Houston’s 2009 Defensive Rookie of the Year Brian Cushing was suspended late last week for violating the league’s performance-enhancing drug policy and will miss the upcoming season’s first four games.

Fellow Texas-based athlete, Lance Berkman, took this opportunity to point out the chasm between how baseball players are treated as compared to football players.

The thing is, Berkman is wrong.

“The man’s a beast, I know that,” Berkman said about Cushing. “I didn’t see what he tested positive for. It said he violated the steroids policy. I will say what will be interesting will be to see the reaction because generally when that happens to a football player it is kind of ho-hum.

“You write a story about it and he serves his four games and nobody will ever say anything else about it. If that happens to a baseball player, they want to strike him from the record book. It’s a totally different reaction, and I’m not sure why that is … “

The MLB’s drug policy is to suspend a first-time violator 50 games, second-time violators 100 games and lifetimes bans for three-timers.

When a first-time violator is banned for 50 games, that’s about 31 percent of the player’s 162-game season. As football players only play 16 regular season games, a 50-game ban in MLB is equivalent to a 5-game ban in the NFL.

Is Lance Berkman referring to Cushing only getting a four-game ban instead of a five-game ban when painting NFL reactionaries with the ho-hum brush? Doubtful.

He’s probably referring to the rigor-moral that nips at the heels of marquee players like Manny Ramirez for months after suspicion or suspension. But notice that I added the term “marquee.” There were 23 other players (besides Ramirez) to be suspended in the five years before him. Go ahead and name a quarter of them.

Wikipedia doesn’t count. Close that tab, you’re cheating.

The fact is, the Cushing situation will coax more than a ho-hum reaction out of people – it already has – because … well, because he’s a talented player; a Pro-Bowler; a second-team all NFL defenseman, AP Rookie of the Year (maybe) and because Cushing himself isn’t ho-hum. Neither was Manny Ramirez.

J.C. Romero, on the other hand? Or Jay Gibbons … very little was made about those suspensions and it’s because they’re not marquee guys. After last year’s poll of retired NFL players revealed that 1-in-10 used performance enhancing drugs at some point in their careers, perhaps some of the this ho-hum reaction (if it exists, which it doesn’t) has manifested because, well, such behavior is ho-hum.

It’s unclear from his statement whether Berkman thinks the NFL populace is too lax or MLB’s populace is too harsh. He might be right about either or both, but in comparison to one another, they’re reasonably equal. Yeah, okay, Cushing is going to miss a quarter of his season instead of a third, but either way, he’s been punished.

Everything’s bigger in Texas, including the whining apparently.

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Photos courtesy of Yahoo! Sports via Getty Images

Sometimes the hardest part of losing the playoffs is saying goodbye. Cleaning out the ol’ locker, preparing to reconnect with the family after a long summer, steal a few keepsakes from the clubhouse, take one last canoe ride around the lake, try to sneak one last kiss from camp counselor Jenna.

I’ve never noticed until just now how similar ending a season is to the final days of summer camp.

I guess that explains why Manny Ramirez’s last encounter with Andre Ethier Thursday afternoon brought a nostalgic tear to my eye.

“Andre. Jou see my pummice stone, man? It’s no in my locker. No in the shower. I bought that at a Bath & Body Works in Cleveland and I won’t have time to replace it before I leave for Punta Cana.”

“Naw Manny. All I have is this Garnier Fructis, which you should really start using when you cut off those dreads.

“Wha’ you mean ‘cut ‘em off?’ I no gon’ cut ‘em off. The dreads are me, Manny. It’s part of my schtick.”

“You’re schtick? I thought we were all growing playoff hair and everything. What’s Casey doing with that beard? And Kemp with that gristle? You telling me that was a stylistic choice?”

“Jour jheri curl is cool, man. Are jou telling me jou gonna get rid of it?”

“Heck yeah, Manny. No one in their right mind wears their hair like this.”

“What about Magglio Ordonez? He wore his hair like you. To be hones’, man, when I first got here, I thought you were Magglio. I was like, ‘Dang man, L.A. went wild at the trade deadline.’ Besides, I’ve had dreads forever.”

“Yeah, but they used to be normal dreads. Now they’re like … they look like sailor’s rope. All throughout the St. Louis series I had to stop myself from tying your mess into an angler’s loop. For serious.”

“Jour just not inquisitive enough, man. You shoulda asked around. Jou shouldn’t assume things, ‘Dre.”

“But what about Kershaw? His beard didn’t even grow all around his face? We really weren’t doing playoff beards or growing our hair out or anything? Dude, this blows. This whole team blows.”

“Ees jus’ a game, man. Have a goo’ vacation. You find my stone, hang onto it. I’m gonna want that back. I’m gon’ golook one more time in the shower.”

