Alex Rodriguez press conference was bad PR—for PR
When the baseball star said he was ‘fighting for my life’ in his high-profile doping case, observers reacted with acrimony toward an apparently scripted plea.
On Monday,Major League Baseball suspended the New York Yankees slugger for 211 games—through the end of the 2014 season—for his involvement a doping scandal, yet he still played in that night’s game against the Chicago White Sox.
He was able to play because he’s appealing the suspension, and in a press conference before the game, Rodriguez painted himself as an embattled warrior: “I’m fighting for my life,” he said. “I have to defend myself. If I don’t defend myself, no one else will.”
That language is very similar to what appeared in a now-deleted tweet from Rodriguez’s PR spokesman Ron Berkowitz. In it, he said, “Hello Chicago!!! Lets do this!!! #fighting”
One might say that’s an example of a PR spokesman and his client simply staying on message, but quite a few observers on Twitter—PR pros included—viewed the confluence as a cynical attempt to generate sympathy.
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