Weighing in on the Manny-McCormick Incident
The Sox just keep making headlines for all the wrong reasons. First we were hearing about Manny Ramirez and Kevin Youkilis getting into a shoving match over Youk's hot-headed-ness; now news comes out that Manny got into a verbal and physical confrontation with the team's venerable travel secretary, Jack McCormick. In case you missed it, here's an excerpt from Sean McAdam's ProJo piece on the matter:
I'm sure you've heard the same obligatory cliche remarks - "This team is a family and every family has disagreements, it's normal... Things like this happen all the time and they're dealt with in-house, behind closed doors, as they should be..." - trying to explain this away and minimize its significance, but regardless of what the Red Sox' PR department would like you to believe, this is much more than a little shouting match between fellow players. Technically, Manny committed assault and battery on a senior member of the Red Sox organization. Maybe I'm wrong here and you all have some incredibly understanding bosses, but if any of us did the same thing at our respective places of employment, we'd be sitting behind bars waiting for our spouse, sibling, friend or parent to post a several-thousand-dollar bail to bust us out.
What Manny did was inexcusable, plain and simple. Not only are actions like these unacceptable in the workplace from a business operations standpoint, but from a moral and ethical standpoint, Manny's actions are absolutely detestable. Manny's a finely-tuned professional athlete who's crafted his physique from thousands of hours of working out; McCormick's a 66-year-old travel secretary who probably hasn't seen the inside of a gym, aside from walking by the Sox' workout facility and peering in, in several decades; who do you think's going to win in a shoving match? Regardless of his reasoning behind requesting 16 tickets (whether he wanted more tickets for a bunch of children suffering from incurable diseases, or if the extras were just for buddies and family members he hasn't seen or heard from in years) and what he may be going through off-the-field and away from the spotlight, Manny deserves to be reprimanded somehow. I'm not saying we should trade him or decline his 2009 option over this scuffle, but I don't think a fine and/or perhaps a several-game suspension / benching is out of line.
This calls into question a much larger problem that's been perpetuated on the Boston sports scene for years; I'm referring, of course, to the so-called "Manny being Manny" phenomenon. The guy's flat-out crazy, and sometimes his antics are humorous. I enjoyed seeing him run up the wall in Baltimore after a catch, high five a fan, then fire the ball back in to the cut off man to help complete the double play as much as the next Manny apologist, but where do we draw the line? As Boston.com correctly pointed out the other day, this is an example of "Manny being angry," not "Manny being Manny." Manny is one of the greatest hitters in baseball history and I sincerely hope that he ends his career in Boston, but his debatable actions are growing more and more bold as he's allowed to get away with things under the cover of "Manny being Manny." An example needs to be set. Hitting Manny in the wallet likely won't have the desired effect, so I think a 2-game suspension sounds just right. It sucks to have to make his teammates suffer as a result of Manny's immature actions (after all, a Manny-less lineup is definitely more inferior than when he's in there), but something has to be done this time. Apparently, about 5,000 Sox fans seem to echo that sentiment, as well. Thoughts?
Manny Ramirez shoved Red Sox traveling secretary Jack McCormick to the ground in an argument over Ramirez' ticket allotment. Several onlookers moved quickly to separate the two.
Ramirez had asked McCormick for 16 tickets for Saturday night's Red Sox-Astros game, an unusually high number for day-of-game. In addition to handling all travel details for clubs, traveling secretaries also take player ticket requests for both home and away games.
When McCormick cautioned Ramirez that he might not be able to fulfill his request, Ramirez responded by shouting: "Just do your job!"
An argument ensued and Ramirez pushed McCormick, sending him to the ground.
Ramirez had asked McCormick for 16 tickets for Saturday night's Red Sox-Astros game, an unusually high number for day-of-game. In addition to handling all travel details for clubs, traveling secretaries also take player ticket requests for both home and away games.
When McCormick cautioned Ramirez that he might not be able to fulfill his request, Ramirez responded by shouting: "Just do your job!"
An argument ensued and Ramirez pushed McCormick, sending him to the ground.
I'm sure you've heard the same obligatory cliche remarks - "This team is a family and every family has disagreements, it's normal... Things like this happen all the time and they're dealt with in-house, behind closed doors, as they should be..." - trying to explain this away and minimize its significance, but regardless of what the Red Sox' PR department would like you to believe, this is much more than a little shouting match between fellow players. Technically, Manny committed assault and battery on a senior member of the Red Sox organization. Maybe I'm wrong here and you all have some incredibly understanding bosses, but if any of us did the same thing at our respective places of employment, we'd be sitting behind bars waiting for our spouse, sibling, friend or parent to post a several-thousand-dollar bail to bust us out.
What Manny did was inexcusable, plain and simple. Not only are actions like these unacceptable in the workplace from a business operations standpoint, but from a moral and ethical standpoint, Manny's actions are absolutely detestable. Manny's a finely-tuned professional athlete who's crafted his physique from thousands of hours of working out; McCormick's a 66-year-old travel secretary who probably hasn't seen the inside of a gym, aside from walking by the Sox' workout facility and peering in, in several decades; who do you think's going to win in a shoving match? Regardless of his reasoning behind requesting 16 tickets (whether he wanted more tickets for a bunch of children suffering from incurable diseases, or if the extras were just for buddies and family members he hasn't seen or heard from in years) and what he may be going through off-the-field and away from the spotlight, Manny deserves to be reprimanded somehow. I'm not saying we should trade him or decline his 2009 option over this scuffle, but I don't think a fine and/or perhaps a several-game suspension / benching is out of line.
This calls into question a much larger problem that's been perpetuated on the Boston sports scene for years; I'm referring, of course, to the so-called "Manny being Manny" phenomenon. The guy's flat-out crazy, and sometimes his antics are humorous. I enjoyed seeing him run up the wall in Baltimore after a catch, high five a fan, then fire the ball back in to the cut off man to help complete the double play as much as the next Manny apologist, but where do we draw the line? As Boston.com correctly pointed out the other day, this is an example of "Manny being angry," not "Manny being Manny." Manny is one of the greatest hitters in baseball history and I sincerely hope that he ends his career in Boston, but his debatable actions are growing more and more bold as he's allowed to get away with things under the cover of "Manny being Manny." An example needs to be set. Hitting Manny in the wallet likely won't have the desired effect, so I think a 2-game suspension sounds just right. It sucks to have to make his teammates suffer as a result of Manny's immature actions (after all, a Manny-less lineup is definitely more inferior than when he's in there), but something has to be done this time. Apparently, about 5,000 Sox fans seem to echo that sentiment, as well. Thoughts?
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