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Andre Ethier photos courtesy of Yahoo! Sports via Getty Images
Manny Ramirez photos courtesy of Yahoo! Sports via AP

Last week, Forbes Magazine, through E-Poll surveys, polled its readers and compiled a top 10 list of the most disliked people in sports. I was confused at first why it was Forbes and not, say, Sports Illustrated executing such a poll. I mean, these are sports figures we’re talking about, isn’t ESPN’s magazine better equipped? Forbes may not be the foremost expert on sports, but flip through any issue of their magazine or click on any page of their web site … dudes know a lot about hateable personalities.

But the list isn’t as much of a reflection of the Forbes company as it is about the company’s readers (ages 13 and up). And what’s reflected is a severe case of “lemmingism.” Everyone who made the list makes sense, but are they a true reflection of the most disliked sports figures?

I mean, hockey is one of the five largest sports in the country (and Canada, if you care) and no one from the NHL represented. Most of the names you’ll see here are hated because of overexposure more than their actions that caused the overexposure. Can they be blamed for that? And if they can, why isn’t Erin Andrews at the top of this list? (She’s not) Heck, one of these guys retired 17 years ago. Is that the best (worst) Forbes readers could come up with? Do they even follow sports?

In the words of the 10th most disliked athlete, “you cannot be serious.”

1. Michael Vick
Why he’s here? Yeah, okay. This isn’t surprising. He had dogs kill one another in his off time. Honestly, if Vick had murdered a human, his jail sentence would have been longer, but he’d be no more hated than he is now.
Does he belong? I’ll put it this way … yes. Yes, he does.
Possible replacement Brett Favre. Vick’s infamy was brutal and awful, but it was also original. You know what isn’t original? Brett Favre’s annual hijacking of the sports pages while he decides if he wants to be a professional suckwad or a retired suckwad. Most of the guys on this list are on here because people are tired of hearing about them. On that front, Favre is head, shoulders and suckwad ahead of everyone else.

2. Manny Ramirez
Why he’s here? Steroids. He used ‘em. He got caught for using ‘em and he missed almost a third of the season for using ‘em.
Does he belong? Dodger fans don’t think so. Manny gets L.A. fans giggly-er than girls at a sleepover.
Possible replacement Sean Avery. I wanted to put a woman on here, but I’m unconvinced that Serena Williams counts. I guess Avery is as close as we’re going to get. I mean, c’mon … these are women’s sunglasses, dude. New York’s self-proclaimed bad boy has literally lobbied to be marketed like a WWE villain, which is not only a tacit admittance that he’s a wanker on the ice, but he’s seemingly badmouthed every last one of his hot and famous ex-girlfriends. Anyone who badmouths Elisha Cuthbert: unlikable. That’s a rule.

3. Alex Rodriguez
Why he’s here? Overexposure. Perhaps the overwhelming disgust for both Madonna and Kate Hudson has spilled over onto him as well.
Does he belong? If you take into account America’s tendency to convert jealousy into hatred along with the fact that he’s dating a movie starlet, makes $25 million a year to play a game in the most famous city in the world and cheated so as to help him achieve all these things, then yeah. I reckon he belongs.
Possible replacement Kyle Busch. This little pipsqueak. This picture best illustrates why he really ought to have made this list. And if you’re a NASCAR apologist, then what about when he snapped the Nashville Superspeedway Les Paul guitar trophy into shards ’cause he was just so gosh darned excited. A-Rod’s a tool that seems embarrassed by himself a lot of the time. Busch shares no such embarrassment.

4. Terrell Owens
Why he’s here? An inability to censor his narcissism.
Does he belong? He belongs for the amount of time various media outlets have spent talking about him over the years, but generally, Owens has done very little to warrant the ire of the American people. At worst, he’s been a bad teammate. Then again, his statistics suggest he’s made his teams better. It’s all about perception.
Possible replacement Tom Brady. Oh no! Not my sweet Tom. What’s he ever done to anyone except urinate awesomeness and use unicorn horns to pick Superbowl glory out of his teeth? Well go ask Bridget Moynahan. He knocked up Coyote Ugly, split while she was pregnant, ignored the birth while pretending not to ignore the birth, hooked up with a Brazilian supermodel (superfluous pic here) and impotently allowed her to treat Moynahan’s kid as if it were her own. Oh, then he had the gall to skip the 2008 season. So I ask you, what’s worse: being a bad teammate with good stats or being a bad husband, father and man with no stats?

5. Kobe Bryant
Why he’s here? Smugness and possibly rape. Mostly smugness.
Does he belong? For the smugness? Yes. For the possible rape? I’d have to visit Denver a few more times to say for certain.
Possible replacement Fedor Emelianenko. People just don’t like it when someone so obviously talented doesn’t need fans’ approval to stay talented. We don’t like when talented people clamor for it either (see: Rod, A) but when you’re good and you know it and no one can do a damn thing about it, it tends to alienate fans. Fans want to feel a part of it all and when they know they’re not a part of any of it, it pisses them off. Now you tell me, which one of these two was I just talking about?

