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Report: MLB to seek 100-game PED ban for Alex Rodriguez (UPDATE) – Metro US

Report: MLB to seek 100-game PED ban for Alex Rodriguez (UPDATE)

Alex Rodriguez fields questions in the clubhouse before Opening Day. Credit: Getty Images Alex Rodriguez has not played this season as he recovers from hip surgery.
Credit: Getty Images

UPDATE (noon, June 5): Few Yankees had any comment on the possible suspension of Alex Rodriguez following Tuesday night’s win over Cleveland.

“I’m not going to speak for Alex,” Mark Teixeira said. “I had no idea. Until I learn more, I don’t have any comment.”

The news of the proposed suspensions broke during the early innings of the game, so the players had little, if any, knowledge of MLB seeking to suspend Rodriguez, Ryan Braun and others in connection to the Biogenesis scandal.

“I think we all had hoped that we had got through it but obviously we’re not through it yet,” manager Joe Girardi said Tuesday night. “Our stance all along is that we’ll let MLB handle it and we really have no comment.”

MLBPA President Michael Weiner said Wednesday morning the union was interviewing players involved in the matter and no suspensions would be meted out until after those were concluded.

“If you’re going to want to find out stuff you’re going to have to go through MLB,” Girardi said prior to Wednesday’s day game against Cleveland.

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On Monday, managing general partner Hal Steinbrenner conceded that at times Alex Rodriguez has disappointed the Yankees.

Now, Steinbrenner may have a new reason to be disappointed with Rodriguez, who is currently rehabbing a second hip injury in Tampa, Fla.

During the early innings of Tuesday night’s Yankees game with Cleveland, ESPN’s T.J. Quinn broke the news that MLB will seek a 100-game suspension for Rodriguez’s second PED offense in connection with the league’s investigation of the Biogensis clinic in Miami, Fla.

Rodriguez was not suspended for his first offense, which occurred when he admitted to using during his three seasons with Texas. Rodriguez admitted to the usage before a packed press conference at the team’s spring training facility in Florida and that seemed to be the end of it.

However, after it was revealed he had suffered a second hip injury, reports surfaced about a connection to the Biogenesis clinic in Florida stating he had re-involved himself with PEDs.

According to the ESPN story, Anthony Bosch, the doctor who ran the clinic, is expected to give sworn testimony to MLB investigators.

Rodriguez and Ryan Braun are the most prominent names in the story. Braun was handed a 50-game suspension after the 2011 season when he won NL MVP, but won an appeal for the ban.

Follow Yankees beat writer Larry Fleisher on Twitter @LarryFleisher.