Playing with House Money

Ponder: Bernie Williams is the anti-ARod. That is, fans love him for his role in the championship seasons and have such low expectations of him (I, for one, thought he'd be retired by this point in the season) that basically anything positive he does is gravy. Alex Rodriguez, in contrast, has never won anything and makes so much money that if he doesn't go 2/4 with 2 rbi every game he isn't earning his keep. It's not just the slump he's in now; even in his MVP season, Rodriguez was still widely considered a bum.

UPDATE: I meant to add that the above should be considered in light of Matt Yglesias' thoughts on salary caps. Rodriguez might be better off in other respects if he were forced to take less than his market value for his services.