6. Allen Iverson
Why he’s here? Because people like “gangsters,” not “gangstas.”
Does he belong? Iverson hasn’t been relevant in two years. Right now, only three teams have shown any interest in paying him to play basketball and one of those teams is in Greece. Hating an irrelevant Iverson is like hating the words to a song a toddler just wrote.
Possible replacement Mark Cuban. If the fine readers over at Forbes want to flippantly throw Iverson on here because he came into the NBA with cornrows and tattoos and everyone was depressed that Michael Jordan was gone, that’s fine. Now allow me to retort by submitting my own irrationally-justified basketball personality. Mark Cuban is loud, he picks fights with players, his hair is often mussed, he likes Jason Kidd too much, his cha-cha-cha is a 1/2-step too slow and he was accused of insider trading. But go ahead, convince me a neck tattoo is worse.

7. Isiah Thomas
Why he’s here? Sexual harassment … and because he hasn’t done anything well since 1993.
Does he belong? Oh yeah. He might have tried to kill himself and when it didn’t work, he might have tried convincing authorities that his daughter was the one who was ill. Also he sexual harassed a woman (not daughter related).
Possible replacement I had a whole case for either Al Davis or George Steinbrenner and although they both totally deserve to be on here, the readers polled by Forbes accidentally got this one right. Isiah Thomas is awful.

8. Stephon Marbury
Why he’s here? Sociopathology.
Does he belong? Absolutely not. Oh sure he’s been a locker room cancer on each of the last four teams he’s played before arriving in Boston, but few noticed until he got to New York and became Isiah Thomas’ cancer. But seeing as how Thomas is more disliked than Starbury, isn’t this a clear-cut case of “the enemy of my enemy is my friend?” Friends don’t put friends on disliked lists. Think of it this way: Stephon Marbury builds the character of every NBA player with whom he comes in contact. Good for the game.
Possible replacement Brock Lesnar. And since very often “bad” is good for the game, who better to illustrate this than the UFC’s Brock Lesnar? Look, you don’t get more white than Brock. He’s a 6-foot-3, 265-pound farm boy who lives and trains in the Minnesota woods, has a drooling problem, drinks Coors and signifies that “he’s No. 1″ with the wrong fingers. He’s thoroughly unlikeable, yet UFC has never been more popular. It’s far more fun to hate than to love.

9. Nick Saban
Why he’s here? Bullying. Lying. Willfully living in Alabama.
Does he belong? Nah. For $32 million, I’d probably live in Alabama too. But I wouldn’t talk to anybody.
Possible replacement Brett Favre (again). Yes, but what better way to emphasize how disliked he is than by having him wear out his welcome on this list, just as he’s worn out his welcome in the NFL. Remember in “Mike Tyson’s Punch-Out” when you beat Bald Bull and then later in the game a meaner, tougher Bald Bull returned? Such is Favre. Just when his awfulness seems to subside, another offseason arrives and it takes three star punches to get him to go away.

10. John McEnroe
Why he’s here? Because he was really outspoken three decades ago.
Does he belong? About as much as a polar bear at the Pyramids.
Possible replacement O.J. Simpson. McEnroe was a loudmouth infamous for throwing hissyfits (and rackets) and complaining about almost every call that didn’t go his way. Essentially he was an NBA player. But all of this happened in the past. He’s retired from the pro tour now. So if inactive players are suddenly eligible for this list, why not pick an athlete who, you know, probably murdered two people? Bonus: How great would it be to have two Buffalo Bills in the top 10?

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Vick, Ramirez, Rodriguez, McEnroe photos courtesy of Yahoo! Sports via Getty Images
All other photos courtesy of Flickr

Photo courtesy of Yahoo! Sports via AP

L.A.’s Guillermo Mota tenderized the thick leg of Milwaukee’s Prince Fielder Tuesday night. It was retaliation from two innings before when Chris Smith did the same to L.A.’s Manny Ramirez. This is the job, it’s all part of baseball. Especially for Mota, who’s plunked former Met Mike Piazza enough times to write a dissertation on the different sounds the ball makes when it hits different parts of his body.

Mota was tossed on Tuesday for his retaliation, of course. But after helplessly getting choked by Piazza while holding a pair of cleats (?!) in 2002 and then, a year later, impotently throwing a glove at Piazza before backpedalling right out of the stadium, we should hand it to Mota for getting tossed from Tuesday’s game with virtually no loss of dignity.

There’s not much to add about Mota. Fielder, on the other hand … well, there’s quite a discovery to be made from his actions on Tuesday. With the Dodgers handily winning 17-4 with two outs in the bottom of the ninth, Mota threw a 4-seam fastball into Fielder’s meaty hamhock. Fielder laughed, jiggling like a bowl full of jelly, Mota hit the showers and Ramon Troncoso came in to pitch the remainder of the game.

Troncoso warmed up for five minutes, then threw 90 seconds worth of pitches (3) and the game was over. Sprinkle in another five minutes of post-game interviews, last-minute hoarding of Dubble-Bubble and Fielder’s mad dash into the Dodger’s clubhouse in hopes of a face-to-face with Mota and we’re talking a total 12 minutes having passed between events. Twelve minutes in between Fielder getting hit and Fielder trying to choke Mota before he could find a glove to throw defensively in Prince’s direction.
Twelve minutes.

