Baseball: Cousin injected me with ‘boli’, says Rodriguez

The New York Yankees star Alex Rodriguez has admitted that his cousin repeatedly injected him with a substance from the Dominican Republic. Joined at a press conference by the Yankees general manager, Brian Cashman, and manager, Joe Girardi, Rodriguez again apologised for taking banned drugs from 2001-2003 while he was with the Texas Rangers and blamed his 2003 positive doping test on being young and naive.

“I knew we weren’t taking Tic Tacs,” Rodriguez said. He said his cousin introduced him to “boli”, saying it was an over-the-counter substance in Dominica. While with Texas, he said his cousin injected him about twice a month during six-month cycles to get an energy boost. “I didn’t think they were steroids,” he said. “That’s again part of being young and stupid. It was over the counter. It was pretty simple. All these years I never thought I did anything wrong.” He said he was not sure how the drug use helped him, but admitted he had more energy. Rodriguez said he has not used human growth hormone or any other banned drug since then. He refused to identify his cousin.

The three-time American League MVP and Major League Baseball’s highest-paid player spoke at the Yankees’ spring training camp 10 days after Sports Illustrated reported that he tested positive in 2003.

“He’s a huge investment. So he’s an asset, and this is an asset that’s currently in crisis,” Cashman said. “So we will do everything we can to protect that asset... If this is Humpty Dumpty, we’ve got to put him back together again, to get back up on the wall.”

In an interview last week with ESPN, Rodriguez blamed the pressures of his $250 million [£176m]contract with Texas for his decision to use performance-enhancing drugs.