NEWSFLASH: It has recently come to our attention thanks to the wonderfully intrepid reporters known as Rush & Molloy that - my god - Cynthia Rodriguez has… a Master’s Degree in Psychology!!! And no one is safe from her Jedi mind tricks.

“Cynthia has a master’s degree in psychology. Once she found out how vulnerable (Alex) was, she got into his head.” - Anonymous “Pal” of Alex Rodriguez

So if my math is correct…

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That took long. After rumors (well ok, stone-cold hard facts) that A-Rod was seen walking around major cosmopolitan cities in North America, acompanied by a “whorish blonde, and lavinshing extravagant gifts on strippers accross the U.S.” (Perez Hilton’s words, not mine), HBW Alumn Cynthia Rodriguez is out of A-Rod’s life, and out of his apartment.

From the NY Daily News:

Yankees superstar Alex Rodriguez vowed yesterday that revelations about his off-the-field antics wouldn’t affect his play for the slumping Bombers.

“I certainly don’t think this will be a distraction to our team,” A-Rod said before last night’s winning effort against the Toronto Blue Jays.

But it may be a distraction at home: His wife, Cynthia, brusquely left their East Side pad last night with two suitcases, refusing to speak with reporters.

A-Rod wouldn’t directly address reports that he spent Sunday night out on the town with a sexy blond gal pal - while his wife was back in New York with their 2-year-old daughter. But his manager, Joe Torre, spoke up for his star player after meeting with him in private.

“Alex is a big boy. I know how serious he takes his baseball, so it really wasn’t an issue for me,” Torre said, adding that he thought the media attention was “over the line.”

I couldn’t imagine A-Rod at a strip club; he is kinda fruity. But I must admit, this whole A-Rod Strippergate has exposed one of the most, if not the most, deliciously juicy controversies New York has ever seen. I mean, Joe Torre commenting on A-Rod’s ability to keep his shenanigans out of the clubhouse?

Even for the Big Apple, that’s impressive.

David Halberstam was killed in a car crash today at the age of 73, when another vehicle slammed into the car in which he was a passenger. Halberstam attended Harvard, where he picked up an obsession with the Red Sox and started writing for the Harvard Crimson. After working at dailies in Mississippi and Tennessee and covering the civil rights movment, he moved back north to the New York Times. While at the Times, he won the Pulitzer Prize for his coverage of the Vietnam war (he later wrote the most famous book on that war, The Best and the Brightest). He has a slew of books, but here in Beantown, we knew him fondly as a bit of a seamhead. He wrote the pennant-race chronicle The Summer of ‘49, which follows titans of the game Ted Williams and Joe DiMaggio as the Red Sox and the Yankees grind their way towards a one-game showdown at season’s end, and The Teammates: A Portrait of Friendship, which follows Johnny Pesky and Dom DiMaggio on the 1,300 mile drive from Massachusetts to Florida to see a declining Williams for the last time. Bobby Doerr, who stayed home to care for his ailing wife yet also worked with Halberstam on that project, talked to Reuters today:

“He was a very likable, compassionate type of person,” Doerr, 89, told Reuters by telephone after hearing of the death. “He was not the type of person to make you think ‘I’m David Halberstam.’ He was just kind of like part of the family.”

Halberstam also wrote October 1964 (about the Yankees and the Cardinals) and served as editor and preface-writer of many other baseball-related books, as well as writing books about basketball and football. And all of that, of course, was in addition to his day job—writing searing indicments of the wars and politics of the second half of the 20th century. Not bad. Not bad at all.

He will be missed.

In light of Stud-Rod hitting his 11th 12th Home Run tonight (game’s still going on it’s over – and CoCo Crisp fell into the bullpen trying to catch #12); we shall induct Cynthia Rodríguez (née Scurtis), into the HBW hall of fame.

Here’s her “Baseball Card” profile, courtesy New York Magazine:

Cynthia Rodriguez (née Scurtis), a.k.a. C-Rod

Wife of: Yankees third baseman Alex Rodriguez, a.k.a. A-Rod

Age: 31

Married: November 2002

Résumé: Ex–psychology teacher (and ex–volleyball player), from Miami

Husband’s income: $16 million a year with the Yankees, plus $67 million over the next several years from his Rangers contract

Lives: Upper East Side

How they met: Body and Soul gym in Coconut Grove, Florida

The wedding: She wore an Amsale gown with Swarovski crystals. Her parents paid.

Favorite hangout: Tao in midtown; loves Taotinis

Unhappily: “Page Six” reported A-Rod spotted “canoodling” with a Brazilian stripper

Happily: Cynthia announced last Tuesday that she’s pregnant