Manny

I'm respectful of fundamentals in sport. Athletes that perform their art the "right way" are nothing to sneeze at. I always learned and often practiced fundamentally sound play, but I'm super proud of my own spins and approaches to my individual game(s). Manny Ramirez might be the greatest right-handed hitter to ever play ball. That's what the common consensus is of late. He is, and forever will be, heavily ridiculed for his continuous tomfoolery in(and out)side the lines. The media has over-influenced everyone to consistently chalk his free thinking attitude up to just "Manny being Manny." I'm so sick of hearing it. I don't agree with all of his alleged antics, but he is certainly a different and/yet a special, special ball player.

I will preface the next sentence with this: obviously I have not seen every, nor even most, play(s) in the history of sport. In the 2008 season, before being traded away from the Boston Red Sox, Manny spontaneously orchestrated what I think is the coolest, if not the greatest, play in the history of sports. He made a tremendous catch running full speed and awkwardly stretching backwards at the wall in left field in Baltimore. In bracing himself for the inevitable post-snag wall collision, he climbed up the wall like vintage Junior Griffey, high-fived a Red Sox fan in the front row above the wall (again: in Baltimore), before abruptly turning around and firing to the cutoff man to double off the untagged-up runner at first base. Who else would have even thought about that? Imagine the criticism he would have endured (though surely wouldn't have cared about) had the runner been just barely safe by an eye lash. Not getting that out would have been directly attributed to the extra second/effort expended in attempting to do something potentially legendarily awesome. Critics can say it may have been selfish or irresponsible all they want. It's one of those things where someone is revered if it goes right and shunned if it goes wrong. Right or wrong, seeing shit like that makes me proud to be alive.