If Alex Rodriguez advances up the ranks on the career home run list this season, the Yankees are going to try to make sure he doesn't get paid for it.
The team plans a fight to void the up to $24 million in marketing bonuses owed to Rodriguez should he chase down Barry Bonds or one of the other three sluggers who sit ahead of him on the all-time list, according to the New York Daily News.
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Rodriguez has 654 career home runs. If he hits six more to equal Willie Mays' 660, Rodriguez would be in line for a $6 million bonus. He would then make another $6 million each time he ties Babe Ruth (714), Hank Aaron (755) and Barry Bonds (762), en route to becoming baseball's home run king.
The bonuses, set as incentive to partake in public relations and promotional campaigns during the record chase, are tied to a deal Rodriguez signed in 2007 that is separate from his player contract, which still owes him $61 million over the next two seasons.
Rodriguez is notorious for creating a distracting sideshow when he unexpectedly opted out of his contract with the Yankees during the 2007 World Series. He eventually signed a 10-year, $272 million contract with the Yankees, but the separate marketing contract was included to secure his return.
But the Yankees now consider the marketing bonuses invalid after Rodriguez's suspension for violating the MLB's drug policy, the report said. His subsequent tactics to launch attacks against the team and the league only further alienated Rodriguez, and the Yankees will argue that he signed the contract under false pretenses, severing his right to the bonuses based on his lies and eventual admission to the use of PEDs.
“This is a relationship that is never going to be repaired,” a source told the Daily News.