Fielder looked confused (bemused maybe?) right after getting plunked. His demeanor didn’t change much once he headed down to first base, by which time Mota was gone. What happened?

It took Fielder’s brain a dozen minutes to recall (probably) the Piazza debacles from six and seven years ago. How can a man who recalls the past so slowly hit a fastball with such ease? Geez Louise, man. Six years in 12 minutes; that’s two minutes for every year of recollection. He’s got an Apple IIe making all his decisions for him.

Quick! Think about your favorite high school memory … … … You’ve thought of something, haven’t you? See? That took, like, three seconds, tops.

L.A.’s Guillermo Mota tenderized the thick leg of Milwaukee’s Prince Fielder Tuesday night. It was retaliation from two innings before when Chris Smith did the same to L.A.’s Manny Ramirez. This is the job, it’s all part of baseball. Especially for Mota, who’s plunked former Met Mike Piazza enough times to write a dissertation on the different sounds the ball makes when it hits different parts of his body.

It’s not going to hit him until tomorrow how ridiculous he looked getting halted at the Dodger’s clubhouse door by an overweight man with a nametag. He’s gonna be so embarrassed tomorrow when his brain processes that.

Remember when Patty Hearst was kidnapped by the Symbionese Liberation Army in January 1974 and eventually helped the terrorist organization rob the Hibernia Bank several months later? Or when Sal “Big Pussy” Bonpensiero avoided doing jail time by aggressively and enthusiastically informing the FBI of the activities of the Soprano organization? Clinton pardoned one and Paulie Walnuts helped whack the other. 

Jose Canseco falls somewhere in the middle.
Undeniably, one of baseball’s least sympathetic characters is trying to become an ambassador of baseball’s Steroid Era. In an ESPN Philadelphia radio interview from Thursday, Canseco was summoned from whatever madcap reality in which he normally operates to discuss the newest bulletpoints added to the growing list of steroid issues. Like saying “Beetlejuice!” three times, Canseco heard 1. “Steroids” 2. “David Ortiz” and 3. “Manny Ramirez” and appeared unsolicitedly.

So what is it this time?

As a guest on the Mike Missanelli show, Canseco discussed, among other things, the necessity for Major League Baseball to have sought out his council on how to deal with the players who tested positive for performance enhancing drugs.

Here’s a snippet:

What baseball should have done in the past is consulted with me. I would have resolved this issue from a long time ago, but [the league is] very stubborn. They blackballed me to get me out of the game. They don’t want to talk to me, they don’t want to listen to me. They’re extremely stubborn. In the past they’ve gotten away with everything. My doors are open to speak with Major League Baseball and the Player’s Association on how to get this subject matter put behind us and move forward. I think a lot of players are getting really bad advice from their attorneys, from their consultants and … it’s just, really, really bad.

“Put behind us?” He says all of this as if the league and the Player’s Association are somehow disallowing Canseco from doing his job of moderating the acceptance of steroids in baseball. He’s like a pastry chef wondering why all his customers are so fat. But there he is, desperate to help the league that, by his own admission, blackballed him, threw him out and locked the door.

The best thing that happened to Canseco after his 2001 retirement was realizing that he was willing to publically discuss things MLB was not. Like it or not, Canseco is the most reliable source on steroid use available to the public. And like a child who finds something that entertains his parents, he’s beaten it into the ground until it becomes truly annoying.

We knew we were supposed to ignore the crazy guy on the bus babbling nosensensically, but we thought he said something interesting, so we engaged him for just a second. He didn’t say anything interesting and now we’re stuck in a conversation with him for another 11 stops. Major League Baseball was smart enough to never make eye contact with Canseco. All these years since his retirement, MLB just keeps working on the sudoku puzzle, hoping Canseco will exit the bus at the next stop.

He hasn’t really helped them, which is why they’ll never seek his council. He’s burned them twice. First by being the poster boy for cheating, then by telling the world how obvious it at was. The league will never let him burn it again by asking for help that it’s too late for him to give.

Canseco poo-pooing the attorneys and consultants of players under indictment is both humorous and sad, like a drunk who danced so much he wet his pants, because Canseco suggests that his advice would have worked out better.

Because lord knows when one thinks of Jose Canseco one thinks of rationality and reliability.

Just like Patty and Puss,’ Canseco has been bent and reshaped enough that he assumes he is someone other than who he is: an incredible slimeball. He wants to create situations in which steroids are looked upon passively, like Ty Cobb‘s anger and racism, as if it were a cute affectation from a bygone era. Because if he is successfully able to do that, then he’s got a chance at the Hall of Fame (don’t worry, he has no chance at the Hall of Fame). He’d perhaps have a cherished baseball post-career. And for that to happen, he believes he needs to insinuate himself back into the central point of one of baseball’s ugliest eras by railing against it.

