Hero in one boro, villian in another

Corey Sipkin/New York Daily News

Yankees third baseman Alex Rodriguez is prime example of the dark side of sports, especially when compared to example set by St. Francis Prep High grad and Super Bowl-winning coach Vince Lombardi.

It was the best of sports; it was the worst of sports.

In the auditorium of St. Francis Prep High in Fresh Meadows, Queens, last week, the pro Football Hall of Fame presented the school with a replica of the bronze plaque hanging in Canton, Ohio, memorializing the integrity-driven greatness that Vince Lombardi, SFP Class of 1933, left on the American gridiron.

The students stood and cheered.

Across the river and into the sleaze, Alex Rodriguez, best known as A-Roid because he won a Most Valuable Player award while on steroids and was busted still doping last season, was suing Major League Baseball in New York Supreme Court over his 211-game doping suspension.

A nation jeered.

And while his lawyers fought for him, billing for some of the $ 275 million snagged for a subpar Yankees stint, A-Roid pigged out in a fancy Miami restaurant before boating with his Playboy Playmate and his kids. All while sporting a wristband with the inscription, “In Jesus’ Name I Play.”

Rodriguez calls his MLB suspension a “witch hunt.”

But in the spirit of that Halloween metaphor, Rodriguez knows that he’s worn a mask his entire career. And no matter the outcome of his lawsuit or MLB arbitration, his legacy will never include induction into baseball’s Hall of Fame in Cooperstown, N.Y., because he rigged his career with chronic visits to Frankenstein’s lab for performance-enhancing drugs.

But A-Roid’s mask was ripped off. And once the black cat was out of the body bag and he was exposed as a “monster” hitter only after Igor jabbed a needle in his butt, A-Roid knew he would rank up there with Shoeless Joe Jackson, Barry Bonds, Mark McGwire and Roger Clemens as one of the worst ghouls to ever haunt professional baseball.

No worries, he can always run for Congress.

Over at St. Francis Prep, here was Vince Lombardi’s grandson, John Lombardi, talking about the sports legend who was raised on E. 14th St. in Sheepshead Bay, graduated SFP and triumphed as one of the Seven Blocks of Granite at Fordham before coaching the Green Bay Packers to two Super Bowl victories. Lombardi built his career on tireless work, discipline, integrity and maybe a second helping of pasta at family dinners.

“It was here at St. Francis Prep where my grandfather decided he wanted to dedicate his entire life to football,” Lombardi told me before the ceremony. “He’d gone to a seminary first but he liked girls too much. He also loved football. And so when he chose football as a life he gave it every fiber of his being.”

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