WATCH: Former Met Paul Lo Duca calls Alex Rodriguez ‘one of the fakest people out there’

Paul Lo Duca, who played for 11 years in MLB, says he’s not buying the “new and improved A-Rod.”

Former New York Met Paul Lo Duca is not holding back his feelings about New York Yankee-turned-analyst Alex Rodriguez, calling him “one of the fakest people out there.”

Lo Duca made that claim in an interview with New York radio station WFAN on Monday:

“People know I’m not a fan, and I’m sorry,” Lo Duca said. “Never will be a fan. I just think he’s one of the fakest people out there…. The way he gets put on a pedestal now is beyond me.”

Lo Duca and Rodriguez both were named in the Mitchell Report, the 409-page bombshell from 2007 that listed 89 Major League Baseball players alleged to have used steroids or performance-enhancing drugs. But Lo Duca says A-Rod’s repeated lies over the years have put him back in the public’s good graces.

Here’s a longer excerpt from his conversation with WFAN:

“I was in the Mitchell Report, something I’ll never be proud of and something that was a mistake of mine a long time ago,” he said. “But I owned up to it. I didn’t lie. Owned up to it immediately, it was over with, and people can judge me the way they want to judge me. … But when you completely lie about it for years after years after years after years, you cash in $260 million and people are like, ‘Well, he’s successful,’ well, hell yeah, he’s successful. … So, now his relationship with [Jennifer Lopez] has taken him to a level that he’s a saint. Give me a break!”

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