Nov. 5 (Bloomberg) -- When it was over, Alex Rodriguez, eyes moist, was at the epicenter of a celebratory pile of pinstripes. His chump-to-champ renovation was complete.

Now that the New York Yankees have secured championship No. 27, as advertised on manager Joe Girardi’s back, it’s worth revisiting a few moments of import during the World Series.

Entering Game 3 in Philadelphia, A-Rod had recorded eight official at-bats, compiling zero hits while amassing six strikeouts against the defending champion Phillies.

Uh oh.

A-Rod, it must’ve seemed to his seen-this-act-before Bronx backers, was experiencing that all-too familiar seasonal metamorphosis -- from MVP to where is he? The leaves on the trees were dying and so was A-Rod’s bat.

Stay in the moment, A-Rod preached all season. Yesterday doesn’t matter. Tomorrow means nothing. All it takes is one swing to make a game of it, to alter a series, to shatter a reputation, to cement a legacy.

Just one.

And then he sent Cole Hamels’s second pitch, a fastball not quite where the pitcher wanted it, toward deep right field. The baseball appeared to hit the top of the wall. Only it hit something else, something symbolic.

The umpires conferred and ruled home run. Phillies 3, Yankees 2. Just like that. A-Rod was alive. So, too, were the Yankees. The game plan, A-Rod said afterward, was to swing at strikes. Only strikes.

Simple

The man who for so long had made everything so complicated, who had to explain his steroid use, was suddenly preaching simple.

Replays showed the baseball actually struck a Fox television camera, not the outfield wall. It’s almost as if A- Rod was taking aim at the lens itself, targeting prying eyes, trying his darnedest to knock the broadcast from the airwaves.

Suddenly Mr. Look at Me didn’t want a worldwide audience. Didn’t need one. He no longer required validation from the outside. He was playing the game for himself and, more importantly, for those who share his clubhouse.

For the first time since A-Rod joined the Yankees he was one of the guys.

The Yankees won Game 3. And Game 4, thanks to a run-scoring double that A-Rod called his biggest hit. And they won last night at the new joint, 7-3, behind a World Series record-tying six runs batted in from Hideki Matsui, reaching the requisite four wins in six games.

“Without him, who knows where our road may have stopped,” Johnny Damon said of A-Rod, who after the final out raced toward the center on the diamond, arms raised, to join the franchise’s first celebration since 2000.

Telling Moments

There were more telling moments.

Like the one in Game 6 of the American League Championship Series against the Angels. A-Rod is batting in the fourth inning. The bases are loaded.

More than 50,000 fans at Yankee Stadium, where everything costs too much, including A-Rod, wanted something grand to celebrate. A-Rod gave them, ho-hum, a base on balls. The guy who once tried to do everything in every at-bat was more than happy for the free pass and another run on the scoreboard.

That’s the Yankee way. Don’t do too much. Trust the next guy, or, as hitting coach Kevin Long likes to say, pass the baton. The point being that everyone, no matter their salary, need only be a helper, not a hero.

First World Series

That game ended the ALCS, catapulting A-Rod into his first World Series. The much maligned Yankee was mobbed by his teammates, including the captain, Derek Jeter. That says something.

A-Rod was one of the fellas.

Speaking of one, A-Rod had ample time to reflect while rehabilitating his hip at the start of the season. He had surgery, then an epiphany. A-Rod realized just how much he missed baseball. Not only the nine innings, but the good and bad that comes with sharing, caring, winning and losing.

Never again will A-Rod be A-Fraud, an insult with its genesis in the clubhouse. At least that’s what former manager Joe Torre said in his book.

Predictably, and understandably, there will be some who insist that a changed A-Rod is nothing more than media-driven hype, a byproduct of more hits, more homers, than any real profound alteration in personality. It’s guesswork, at best.

All we can go on is what those who know A-Rod best, his teammates, have been saying. What we see, what we’re privy to, is the baseball manifestation of a new man.

Media Warning

“You better start writing some nice things about the guy,” Nick Swisher instructed in the Moet & Chandon-soaked clubhouse.

If it’s all an act, a sham, then A-Rod is fooling an awful lot of people who have more reason for skepticism than any outsider.

It has to be more than just home runs and RBI. Barry Bonds delivered, again and again, and that didn’t stop his teammates from showing their disdain for his selfishness.

“He’s a great guy and a great teammate,” said Yankees ace CC Sabathia, who joined the team as a free agent during the offseason. “He made me feel comfortable from day one.”

Speaking of day one, let’s revisit the first inning of A- Rod’s first game this season. He walloped the first pitch he saw for a three-run home run.

That’s how it started.

It ended with A-Rod on a podium, the World Series trophy above his head and the eyes of the baseball world fixated on him. A-Rod was asked personal, but responded in the collective.

“We’re standing here as world champions,” he said. “We’re going to enjoy it. We’re going to party.”

We. We. We.

You better believe something has changed.

(Scott Soshnick is a Bloomberg News columnist. The opinions expressed are his own.)

Click on “Send Comment” in the sidebar display to send a letter to the editor.

To contact the writer of this column: Scott Soshnick in New York at ssoshnick@bloomberg.net

Last Updated: November 5, 2009 01:28 EST