But he was one of the largest players involved in creating it in the first place. Accepting anything from No-Way Jose would be igniting another fire that the league would be unable to extinguish.

Manny Ramirez‘s return to Chavez Ravine on July 16 was overwhelmingly (and unsurprisingly) positive. Why not? They cheered Bonds in the Bay Area. Missourians still dig Big Mac (and Big Macs). They cheered Alex Rodriguez in the Bronx. Heck, New Yorkers even cheered Sergio Mitre after he threw 5.2 innings in a winning effort on Tuesday. The bottom line is that fans – generally speaking – want their players to be clean and awesome, but when push comes to shove, they’ll settle for just awesome.

And maybe at the major league level that’s actually okay to do – no matter what fans are told they’re supposed to feel about it. What have steroids been proven to do? The answer after all the bluster of the last half-decade, is not too much. Sure some of the superstars that have been decidedly guilty (if not proven so) for PEDs have seen a dramatic dropoff of their statistics after the point in which they were slammed. Miguel Tejada, Jason Giambi and Sammy Sosa all come to mind. But two of this season’s biggest stories have been Alex Rodriguez’s admitted use of steroids and Manny Ramirez’s 50-game suspension for taking care of her uterine wall.

Rodriguez missed 28 games at the start of the season because of a hip injury unrelated to the steroid scandal (supposedly) and Ramirez returned from his suspension at the beginning of this month. So how much different are those dirty rotten cheaters’ numbers been this season than their career averages? Again, not too much.

Ramirez’s 2009 statistics if averaged out over the course of a full season:

G PA AB R H 2B 3B HR RBI SB CS BB SO BA OBP SLG OPS
156 642   510   113   174    43     4     39     131    –     –   117   96    .340   .470    .666   1.136

Now, here are Ramirez’s numbers from his previous (presumably steroid-riddled) 15 seasons in the league:

Stat compilation courtesy of Baseball-Reference.com

G PA AB R H 2B 3B HR RBI SB CS BB SO BA OBP SLG OPS
157 682   547   97     138   19      0     45     131   14    2    121   109   .252   .397    .535    .932

Now, here are Rodriguez’s numbers from his previous (presumably cheat-filled, frosted-tipped) 14 seasons in the league:

Stat compilation courtesy of Baseball-Reference.com

Not all of Rodriguez’s stats are on par, but the big ones that get the headlines (and asterisks) are. He’s running less and earning fewer runs, but that isn’t necessarily even in Rodriguez’s control. What is in is control are homers, RBIs and his patience at the plate all of which surpasses even his 162-game averages (and few superstars still play all 162 games these days). Again, the aspects of Rodriguez’s game that would conceivably be punctured by a leak in the steady flow of steroids simply have not been affected.

One can extrapolate from these numbers that this is why an overwhelming amount of fans can’t be bothered losing sleep over this ongoing ruination of the game. If one believes Ramirez and Rodriguez are no longer using steroids (it would be simultaneously shocking and appropriate if they were), then one has to wonder at all the “fake and liar” talk is about that surrounded these two superstars. What were they lying about? Because it doesn’t appear to be statistics related. And judging by the applause those two players got in their first home games following their shamed revelations, the stats are really all anyone cares about.

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Photos courtesy of Yahoo! Sports via Getty Images

One in 75. This is the ratio of average professional baseball players to elite ones.

In Major League Baseball’s 133-year history, 17,056 players have come and gone. From that, only 229 of those players are in the Hall of Fame (about 1 of every 74.5).

Yes, the roster sizes, number of teams and players churning up and down the farm system varies on an almost unquantifiable level, but for the sake of this hypothetical, let’s say that there are 25 players on a major league roster, multiplied by 30 teams …

… Hey! Don’t skip the math stuff just to get to the glossy pictures. Embrace the numbers.

Where was I? Oh right … 25 players multiplied by 30 teams equals 750 players currently playing baseball.

And no, I haven’t forgotten about the mere 16 teams in 1917 or 12 teams in 1897 or the dearth of players a century ago as compared to today. But this is a hypothetical, remember? If you trust that the overstuffed rosters of today cancel out the lack of expansion teams from yesteryear, then will too.

If one out of every 75 players makes it to the Hall of Fame and there are 750 players in the league right now, then the law of averages suggests there are 10 future Hall of Famers active in the league today. This suggestion is made more compelling when one considers what the Steroid Era will do to these averages (if anything).

Sidelines looks at the 10 most likely active players to make it into the Hall of Fame. Obvious Cooperstown-bound players like Alex or Ivan Rodriguez, Manny Ramirez and Andy Pettitte become less obvious because of their involvement with steroids. I’d still bet some of them get in, but I’d bet on the following 10 before any of the afore mentioned.

Fun facts about these 10 players: Six of them have played on the same team throughout their entire MLB careers. All but two of them played on one team for more than half of their careers. Half of these players played for either Seattle, a Canadian team or both at some point in their careers.

