Comparing Michael Phelps’s and A-Rod’s Sins

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I had a column about how A-Rod wasn’t going to be charged with anything but that Phelps probably was – but apparently the local sheriff – after 8 arrests – thought better of wasting to many resources.

This image was inspired in part by this blog post by Timothy Egan at the New York Times. Egan initially focused on those who didn’t get away with youthful indiscretions:

At least one in five people in state prisons are doing time for drug offenses. What must they think, rotting away in musty cells, hearing a president or a celebrity athlete dismiss their mistakes with the hoary line of young and stupid?

…Phelps seemed contrite in trotting out his young and stupid defense. “I’m 23 years old and despite the successes I’ve had in the pool, I acted in a youthful and inappropriate way,” he said.

More like youthful and appropriate. I have a hard time going after him for taking a hit of pot after he spent most of his life as a robo-athlete…

 

But this passage’s appropriate savaging of A-Rod is what inspired the above image:

A-Rod will likely face no legal consequences, nothing from the the toothless barons of baseball. Phelps took his hit for recreation. Rodriguez did his drug to cheat the game and himself. He lied about it. And then he blamed it all on his age and pressure to perform because of his oversized contract.

His punishment will come from the Bronx fans, brutal in their daily assessments, people who know that if they put a syringe in their arm while working with heavy equipment nobody will cut them a young-and-stupid break.