After this week those of you who don’t watch ESPN might not know the issues with Alex Rodriguez. I have been watching ESPN periodically, only periodically because you don’t get any information of sports anymore, so I feel the need change the channel. ESPN has the Alex Rodriguez interview one time ever 3 hours. Today was the first time that I had only seen it on ESPN two times. Alex Rodriguez has been accused of using steroids in the Major League. Alex Rodriguez is very fortunate today that for once in his life, the good public relations thing to do was also the smart thing to do and right thing to do. Back in 2003 during an interview (before steroids were banned in the MLB), Rodriguez had admitted to using/trying steroids (not knowing the consequences of bad PR). I chose this article because it had public relations in the title and it has been a big topic all week. It also shows the affects of good and bad public relation skills.
“Most fans, though, will give A-Rod the benefit of the doubt, and believe that he's come clean with nothing more to hide. That's fine - after all, he hasn't had a positive test since MLB began punishing steroid offenders. And he'll be able to answer any drug questions by pointing back to his admission, making any questioner look like a muckraker. The admission, in that sense, gives him the upper hand so long as no new damning details emerge. It also relieves pressure from being hounded by the questions every day when he comes to work, allowing one less distraction to affect a very distractible player. Smart move.” This part of the article expresses the good public relation skills from Rodriguez.
“Most importantly, admitting his mistake and telling the truth was the right thing for Alex Rodriguez to do. It doesn't change the fact that he's lied for the past eight years, or any of the other things that there are to not like about him, but it's never too late to tell the truth. There will be repercussions, with fans grumbling that he must be back on the juice every time he hits a tape-measure home run, and there will always be lingering doubters about whether he only admitted that which could be proven, but for those outside of the tinfoil-hat community, today is a redemptive day for A-Rod and for baseball.”
I like how he ends this article stating how he did his goods and bads, and how Rodriguez will have to pay for his actions and how he will now have better PR skills to keep him out of trouble.
A-Rod learns important PR lesson
Jesse Spector
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As my boyfriend is the biggest Yankees fan you will ever meet, I bet I can top almost anyone in the class with the number of times we’ve watched this interview and discussed this situation! Something I do find interesting is that each time we discussed this, there was never anything that we labeled as negative about what A-Rod had done.
ReplyDeleteI think it was an incredible stroke of luck that his PR rep at the time told him to confess. It wasn’t illegal at the time to use them; it was just frowned upon. So he manned up and told the truth. Now he’s getting accusations and slurs thrown his way because of something he admitted doing five years ago.
It’s kind of like all those sitcoms where the husband tells the wife, “Don’t yell at me for something I told you I did!” People should not be punishing A-Rod five years after he told the truth about using steroids.
Working in a sports bar, ESPN is on every other television in the place. I have seen his interviews over and over again. I think its a good thing that he has come clean, but what happens in the future because of this is what determines the character of Rodriguez. it seems like every other all star in the MLB is using some form of performance enhancing drugs and it sickens me. these incidents gives todays youth the idea that the only way to succeed in professional sports is by using performance enhancing drugs.
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