Alex Rodriguez vs. the World continues today with the filing of his massive lawsuit against Major League Baseball and its commissioner Bud Selig, who is named as a defendant and has had a “disastrous tenure,” according to the plaintiff. Seeking unspecified damages, the lawsuit claims the league has “one, and only one, goal: to improperly marshal evidence that they hope to use to destroy the reputation and career of Alex Rodriguez, one of the most accomplished Major League Baseball players of all time.” It gets more colorful from there.
The suit alleges that baseball has “relentlessly harassed” employees of the Biogenesis anti-aging clinic for dirt on A-Rod, repeatedly leaked confidential details to the media, and attempted to back up its 211-game suspension using new evidence, “retroactively justifying the discipline it previously imposed.”
The MLB, Rodriguez and his team claim, have gone on a “scorched-earth” campaign to bring him down, and are not above shadiness to achieve that goal:
Dan Mullin of MLB purchased what were represented to be these stolen [Biogenesis] documents for $150,000 in cash, which was handed off in a bag at a Fort Lauderdale, Florida area restaurant. Upon information and belief, neither the recipient of the cash, nor MLB, filed the required IRS form 8300 for a cash transaction in excess of $10,000. Failure to do so is a federal offense.
Mullin, the suit charges, also “engaged in an inappropriate sexual relationship with a witness whom he himself interviewed about the Biogenesis matter.”
But it all comes back to Selig, who “deliberately turned a blind eye to prolific steroid use because of the overwhelmingly positive publicity generated by the record-breaking competitions of McGwire, Sosa, and Bonds,” and later, in the case of A-Rod, “quickly jumped at the opportunity to vindicate his legacy by showing that he was tough on PES, and to harm Mr. Rodriguez.”
MLB, in a statement, said “we vehemently deny the allegations in the complaint,” which it called “nothing more than a desperate attempt to circumvent the Collective Bargaining Agreement.” Below is the entire suit, via Deadspin:
