A-ROD MAY BE BANNED FOR LIFE FROM BASEBALL IF HE DOESN'T TAKE A DEAL

ALEX RODRIGUEZ

Major League Baseball officials have notified the Players Association that Alex Rodriguez’s upcoming suspension — to be announced as soon as today — will be “considerable” and very well could be a lifetime sentence if he doesn’t agree to a deal.
To that end, ESPN reported last night Rodriguez’s legal team had begun negotiating a deal to avoid a life sentence and the subsequent appeal. It was reported Sunday that last week, A-Rod’s representatives met with baseball officials to hear potential penalties.

Armed with evidence MLB purports nails A-Rod not only for possession of illegal performance-enhancing drugs but also for obstructing MLB’s investigation into Biogenesis, commissioner Bud Selig and his lieutenants are seriously contemplating suspending Rodriguez for life then letting the Yankees’ beleaguered third baseman fight that charge in an arbitration hearing — unless A-Rod agrees to a last-minute plea for something in the neighborhood of a full season.

Rodriguez has retained the services of Cohen, Weiss and Simon, a Manhattan law firm that boasts on its website of being “proud of our reputation as one of the nation’s leading firms devoted exclusively to the interests of labor and working people.”

Meanwhile, Rodriguez continued to work yesterday on a comeback that is sure to be delayed, if not canceled, imminently. The Yankees announced A-Rod, sidelined first by left hip surgery then by a disputed left quadriceps condition, will play today in a simulated game at the team’s minor league complex in Tampa and, if all goes well, will participate tomorrow in a minor league game — the location to be determined by weather forecasts. In theory, Rodriguez could join the Yankees Saturday in San Diego.

That likely is moot, though, because baseball intends to suspend Rodriguez and nine other players for their alleged involvement in Biogenesis, the now-shuttered anti-aging clinic in South Florida. If A-Rod can’t agree on a settlement and vows to appeal, his suspension figures to come via the Basic Agreement, a mechanism that would keep him off the field as he waits for arbitrator Fredric Horowitz to hear his case. If Rodriguez is suspended through the Joint Drug Agreement, then he could play through his appeal.

The Basic Agreement doesn’t spell out an exact time line for an appeal if Rodriguez is suspended by Article XII(B), best known as the “best interests of baseball” clause, but the Players Association would request an expedited hearing, then it would be a matter of Horowitz finding time in his schedule. In this scenario, Rodriguez’s case could be heard and ruled upon by the completion of the 2013 season.

Selig also is considering suspending Rodriguez by using Article XI(A)(1)(b) of the Basic Agreement, known as the “integrity of the game” clause, which empowers the commissioner to hear the appeal (although the union still could jump through myriad legal hoops to bring the case to an arbitrator). Yet the Players Association would fight hard against a precedent in which a player doesn’t get to appeal his case in front of an independent arbitrator, and the current Basic Agreement features a letter from Selig to Players Association executive director Michael Weiner assuring he wouldn’t use this clause to negate players’ rights.

Of the other nine players still involved in Biogenesis (discounting the already suspended Ryan Braun), at least eight — a group featuring Yankees catcher Francisco Cervelli, Detroit shortstop Jhonny Peralta, San Diego shortstop Everth Cabrera, former Yankee Jesus Montero (of Seattle) and former Met Fernando Martinez (now in the Yankees’ minor league system) — are expected to agree to suspensions lasting 50 games or a few games more. Texas outfielder Nelson Cruz could fight a ban — baseball officials sounded less confident yesterday of a Cruz settlement than they did on Tuesday.

The pleas of all of these players, combined with the 65-game suspension to which Braun already had agreed, would make it even more difficult for Rodriguez to win an appeal, as baseball can point to these players as testimonies to the credibility of Anthony Bosch, Biogenesis’ founder who has become MLB’s star witness.

A lifetime sentence would be difficult to support in front of an arbitrator, given Rodriguez is a zero-time offender in baseball’s eyes. However, given a lifetime suspension to consider, Horowitz could agree on Rodriguez’s guilt and come down with a lesser sentence without acquitting A-Rod altogether, which MLB could still view as a victory.

Nevertheless, MLB would just as soon avoid the risk and mess of a hearing if Rodriguez is indeed amenable to a deal.

In preparing for his simulated game, Rodriguez spent about 3 1/2 hours yesterday at the Yankees’ minor league complex. He took live batting practice, fielded ground balls at third base and threw to first, and ran the bases. He declined comment to reporters upon his departure.