In no particular order:

Ken Griffey Jr.
Career highlights: 13-time All-Star, 1997 AL MVP, 600+ HRs
“The Natural” gets my vote because a) he made backwards baseball caps acceptable for grown men and b) because anyone who can ruin the lives of annoying sign-holders deserves special enshrinement.

Pedro Martinez
Career highlights: 8-time All-Star, 3-time AL Cy Young Award Winner, 3,100+ Ks
If Randy Johnson scared hitters stupid, Martinez – from 1997 to 2003 – just made them look that way. He was angrier than Greg Maddux, but just as smart. And then the year after his peak … he (and his wee friend) won a World Series.

Albert Pujols
Career highlights: 8-time All-Star, 2-time NL MVP, 2001 Rookie of the Year
Not even a gross last name can slow this guy. At his current pace, he’ll reach 500 homers by April of 2012, at the age of 32. Barry Bonds hit his 500th on April 17, 2001 three months before his 37th birthday and 15 days after Pujols made his MLB debut.

Mariano Rivera
Career highlights: 10-time All-Star, 3-time saves leader, 500+ career saves

The guy hasn’t started a game in over 14 years and at some point in all that time, you’d think someone would have convinced him that “Panama” was a better song to enter the ninth inning to than “Enter Sandman.”

Ichiro Suzuki
Career highlights: 9 seasons: 9-time Gold Glove Award winner, 9-time All-Star, 1999 AL MVP, 1999 Rookie of the Year
If the Hall loves two things it’s consistency and guys with silly names. But if the Hall loved three things, I’m sure the third thing would be Asians. So Ichiro’s at least 2-for-3. What? Did you think I was suggesting Ichiro had a silly name? Not cool, dude.

Derek Jeter
Career highlights: 10-time All-Star, 1996 Rookie of the Year, 6 World Series Appearances
If players were elected to the Hall of Fame based on past girlfriends, Jeter would get his own wing. As it stands, the people he’s dated are just a fringe benefit of being the face of the most recognizable franchise on Earth … and that’s nice too.

Trevor Hoffman
Career highlights: 7-time All-Star, 2-time season save leader, 575+ saves
I could go on about longevity and the ability to pitch in “high-stress” save situations year-after-year. But really, it’s simple: Hoffman is the all-time saves leader. Saves are recognized as a meaningful statistic (for now) and you can’t have the all-time leader in a meaningful stat excluded from the Hall of Fame. That would be stupid.

Roy Halladay
Career highlights: 2003 Cy Young Award Winner, 6-time All-Star, 4-time season leader in complete games
As of this writing, Doc Halladay is still a member of the Toronto Blue Jays, a team he’s been on for his entire 11-year career. If he gets traded to a contending team … well, then 11 years in medical school would not have gone to waste.

Chipper Jones
Career highlights: 1999 NL MVP, 11-straight playoff appearances
What jumps out at most people about Jones’ career is that nothing about his career really jumps out. He’s been solid for 16 years in an era where the Braves dominated the NL. And although the pitching staff of those teams were the motor that kept those teams humming, Jones was the chassis … or maybe the seats. Car seats are highly underrated.

Randy Johnson
Career highlights: 10-time All-Star, 5-time Cy Young Award Winner, 9-time season strikeout leader, 300+ career wins, 4,800 career Ks
Why is the Big Unit already as good as enshrined in Cooperstown? Because dead birds don’t get a vote.

Tip o’ the cap to Craig Robinson at Flip Flop Flyball

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Photos courtesy of Yahoo! Sports, Flickr

Hey, did you hear? L.A.’s natural hitter uterine supplement abuser Manny Ramirez got caught using uterine supplements and was sent down to the minor leagues until his uterus was less supplemental. Have I got that right? I’m not keen on details. Really, the only thing I’m sure about is that Manny Ramirez has a uterus. I’m also sure that while he was down in the minors last month, Man-Ram made a few dozen minor leaguers angry with him.

When people discuss Ramirez, it’s hard not to bring up the word traditional. I mean, what’s more traditional than a 12-time MLB All-Star Dominican with a uterus? So it only made sense that when Ramirez was slumming in Albuquerque or Inland Empire’s minor league teams that Ramirez would behave exactly as everyone before him has behaved, right?

It’s been a longstanding tradition that big leaguers who rehab (from addictions to feminine drugs) in the minors buy their small-time teammates dinner before going back to the big leagues.

So imagine the confused shock swirling around the sports world upon hearing that the guy who took a whiz in the Green Monster in between innings or played the field while wearing an iPod didn’t conform to the dictates of minor league tradition and played for – not one – but two minor league teams without buying them squat. According to Minor League Dugout, “one of baseball’s unwritten rules requires major league players on rehabilitation assignments to furnish a post-game meal for their often under-funded minor league teammates.

Photo courtesy of Yahoo! Sports via Getty Images

Why aren’t unwritten rules ever eventually written down? How can a rule that no one speaks about be a requirement as suggested in the above description? And why, sweet Jesus, would anyone assume Ramirez would do … anything that is expected of most other players? When has that ever happened with him?

