Alex Rodriguez

Alex Rodriguez (born Alexander Emmanuel "Alex" Rodriguez on July 27, 1975) plays third base for the New York Yankees, which is an American Major League Baseball team. They signed him in December 2007 to a contract that will last for 10 years and pay him $275 million (breaking the previous record for the highest paid contract, which was $252 million). Rodriguez is one of the best all around baseball players today. He is also the youngest baseball player to have ever hit 500 home runs, thus breaking a record that was set by Jimmie Foxx in 1939. Another record that he has set is for having more than 100 RBI seasons, which is more than any other baseball player in history.

Rodriguez was born in Washington Heights, New York City. As a child he idolized several baseball players, including Keith Hernandez, Dale Murphy, and Cal Ripken. His favorite baseball team was the New York Mets. While in high school he became a star shortstop player, batting .419 in 100 games, during which time he also had 90 steals. This helped his team at Westminster Christian High School in Miami, Florida to win their national championship in his junior year. Then in his senior year of high school he became first team prep All American. He hit .505 with 9 home runs, 36 RBIs and 35 steals in 33 games. This led him to become Gatorade's national baseball student of the year that year. Rodriguez then went on to be the first high school player to try out for Team USA (1993) in which he became regarded as the country's top prospect. While Rodriguez could have gone on from there to play baseball for the University of Miami but he turned down their scholarship, opting instead to sign a contract with the Seattle Mariners who selected to offer him $3.9 million in the first round of the amateur draft when he was only 17-years-old. Ten years later he gave the school $3.9 million to renovate their baseball stadium. The stadium will be named in his honor, the "Alex Rodriguez Park at Mark Light Field."