The Larely Beagle – The Community Newspaper of Larely, California

New York, NY – Baseball great Alex Rodriguez held a press conference today in which he retracted all of his comments made to ESPN’s Peter Gammons about steroid use. According to Rodriguez, the entire interview was a huge misunderstanding because he thought the interview was to discuss hemorrhoids, not steroids.

Rodriguez explained the epic misunderstanding by saying, “ESPN contacted me about doing an interview because they said they had info about me testing positive for ‘roids back in 2003. I immediately assumed they were talking about hemorrhoids because I had a pretty nasty bout with them back in 2003 and I’ve always been too embarrassed to talk about them. But, I figured since they were going to publish the story, I should probably come clean about them. So I talked to my agent [Scott Boras] and we agreed to do the interview. I never would have done that if I knew we were talking about steroids, because as I told Katie Couric in 2007, I have never taken those.”

Rodriguez also said that the hemorrhoids occurred because “When I arrived in Texas in 2001, I felt an enormous amount of pressure. I felt like I had all the weight of the world on top of me, and I needed to perform at a high level every day. Because of that stress I began straining way too hard during bowel movements. That combined with my rock hard stool from not getting enough vitamin E and ingesting way too much dairy led to me testing positive for ‘Roids. It’s not something I’m proud of, but it happened and I regret that. I was young, I was stupid, and I was naïve.”

Rodriguez says he will now most likely miss a week or two of spring training so he can go on an extensive media tour to clear his good name. “The thought of my legacy being tarnished over a misunderstanding is too much for me to bear. The best thing for me to do at this point is to go out and pound the pavement to let people know that at no point during the interview did I think we were talking about steroids.”

Despite all the recent negative press, Rodriguez says he knows he’ll be able to undo the damage because “Just look at George Brett. He’s another Hall of Fame Third Basemen that tested positive for ‘roids and he came through everything just fine.”