Sports writers have got it all wrong. Man-Ram’s not selfish in the negative use of the word, but an objectivist, maybe even an egoist. Ramirez has been called a lot of things in his 16 years in the league and most of those things settle somewhere around the idea that this guy is a flaky buffoon. And the fact that he makes about $17,000-and-hour more than the dude who he replaced in Albuquerque’s lineup while he was there does lend itself to a slam dunk good deed. What’s a few $60 steaks to a guy making $23.9 million this year?

But this all assumes that Ramirez listens to party lines, which is a weird assumption to make considering you just called him a flaky buffoon.

Yes you did. I just heard you.

Perhaps Ramirez is principled. You ever think of that? Those calling Ramirez a “cheap ass” perhaps have not considered that he doesn’t believe his money should be given away “just because.” Perhaps Ramirez has been reading some Ayn Rand.

From The Virtue of Selfishness:

Objectivists will often hear a question such as: “What will be done about the poor … in a free society?” The altruist premise, implicit in that question, is that men are “their brothers’ keepers” and that the misfortune of some is a mortgage on others. Observe that he does not ask: “Should anything be done?” but: “What will be done?” – as if the collectivist premise has been tacitly accepted and all that remains is a discussion of the means to implement it.

Honestly, did anyone ask Manny Ramirez if he’d like to buy his team dinner? Perhaps he felt that throwing his money around would insult his bat brothers. Many have assumed Ramirez believed buying dinner was virtuous and declined anyway because of greed. Do we know he felt that way, or have the feelings of many been projected onto the feelings of Manny?

Howard Roark designed buildings no one wanted. Dagny Taggart kept her railroad operating when no one else could. Manny Ramirez – perhaps – skimps out on a team dinner in order to assert his independence from tradition. Common with all of these mythical figures is their virtue in the face of immense contrasting social pressures. Ayn Rand would applaud Ramirez, just as most others have been booing him.

Only individual men have the right to decide when or whether they wish to help others; society – as an organized political system – has no rights in the matter at all.

You hear that, Organized Political System? Back off! It’s just as likely that his choice not to treat everyone to a fondue dinner was as virtuous as it was selfish. Has anyone investigated the type of players on Inland Empire and Albuquerque? Did they deserve a fondue outing? Had one of those minor leaguers verbalized that he expected a free feast simply because he’s less financially secure than Ramirez, then I’d bet the same society that calls Ramirez cheap would also call the minor leaguer a mooch. Ramirez was a tourist to these teams and unlikely made any long lasting friendships.

Is it necessary to treat a team to dinner simply because others have? A lot of people wouldn’t be able to drive in 100 RBIs in a single season, does that mean Ramirez should have refrained from doing so?

Ms. Rand continues:

The practical implementation of friendship, affection and love consist of incorporating the welfare of the person involved into one’s own hierarchy of values, then acting accordingly. But this is a reward which men have to earn by means of their virtues and which one cannot grant to mere acquaintances or strangers. What, then, should one properly grant to strangers? The generalized respect …

Reports claimed that Ramirez was cheap, not that he was disrespectful. How can we be sure Man-Ram wasn’t paying the ultimate respect to his players by letting them feed themselves like men? He earned negotiated his fortune, why would he spend it on an abstract idea of tradition?

Those players will thank Ramirez in a few years when their misplaced anger motivates them to hit a major league fastball.

That would be true charity.

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A steak dinner thanks to Home Run Derby

I feel for you moviegoers, I do. What’s happening more and more in Hollywood is the same erosion I’ve seen in another great art form: sports nicknames.

Gone are the days of classic clever nicknames like George “The Iceman” Gervin, Jared “The Pillsbury Throwboy” Lorenzen (also known as “The Hefty Lefty”), Harold “The Galloping Ghost” Grange, Jaromir “Puff Nuts” Jagr, Ted “The Splendid Splinter” Williams or Karl “The Mailman” Malone. I could go on and on (and on), but with the exception of a select few current players, nicknames in the last 5-10 years have been bland and unoriginal.

Below are the 10 worst nickname fails.

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“The Princess of Diving” China’s Guo Jingjing is considered the most successful diver in Olympic history and she totally deserves a nickname, but this? Why not call her the “Jing-a-ding Kid” or something snappy like that? “The Princess of Diving” is so…so…untrue. Diving has no royalty. To have a princess you’d need a queen. Who’s the queen of diving? And why isn’t that person considered the most successful diver in Olympic history? Imagine if James Brown was called “The Hardest Working Man At This Concert Venue On This Particular Night”?

Photo courtesy of Flickr

“Candy Man” The world was enamored with the candy-eating habits of L.A. Laker Lamar Odom right before the start of this season’s NBA Finals. It was so enamored that it totally forgot that about 1998′s No. 1 draft pick Michael Olowokandi. I know “The Kandi Man” is different than “The Candy Man,” but c’mon…you say ‘em the same. And with Odom, we’re just three Candymen away from five. And nothing good comes from saying Candyman five times.

