off about the date of Barry’s 2003 drug test. Two weeks later, the government revealed documents in which Balco executive Jack Valente says he gave Bonds steroids. Valente will dispute the claim, but no one will listen.
There’s plenty of drama behind the scenes, too. While Selig continues to push Fehr to adopt MLB’s minor league drug policy and its year-round random testing, two federal district court judges instruct the government to return the 2003 test results. Judge Florence-Marie Cooper is the third judge to so order, finding in mid-September that “the government callously disregarded the affected players’ constitutional rights.” In an earlier decision, Judge James Mahan asked if the Fourth Amendment, which protects citizens against illegal search and seizure, “had been repealed” and instructed the government not to inspect the data it seized before returning it.
The government ignores Cooper’s order, as it had the previous two. Federal agent Jeff Novitzky continues to review all the data seized from CDT while the prosecutors in charge of the investigation appeal each decision to the United States Court of Appeals for the Ninth Circuit. The chase after the 104 players who tested positive in 2003 continues.
The story goes quiet in November, when the country reelects President Bush, who promises to privatize Social Security and continue his war on terror. As is customary, many cabinet members resign, including Attorney General John Ashcroft, who had taken a strong personal interest in the steroids investigation. Bush replaces Ashcroft with White House Counsel Alberto Gonzales, who will soon make a key decision that complicates life for Mark McGwire.
But the year ends as it began: with Giambi, Bonds, and Balco in the crosshairs. In the first few days of December, the San Francisco Chronicle runs excerpts of last year’s secret grand jury testimony from Jason Giambi and Bonds that are leaked to the paper by Jack Valente’s defense attorney. The newspaper puts out Giambi’s story first. The Yankees first baseman, who has repeatedly denied ever using performance-enhancing drugs, provides the grand jury with a detailed account of steroid injections and human growth hormone use.
Told he would be granted immunity from prosecution if he told the truth but would face perjury charges if he lied—the same deal offered every player who came before the grand jury—Giambi testified that Greg Anderson gave him what the trainer called the Clear and the Cream. The first is a steroid in liquid form, the other a balm containing steroids.
“Did Mr. Anderson provide you with actual injectable testosterone?” Assistant U.S. Attorney Jeff Nedrow asked Giambi.
“Yes,” Giambi said.
Referring to an alleged steroids calendar from January of 2003, Nedrow asked, “And this injectable T, or testosterone, is basically a steroid, correct?”
“Yes,” Giambi said.
“And did he talk to you about the fact that it was a steroid at the time?” Nedrow asked.
“Yeah, I mean, I… I don’t know if we got into a conversation about it,” Giambi said. “But we both knew about it, yes.”
The Chronicle posts the story on the morning of December 2, and it’s only a matter of hours before Yankees President Randy Levine is meeting with MLB Vice President Rob Manfred. The two former colleagues speak for an hour, and the conversation boils down to one thing: the $84.5 million left on Giambi’s contract.
“Can we void the last four years of his deal?” Levine asks.
“No,” Manfred says. “The union will fight it, and they will win.”
The same question dominates talk radio in New York, which is all Giambi all day long. The tabloids have a field day. BOOT THE BUM, screams the New York Post front page, labeling Giambi THE LYIN’ KING.
DAMNED YANKEE, shouts the Daily News.
It’s Selig’s worst nightmare: a big star on the game’s most famous team unmasked as a cheat. But he barely has time to remind baseball officials that they are barred from discussing steroids before the Chronicle comes back with the Bonds story the very next day.
The home run king’s testimony is less straightforward than Giambi’s but no less damning. At several points Bonds admits to “unknowingly” taking substances that are now known to be designer steroids. Yes, he told the grand jury, Anderson gave him the Clear and the Cream. No, he testified, he did not know what either product contained. Nor did he question his longtime trainer.
“When he said it was flaxseed oil, I just said, ‘Whatever,’ ” Bonds testified. “It was in the ballpark… in front of everybody. I mean, all the reporters, my teammates… they all saw it. I didn’t hide it.”
“Were there any effects from those two items that made you think, ‘Gee, he didn’t tell me it was a steroid?’ ” Nedrow asked Bonds.
“If it’s a steroid, it ain’t working,” said Bonds, who insisted that Anderson would never give him an illegal substance without telling him. We’re friends, Bonds testified, and Anderson “wouldn’t jeopardize our friendship.”
The two stories hit hard. President Bush issues a statement urging baseball to deal with the use of steroids and all other illegal performance-enhancing substances immediately. McCain threatens to introduce his own drug testing legislation if baseball does not replace its current program with “one as stringent” as the one used by the minor leagues. “I’ll give them to January,” McCain says.
This time Fehr isn’t arguing. It’s clear now that the current program, with its single test and no penalties for first-time offenders, was a mistake, especially with the twin fires of Balco and CDT threatening to torch the game’s credibility. The program did not do enough to discourage steroid use, nor did it convince anyone that the players and their union were serious about cleaning up the game.
Now two of the game’s biggest stars have been outed as steroid users, even as the union and their lawyers continue the battle to recover the test results still in the hands of the government. On December 10, Federal Judge Susan Illston, who is also presiding over the Balco case, issues yet another order for the government to return baseball’s tests. The prosecutors again appeal, putting the fate of players in the hands of the Court of Appeals for the Ninth Circuit—as well as the growing number of lawyers, clerks, and other people who have seen the list of positive results.
If the union loses, scores of players face subpoenas and the same risk of perjury that ensnared Bonds and Giambi. Fehr and the union lawyers spend much of their annual Executive Board meeting in December explaining the legal ramifications of the CDT case, and it doesn’t take long for all in attendance to understand the need to re-open the drug agreement with MLB.
Selig’s men push hard, and a new agreement is all but completed before they break for Christmas. In addition to tests in spring training, the tentative agreement stipulates there will now be unannounced, year-round random testing for all players, including those who don’t spend the offseason in the United States.
Most important, the identities of first-time offenders will be revealed. The plan also calls for a 10-game suspension for the first positive test, 30 games for the second, and 60 games for the third—all without pay.
A good year for baseball—a very profitable year—is ending badly. But both Selig and Fehr are hopeful that their new agreement will finally get the game’s drug problem under control.
Nothing could be further from the truth.