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Feb 20, 2009 11:30 AM
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They always say that it's not the crime that ruins you—it's the cover up. Well, if the latest reports about Alex Rodriguez are true, his "confession" may have done more harm than good.
Rodriguez's big steroid admission amounted to three years of primobolan use, administered by a harmless unnamed cousin, but just the slightest amount of digging has cast all of his claims into doubt and a new revelation threatens to undermine his whole career.
The New York Daily News is reporting that Rodriguez is close friends with Angel Presinal, a personal trainer who was banned from every Major League Baseball clubhouse in 2001. Presinal worked for Juan Gonzalez, then of the Cleveland Indians, when he was accused of shipping an unmarked bag filled with anabolic steroids into Canada on an Indians road trip. No charges were ever filed, but MLB investigated (the incident is mentioned in the Mitchell Report) and eventually barred Presinal from entering any private area of any stadium. Players have been warned to stay away from him. Gonzalez became teammates with A-Rod in Texas in 2002.
But Alex's association with Presinal apparently continued long after he left the Rangers. One source told the paper that Presinal "accompanied A-Rod for the entire 2007 season," always staying in Alex's hotel on road trips. He was careful to never be seen with Rodriguez, but would allegedly share a separate room with the cousin, Yuri Sucart, and meet with Rodriguez there. Rodriguez, of course, won the MVP in 2007 and held that season up as proof that he could perform at the highest levels without steroids.
The News also links Presinal to the Dominican Republic's national basketball team, their World Baseball Classic team—which A-Rod will play for this year—and many prominent major leaguers including: "Pedro Martinez, David Ortiz, Vladimir Guerrero, Bartolo Colon, Miguel Tejada, Adrian Beltre, Moises Alou, Jose Guillen, Ervin Santana, Ruben Sierra, Francisco Cordero, Jose Mesa and Juan Guzman, among others." Yikes.
But wait there's more! Rodriguez also stated that the drug he used was purchased over the counter in the D.R., a claim too good to check—except ESPNdeportes actually did check. (They speak good Spanish, you know.) It turns out that primobolan (the drug he tested positive for) is illegal in the Dominican Republic and was never available over the counter as Rodriguez claimed it was. Cripes.
So it looks like Alex Rodriguez's story has gone from "unlikely" to "improbable" to "completely full of shit." Sucart isn't even a blood relative. At the very least, he is not telling the full story and his failure to tell the whole truth—despite two very public attempts to do so—has undermined whatever credibility he might have had left.
A-Rod's pal, the tainted trainer: Steroid-linked friend is banned by every MLB team [NYDN]
Primobolan, drug Alex Rodriguez used, not available for legal purchase in the Dominican Republic [ESPN]
Send an email to Dashiell Bennett, the author of this post, at dashiell@deadspin.com.
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