Photo courtesy of Flickr

“Pistol” This nickname first belonged to NBA guard Pete Maravich in the 70s and frankly it was awesome. But then the name was attached to tennis player Pete Sampras and became less awesome. Both players were extraordinary, but once there’s a “Pistol Pete,” you can’t just go and start another Pistol Pete. This isn’t replacing your dead chihuahua with some other chihuahua. There can only be one. Don’t cheapen them both. Just because the Petes were in different sports doesn’t mean people won’t notice.

Photo courtesy of Flickr

“Pudge” Sox catcher Carlton Fisk was “Pudge.” No one else. You know why he was called “Pudge” because he wasn’t a skinny man. You know why he wasn’t called “Fatty” Fisk? Because despite his shape, he was beloved. Fat people who are beloved are called pudgy, not fat. The other “Pudge,” Ivan Rodriguez hasn’t been fat for a decade – how could he let this nickname happen, much less continue? Look at the adjacent picture, does that guy look pudgy to you? Odom did like Candy. Sampras was a pistol. But Rodriguez? He ain’t pudgy. Why steal a nickname that isn’t even appropriate?

Photo courtesy of Flickr

“L.T.” New York Giants linebacker Lawrence Taylor is L.T. The nickname is lame and unimaginative enough that it can only belong to someone as rabid as L.T. (ignore his sixth round exit from “Dancing With the Stars”) Giving Taylor a quirky nickname would be overkill; like jamming Skittles in a Twinkie…it would be too much. It’s bad enough when you steal a clever nickname, but the people who nicknamed San Diego Charger RB LaDanian Tomlinson were too lazy to even come up with their own bland nickname.

Photo c/o Time/Life

“Sugar” Boxers Carlos De Leon, Ray Leonard and Shane Mosely: What do they have in common? They all stole a fairly gay nickname from Ray Robinson. Ray Leonard reportedly didn’t want to step on Robinson’s name, but tough. Because Robinson was a Ray and Leonard was a Ray…what can be done? Everyone’s hands were tied. Also, “Sugar” De Leon? Gay.

Photo courtesy of Flickr

“The Flower” Guy LeFleur had this horrible nickname hung on him. You know why? You’ll never guess. Y’see, “le fleur” translates to flower in French. So you can see, it’s just a quick hop, skip and jump to calling Guy “the Flower.” Except that “The Flower” is about as wussy as being called “Prance Dancer.” If I were LeFleur, I’d have drawn blood from anyone who called me that until there was a Pavlovian reaction to the word “flower.” I wouldn’t stop until whenever le fleur was uttered, people automatically thought about bleeding.

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“ManRam” The Dominicans are really the largest victims here. Any time a Ramirez or a Rodriguez makes it big, everyone knows what their nicknames are going to be. It’s positively mechanic. HanRam, ArmRam (what the hell’s an ArmRam? It sounds gross and painful) and the original ManRam. Manny Ramirez’s nickname wouldn’t be so bad if it was connected to He-Man’s RamMan. If that were the case, I might actually think it was kinda cool. But I doubt it was and I’m positive none of the other Ramirez players have anything to do with the Masters of the Universe.

Photo courtesy of Yahoo! Sports via Getty

Anything Shaquille O’Neal names himself If there’s a cardinal rule of nicknames, it’s that you cannot give one to yourself. NBA all-star Shaquille O’Neal has ignored this rule for over a decade now. He got kinda lucky with the first few (“Shaq,” “The Diesel” “The Big Aristotle”) but then kept going like a toddler who found a way to make his parents laugh. Prepare for it to get beat into the ground. “ShaqFu,” “The Big Daddy,” Superman,” “The Big Agave,” “The Big Cactus,” “The Big Shaqtus,” “The Big Galactus,” “Wilt Chamberneezy,” “The Big Baryshnikov,” “The Real Deal,” “Dr. Shaq,” “Sheriff Shaq” and “Shaqovic.” Yup. Okay. Got it. O’Neal is large and likes the first four letters of his name. Hey, I got one. How ’bout “ShaqFool”?

Photo courtesy of Yahoo! Sports via AP

“A-Rod” I want to punch someone. Who can I blame for this? Is this J-Lo’s fault? P-Diddy? More than any other nickname pattern, this is the dumbest and laziest. It’s not a nickname, it’s an abbreviation of someone’s full name. That’s it. Compare A-Rod or T-Mac to “Sweetwater” or “Cool Papa” or “Nightrain”… it ain’t even close, man. If my mom can figure out why a player like Francisco Rodriguez is named K-Rod and is tickled by how clever it is, rest assured it is neither cool nor clever. It’s like when your mother asks you how you like the new Black Eyed Peas album…that’s when you know it’s time to stop listening to Black Eyed Peas albums.

Really, that’s the worst thing I can say about any of these nicknames: My mom totally gets them.