Alex Rodriguez‘s Comeback, Silencing Critics and Helping Yankees Win Games

After serving a year long suspension for his involvement in the Biogenesis scandal, Alex Rodriguez began the comeback from his suspension and the year he spent out of professional baseball. Even someone as gifted as Rodriguez couldn't help but be a little nervous about what lay ahead of him. "This is a hard thing I am trying to do," Rodriguez admitted to Newsday back in February. At the halfway point of the season, the New York Yankees are back to their winning ways and sit in first place in their division, due in no small part to what Rodriguez has done on the field.

What has been lost in all of this is that Rodriguez, who turns 40 on July 27th, is a genuinely talented player. Sure, he took steroids and they probably aided in his performance but they didn't make him Alex Rodriguez. That he did himself and this year's comeback is proving that. (So much so, that the Yankee fans, who once bemoaned his presence on the team, now are griping that about his omittance from the All-Star game.)

Hank Steinbrenner, co-owner of the Yankees and son of the legendary George Steinbrenner noted in an article on CBSSports, "I think this is one of the greatest comeback years any player has ever had." Through the halfway mark of the season, Rodriguez has played in 82 of the Yankees 88 games, batting .278 with 18 home runs and 51 runs batted in. The 18 home runs are his most since 2010.

Major League Baseball has a Comeback Player of the Year award that is given to a player of the year award that is given to a player who has been judged to re-emerge on the baseball diamond in a given year. A similar comparison to Rodriguez is Jason Giambi, who won the award in 2005. Giambi was dogged by a steroid scandal of his own. The season previous to winning the award, he batted . 208, also while wearing the pinstripes of the Yankees.

If Alex Rodriguez has a second half to match his first half of the season, he could became the second scandal-plagued Yankee in the last decade to win The American League Comeback Player of the year.