Alex Rodriguez Appeal Hearing: A-Rod begins his defense

The Alex Rodriguez appeal hearing resumed on Monday with Team A-Rod getting the chance to defend their client. Unfortunately, A-Rod won't be testifying just yet, but according to the snippets that Ken Davidoff is reporting, things are already getting underway as they call on their many witnesses.

They called a doctor to the stand, who believes that A-Rod could not have possibly underwent the doping regimen that Anthony Bosch described without testing positive at some point in the last few years. An IT expert testified that Bosch had also somehow altered texts and emails in order to portray a relationship between him and Rodriguez that didn't actually exist.

They will call to the stand Yankees team president Randy Levine and MLB investigator Dan Mullin on Tuesday and want Bud Selig to testify as well. Independent arbitrator Frederic Horowitz still has to determine whether or not he will allow Selig to testify, as MLB believes that Rob Manfred's testimony should be all that is needed to defend the suspension.

While the doctor raises a valid point, though it's easy to get around a positive test these days, the idea that Bosch fabricated a relationship with A-Rod through emails and text messages is a little too farfetched. I don't know what Randy Levine will offer Team A-Rod, but it will sure be interesting. They need to really get into it with Mullin if they have legitimate evidence of all the wrongdoing that went on during the investigation. If I'm Horowitz, I'd absolutely want Selig testifying so he can actually be involved in this process and just to see what kind of silly things he could say.

On the flip side, MLB still believes that A-Rod's ex-spokesman Michael Sitrick has avoided a subpoena in relation to him authorizing the leak of Ryan Braun and Francisco Cervelli to Yahoo! Sports. If he turns out to be guilty, and Alex Rodriguez knew what he was doing, MLB can prove he was obstructing their investigation.

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