Shot by Steven Klein
The night before his life changes forever, Alex Rodriguez calls from Miami with an urgent request. A-Rod is worried about something he said during our interview last night. I've been hearing mysterious warnings all afternoon: Alex needs to talk. Alex wants to clarify something. Can't say what. Alex will call you from his car.
"Listen," Rodriguez says. "I was thinking about one thing that I spoke about—it's something that's kind of trivial but will give me a hard time for no reason." He pauses. "The song."
Aha. Last night, he let slip his favorite Madonna song. The curious relationship between A-Rod and the pop icon makes for delicious gossip, of course. Is Rodriguez terrified that Madonna will resent the tongue-wagging? Or, better still, has he picked the wrong song as his favorite, and fears that an offended Madge might march her stilettos over his back? No: Rodriguez believes that revealing the song would lead to its being played every time he stepped to the plate during an away game. "The last thing I want to do is go to every stadium and have them play that song," he says. Fine—to be honest, it's not even a great Madonna song (if it had been something juicy like "Justify My Love," forget it).
Looking back, his preoccupation seems surreal. Just the day before, Selena Roberts, a reporter from Sports Illustrated, had confronted Rodriguez at a Miami gym, asking for his reaction to evidence that he'd tested positive for illegal steroids in 2003. And now here he was, sweating a Madonna song. It's like worrying about the in-flight movie as your plane is belly flopping on the Hudson River.
Maybe Rodriguez is in denial. He's just spent the afternoon happily posing for the cover shoot for this story, showing off his strapping physique and loosening up with shots of Patrón. His pals talk of continuing the party nearby, at the remodeled Fontainebleu hotel. When he calls later there's no panic in his voice, no foreshadowing of the humiliation that he, at least, knows is coming. It really is as though his biggest concern in the world is that Madonna song. That fear is misdirected anyhow: Like an opposing team's ballpark needs any inspiration to crank up a Madonna song when A-Rod comes to the plate. Velvet-vested organists have been practicing the entire Ciccone oeuvre for months.
"He is so misunderstood," says Rodriguez's friend and manager Guy Oseary, who has worked with Madonna for more than two decades. "He really hasn't had the chance to show people who he really is."
It must mean something that Rodriguez seems more eager to talk about Madonna. His relationship with the 50-year-old pop priestess has been a "Page Six" staple for months, though there's been no confirmation of its exact nature. "Well, we're friends," Rodriguez says. "She's an amazing entertainer. And it's been amazing how she's been able to stay on top for three decades. I have a lot of respect for her." He says he's enjoyed their conversations, and her counsel. "She's very smart," he says, "and she's passionate about everything she does." Rodriguez can't name anything specific he's asked Madonna for advice on, "but if there ever was any situation, she's a great ear to have, you know?"
Their meeting was not, as some have speculated, arranged by Oseary, who represents them both. "I met her about 12 years ago in Miami, believe it or not," he says. "That's how we know each other. I was trying to buy her house, and I couldn't afford it."
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