TBOH Mailbag: On Valium and Manny Ramirez

This could just be the valium talking, but have you done a post on why the Phils didn’t make a run at Manny Ramirez?  What did the Rays sign him for, $3 million?  The Phils couldn’t have paid him that to play a corner outfield position (could Raul move to right?) and maybe platoon with D. Brown if necessary?  Surely he’d get 450 at bats if he could stay healthy, and he’s unlikely to stay healthy for more than that.  Seems like a perfect fit, no?  Worth the risk of his personality?

-Bureaucratist

Wow!  We get to do another reader mail thing!  I’ve only done this once before, so this is quite a thrill.  Sure, Bureaucratist is one of the only people who sends me emails… and yeah, sometimes he contributes to this site, but his email appeared in bold in my inbox, so it still counts.  Hey, if it weren’t for technicalities, this blog wouldn’t even exist.

What’s the question again?  Oh god I’m already screwing this up.  Please don’t think I’ll mishandle your emails

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I may not be the best person to ask this question, because I hate Manny Ramirez.  I’m also a hypocrite, completely.  I tend to demand personality from people and books who aren’t giving it out enough, and then turn my nose up in disgust at other people who are offering way too much of it.

So then there’s Manny, whose got personality spilling out of every orifice, to the point that I forget that he was one of the greatest hitters of all time.  I laughed along with his antics–the high-fiving a kid after an awesome catch, then immediately throwing a guy out at the plate thing I remember the most–but that was mainly because I was dating a girl who was a big fan of his at the time.  When that influential fog lifted, I realized he’s just a clownish weirdo whose character traits bleed an awful lot past “quirky” and into “infectiously irritating.”  What sent me over the edge was the “Whoops-Manny-totally-forgot-English” thing he did during that press conference.

Personally, I wouldn’t want him in my clubhouse, chemistry-wise.  But any teacher I’ve ever had, plus most lab partners and the cat I accidentally sprayed with battery acid, will tell you:  I am no chemist.

As for the money, I’ve just been going around under the assumption that the Phillies can’t afford to go after anybody. I mean, they say that all the time, but they even did their big secret move of the offseason, so I think they really can’t this time.  I assume it would take some financial finagling, which, for a guy in the stage of his career, with the…personality… he’s got, would not be worth it.  Getting Manny would have been a definitive sign, I think, that we were trying to win now. Ruben wants to inject some youth into this team as it ages.  Manny Ramirez does not qualify in this manner, even if he’s got the mental capacity of a four-year-old.

Come on, is he going to stay “healthy”?  Philly’s audience has hated him pretty hard for so long, all he’d need is a prolonged offensive drought, then get booed, then say something stupid in the papers, then pretend to have a leg injury… and that’s that.  I feel like we’ve been so fortunate to avoid attitudes like Manny’s and still feature a shit-ton of talent.  Why bring him in now?  So he can mentor Domonic Brown?  Sweet jesus.  You stay away from him, Manny.

Anyways, feel free to send emails with thoughts/questions/questionable thoughts; that way I’ll be able to do more than one of these per quarter–thatballsouttahere@gmail.com.