Welcome to TBO.com. Skip directly to: our Keyword Search, Section Navigation, Content.

TBO.com - TBO is Tampa Bay Online

Sports

TBO > Sports

Yanks: Keep Cousin Away

The Associated Press

Published: February 27, 2009

NEW YORK - Alex Rodriguez was told by the New York Yankees to keep his cousin away from the team.

The message was given to the star third baseman Thursday, said a person familiar with the situation, speaking on condition of anonymity because the team did not make an announcement. The message applied both to spring training and the regular season.

Rodriguez also was told the cousin should not be anywhere the team congregates, which presumably includes the team's hotel when it travels and the ballpark.

Speaking at Steinbrenner Field in Tampa, General Manager Brian Cashman said only that the matter of Rodriguez being picked up from his spring training opener Wednesday by his cousin "has been handled."

Rodriguez took a similar tone following New York's 5-1 victory on Thursday against Tampa Bay.

"It's been addressed," he said. "And, no further comment."

A day earlier in Dunedin, Rodriguez homered and walked twice, then got into a SUV driven by Yuri Sucart. He's been identified as the cousin who provided Rodriguez with performance-enhancing drugs obtained in the Dominican Republic. Rodriguez admitted using them while playing for Texas from 2001-03.

Rodriguez acknowledged to the Yankees that having the cousin meet him at the ballpark in Dunedin was a mistake, the person who told The Associated Press about the situation said.

GIANTS: Ace Tim Lincecum agreed to a $650,000, one-year contract with San Francisco.

The 24-year-old Lincecum won the National League Cy Young Award in 2008, going 18-5 with a 2.62 ERA while striking out a major league-leading 265 batters in 227 innings.

METS: Ace Johan Santana was scratched from this morning's B game start against Italy because of tenderness in his pitching elbow. Mets manager Jerry Manuel said the decision was precautionary because Santana has a history of feeling elbow soreness this time of the year. Santana remains on track to make his regular exhibition game debut Tuesday.

NATIONALS: Jose Rijo, a special assistant to GM Jim Bowden, was fired Thursday, the latest fallout from a scandal involving a top prospect from the Dominican Republic who lied about his age and name.

The team also fired Jose Baez, the Nationals' director of operations in the Dominican Republic, and cut ties with Rijo's academy in the Dominican Republic.

It was at Rijo's Dominican academy that the Nationals organization was introduced to a player it first knew as Esmailyn "Smiley" Gonzalez. He is the Dominican prospect who received a $1.4 million signing bonus in 2006, when the Nationals thought they were signing a 16-year-old shortstop.

President Stan Kasten said last week that a Major League Baseball investigation determined Gonzalez was born in November 1985, not Sept. 21, 1989. It was also discovered his real name is Carlos David Alvarez Lugo, Kasten said.

Share this: