Recently Miguel Tejada, who was mentioned and admitted to taking steroids, was once again the center of another accusation. This time it was about his real age. ESPN’s Tom Farrey confronted Tejada with a copy of his original birth certificate which held his real name as well as real age. Apparently Tejada is listed at age 31, when he really is two years older. However, who even knows for sure after that if his certificate was forged in the first place. Many baseball players in other countries, mainly from relatively poor households, forge their birth certificates to appear older or younger, whichever more appealing at the time, to be able to play baseball in the Majors and make money.
Another case like this was Rafael Furcal, who was 18 as a rookie, then 26 the very next year. Imagine aging 8 years in just 365 days. So is this even a problem? Besides the fact it is illegal, I think no player should really be to ashamed about lying about their age especially if it helps you to make money and play a little earlier than your supposed. Also, we still as fans get to see our favorite players in action in their prime. Furcal had a very exciting season as a rookie, even if he had been playing ball forever at age 25 when we all thought he was 18.
Truth is that it really is nothing to be ashamed of. Tejada was quoted, when admitting to the discrepancy in his age, “It’s nothing that I do to hurt nobody to do nothing wrong, at the time, I just wanted to be signed by baseball to be a baseball player, you know” Once you are able to understand what he is trying to say correctly in bad English then u can understand that he just wanted to play and this was the way it was going to happen. He didn’t hurt anyone else in the process and was just getting his dream handed to him like this.
It may shame some players and their legacy, however, it is the way the world works now. People want the stars in the league faster and younger. Usually, many are more athletic and exciting at such a young age and are able to play much longer. Who knows how old Albert Pujols really is, he could be 18 even though he looks 40. But, at least he is in the league hitting jacks and haunting Brad Lidge in his sleep.
http://sports.espn.go.com/mlb/columns/story?id=3357337
http://blogs.chron.com/baseballblog/archives/2008/04/tejada_should_n.html
Tags: age, furcal, haunting brad lidge, pujol, tejada
April 23, 2008 at 3:08 am
I believe it is hard for someone from a third world country or poor standings to be told that your too old to start playing ball or past your opportunity to grow. I think that Tejada needed to lie about his age and help out his family financially in the long run and I applaud him for this, not scold him for the lie. People need to understand that individuals in his position aren’t always doing things to better themselves, they are trying to help everyone around them. AND yes Pujols homerun is still haunting Brad Lidge to this day and I don’t think it has landed yet.
April 23, 2008 at 9:59 pm
I honestly don’t believe baseball teams care that much about a player’s age, although it is disheartening that Tejada and others think so. If a player can play at a high level, it really doesn’t matter how old he is. Production is production. Ask somebody like Jamie Moyer who is closing on 40 yet still playing baseball. It does seem a bit unethical for a team to refuse a player’s services simply based on age, but then again its probably ignorant for that team to do so without considering his playing abilities. With that being said, I think its utterly ridiculous that ESPN and others are throwing the race card into this. He’s been lying about his age, so in order to cover it up he uses the race card.. great, as if we haven’t seen that enough lately. I loved the title of this post, by the way.
April 23, 2008 at 10:01 pm
Don’t forget Tejada was accused of using steroids… excuses, excuses.
April 24, 2008 at 3:19 pm
I believe that if he had the talent people were looking at an age like that, why lie about it? If anything he would have to wait a little longer to get what he wanted. He should have known that this wouldn’t be kept hidden forever. It blew up more so because he lied about doing steroids on top of his age and now he may even face deportation due to the fact he can lose his green card. As soon as the whole steroids thing reared its ugly head he should of fessed up then instead of deny everything and get into more trouble.