baseball players’ personal lives and troubles can often overshadow or eclipse their great talent. sometimes, that might not be very fair. but other times, their shit is so whack that when the players name is mentioned, the scandal or problem is the very first thing you think about.
that’s how i feel when i hear about roberto alomar. and it troubles me. firstly, 12 is my favourite number. so there’s that. secondly, he was an amazing ballplayer and a huge asset to the blue jays, there’s no denying it. but in 2009, he was slapped with a lawsuit from a woman who alleged he coerced her into unprotected sex without telling her he had AIDS. the lawsuit was later withdrawn, and he told the media that he didn’t have the disease. but the very next year, his wife sued him for the same reason. HIS WIFE!
some great players throughout the years have done some pretty fucked up things: crashing their cars into telephone poles, getting wasted and throwing punches, using steroids, betting on the game, the list goes on, and so it goes. but telling someone you’re clean when you have a disease like AIDS, and then having unprotected sex with them- that’s the lowest of the low. and yes, there is a responsibility of the other party to insit on a condom or other form of protection- i’m not saying the other parties didn’t also make mistakes. the wife should have insisted on testing before they started boning sans rubber. but the fact remains that if someone knows they have AIDS or is HIV positive and they engage in unprotected sex, they are commiting a crime. a really fucking heinous and serious one.
he’s the first player to have his jersey retired by the jays. it’s a great achievement, and i want to be happy for him. but it makes me cringe. and if the accusations are true (the details are still unclear, and his lawyer refuses to confirm or deny if he is HIV positive or has AIDS), i’m disappointed that he is getting this kind of accolade.
his career achievements may have been great, but to celebrate a person who would do something so terrible is doing a disservice to the integrity of the sport of baseball.
There is but one response to this: “innocent until proven guilty”. I know that saying this denies the validity of a lot of strong emotions, but the fact that both cases were eventually withdrawn and both women had much to gain financially by a ruling in their favour must surely blunt one’s anger over an unproven charge. Keep in mind that the woman who first sued him, Ilya Dall, also accused him of “exposing her children to the disease because he kissed them, got saliva on them, put his toothbrush next to theirs – none of which, in fact, transmits the virus.” It is exactly for cases like this that this over-riding principle of law exists.
(Edit: some of the image on the page that I linked to are NSFW.)
