Jayson Stark on Manny

The accusations against Ramirez are that he dogged it during July before the trade, sinking his value. He must have been really awful right?

Yeah, .340/.447/.627 awful.

But that's the whole month; what about from the all-star break to the trade?

He hit .351/.467/.622.

He was actually a little better for that part of July.

Now let's read what Jayson Stark wrote.

For a man who decided his personal net worth was more important than an entire franchise and all the people who played with him, covered for him, depended on him?

Sheez. How sad is that?

"It really bothers me," one GM said this week of the Manny-mania lovefest that has unfolded in L.A. "What he did in Boston was criminal. Now he goes there, and everything's OK? No, sir. It doesn't change the fact that how he got there was criminal."

Remember, .351/.467/.622 is criminal. You want my guess as to which GM said that? Brian Cashman. Let's remember that Ramirez has made trade requests every year since 2004. Let's also remember that his performance in Boston was still quite good and useful.

OK, here's why you should care: Because this could easily morph into a giant problem for every franchise; for the entire sport, in fact.

If Manny Ramirez wanders into the free-agent market this winter and gets anything close to the four years and $100 million he believes he'll get, think about the message that would send, the precedent that would set.

First of all, does it piss anyone else off when MLB deemed synonymous with the entire sport of baseball? There are other levels, other leagues, other countries which play, and Japan won the WBC.

Secondly, if Manny Ramirez gets a 4 year $100m deal, I'll laugh. Because that would mean someone would take a chance on him being $25 million good at age 40, when we could expect a .295/.385/.455 line. Given that there's still a reasonable chance that he could have some more injuries (which were actually not all faked). On the line about Ramirez making up injuries, though, the Dodgers do that all the time with their bad players. The most recent example being Andruw Jones:

TORRE SAID there's some thought of putting AndruwJones on the disabled list to make room for the return of Nomar Garciaparra. "That knee is still sore," Torre said of Jones. "We'll see what the doctor has to say."

Ten minutes later Jones was spotted in center field trying to catch a fly ball -- hurdling the 3 1/2 -foot white fence used to hold back fans before the game, and looking like an Olympic hopeful.

Besides, the Dodgers would only accuse their young players of faking injury. Like Tony Abreu. Who really was seriously injured, and still is. Maybe Manny and LA are a good match.

But seriously, if you want to pander to Red Sox fans, that's one thing, but let's face it, Manny is a good player, and all three of these teams had good reasons to make the move. LaRoche wasn't getting playing time in LA and Pittsburgh needed a 3B. Bay is not only a good hitter but also a good defender, and is signed to a nice cheap contract; not a bad haul. Manny is a very very good hitter. It worked out all around, and Pittsburgh got a few other players too.