I’ll tell you the truth folks; there is a side of me that hopes that even the most troubled people are capable of change. Now, that comes with the understanding that those same people have to make that choice and have to admit to themselves that the path they are currently on isn’t the one they strove to be on.
And isn’t that the first step down the right path; admittance?
For former slugger Manny Ramirez, he appears ready to take that first step. In an interview with ESPN’s Pedro Gomez, Ramirez finally admitted to his transgressions against the Major League Baseball drug policy, saying, “I also want to show my kids that if you make a mistake, don’t quit. Just go back and fix it.”
For Ramirez, admittance is a big stride. After initially running afoul of the MLB policy in 2009, Ramirez opted to take the route of blaming a banned substance in a prescription for a “personal medical issue” for triggering the positive test. Granted, he accepted the 50-game ban because ultimately the responsibility of knowing the policy falls on the players and not their doctors, but he sidestepped intentionally taking a banned substance that was later identified as a female fertility drug. When Ramirez again turned in a positive test and faced a 100-game ban last season, he abruptly opted to retire rather than face up to his mistakes.
Yet, here we stand a year later and Ramirez is trying to get himself reinstated from the retired list and find a job with a team looking for a right-handed DH. MLB has agreed to reduce his ban to 50 games, basically giving him credit for time served, but Ramirez still needs to find a team willing to take a risk on a man nabbed twice by baseball’s testing policy. To do that, he’s holding court and trying to say all the right things, like “I want to show people that Manny can change, that he can do the right thing” and “A bunch of guys are going to look at me and say hey, this guy made a mistake but he didn’t quit. Look how he finished. He did the right thing and came back”
Like I said, there is a side of me that hopes that people can change. For Manny Ramirez, it is easy for me to sit here as a Red Sox fan and hope that Manny can as well. However, I’m a bit skeptical, as I’m not sure that I buy into Manny’s sincerity 100%.
Sure, this is a broken man, but given the expected humbleness, there are a few things that have me ultimately questioning things:
Firstly, during this interview with Gomez, Ramirez continued to refer to himself in the 3rd person, repeatedly saying “He” and “Manny”, rather than owning his statements with the ever powerful “I”. As much as I want to feel he is admitting to his mistakes, putting it into an outside perspective feels a bit cowardly and half-hearted to me. He wants to sell sincerity without necessarily truly taking responsibility for his actions.
Secondly, I’m not sure that playing the game is where Manny will truly find redemption. We need to remember that he is a 38-years-old former slugger and proven steroid user. Whether via attitude, health or suspension, Ramirez showed an inability to take the field regularly during his last few seasons and had been relegated to DH duties when he signed with Tampa last season. There is no evidence that his body will hold up to the rigors of playing again, even in a DH role, especially given the massive drop-offs expected of PED users after they stop cycling it into their bodies. Given that and the obvious fact that he’ll still need to serve a 50-game ban once he signs with a team, it is hard to imagine a team taking a chance on Ramirez at this point in his career.
You can only be burned by the same pot before you stop reaching for it.
That said I believe Ramirez’s path to redemption is different, and perhaps a bit unknown to him. One of the knocks against Ramirez during his tenure in Boston was his unanswered promises to take a philanthropic role in the Boston community. Sure, he donated vehicles to the Dodgers for their auctions, but never really approached the charitable status that many of today’s top players enjoy.
To me, Ramirez still has that chance to right his wrongs and make up for his transgressions. Trying to recapture the glory days and showing that you can go out on top isn’t the way to that. Instead, Ramirez needs to become an advocate against the very thing that brought him down. I’m sure that Bud Selig and his offices could easily put together an outreach program, and use Ramirez as its figurehead, that will help to dissuade kids from becoming involved with steroids or growth hormones. He can be the poster boy for the fight against performance-enhancing drugs, the rallying point for an entire generation of future ballplayers.
Most importantly, he can “show people that Manny can change, that he can do the right thing”, and in doing so, be the role model that he should have been.
The author is a lifelong Red Sox fan who hopes that Manny is certainly done being Manny and is ready to be a role model.
Sources:
– Sources: Ramirez Used Fertility Drug, espn.com – Manny Ramirez: I’ll Be A Role Model, espn.com