Alex Rodriguez might soon be the Major League's homerun king, but he isn't getting any hits with his Florida tenants.
The New York Yankees slugger has come under fire for mismanaging an apartment complex near Tampa he owns through a real estate company he owns.
Rodriguez, a Miami native, owns Newport Property Ventures, which owns and manages the Normandy Park Apartment complex in Temple Terrace.
Last week the celebrity gossip site TMZ reported the complex came under fire from local housing officials for a number of safety code violations.
A-Rod's tenants identified a number of red flags to city officials, including overflowing trash receptacles, rusty pipes, and a heinously murky swimming pool which looked more like a science experiment than a place to cool off on a sunny day.
A local news team in Tampa also reported on the story Sunday evening, putting some extra heat on A-Rod and his management team.
"It's amazing a person that's got that much money can have properties that look like this," one tenant told Tampa's Fox 13 News. Another tenant called Rodriguez a slumlord.
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But according to TMZ, the property managers employed by Rodriguez to oversee the apartments have begun cleaning up the complex and drained the offending pool. TMZ said a few of the tenants at Normandy Park said "everyone responsible seemed to step it up" after they first posted photos of the complex on Friday.
Cleaning up Normandy Park should do wonders for A-Rod's VORL (Value over Replacement Landlord).
David Hill is a Miami native and cofounder of Marlins Diehards, the only Florida Marlins blog with perspective on the eccentricities of Marlins fandom.
