Did A-Rod’s team pay supporters to protest at his hearing?

A-Rod is one of the most despised figures in baseball, yet the man somehow still has fans. But he may not have quite as many supporters as the amount of protestors at his MLB hearing would lead you to believe.

Scores of supporters have been outside MLB’s offices on Park Avenue in New York this week while Alex Rodriguez attends his hearing for his 211-game PED suspension. Many of the supporters are holding signs slamming the New York Yankees and MLB. The effort reportedly is being led Hispanics Across America (HAA).

The New York Daily News has been all over the protest, and their suspicions are high. For instance, they cited a tweet from a protestor who claimed he was getting paid to be there and having meals provided. The person supposedly later claimed they were just joking. Another protestor was holding up a sign that called Yankees president Randy Levine the devil, but the person holding the sign admitted they didn’t know who Levine was. Sure, that sounds ridiculous, but it’s actually pretty easy to rope people into holding up a sign and supporting a cause despite not knowing all the details of the matter. I wouldn’t expect all HAA members to know the inner-workings of the Yankees, but I would expect them to follow instructions from an HAA leader who tells them to hold up a sign.

And then as Jimmy Traina pointed out, all the signs are written in the same handwriting.

Now I’m not qualified to say whether or not the protestors are fakes, but I certainly wouldn’t put it past A-Rod and his team. This is the same guy who tried to have one of his people buy the Biogenesis records to keep MLB from them. Do you really think he’d be above paying people to protest outside MLB’s offices to make it look like he has fans? Neither do I.