Associated Press reports Ramirez has signed a contract with the Kochi Fighting Dogs of Japan’s independent, four-team Shikoku Island League.
He last played professionally in 2013 for the EDA Rhinos of Chinese Professional Baseball on Taiwan.
Alleged domestic abuse. And here's his Broward County arrest page.
Innocent, etc.
Sara Rimer, who first met Manny Ramirez when he was still in high school, tries to make sense of it all:
Don't let the broom hit you on the way out.
Bruce Allen does the media roundup, which focuses on Clay Buchholz.
During yesterday's painful Sox loss, Tim McCarver, when he wasn't busy mispronouncing Massachusetts place names and just being Tim McCarver, kept blathering on and on about how Sox fans felt about stuff, as if he actually talks to Sox fans.
Today, Dan Shaughnessy does the same shtick, writing that:
Red Sox Nation is beaming over the news of Manny getting slapped for 50 games for using a banned substance.
Chad Finn explains why, even if Manny were on the juice in 2004 and 2007 - and there's no evidence yet he was - the Sox victories those years were no worse than any other team's titles over the previous ten years (especially the 1999 and 2000 Yankees).
Schilling says stop worshiping ball players, just accept the fact that tons of players (but not him, he hastens to add) juiced up, and don't you dare suggest 2004 is now "tainted:"
... Relish in the Halladays, Rolens, Sabathias, Lowells, Counsells, Variteks, Garnetts, Jameses, Bruschis, Vrabels, the Jason Bays of the world. Relish in men of supreme character and tireless work ethic who respect the game and their teammates and suit up every day to leave it all on the field. If 100 more names come out I can still give you my word there are a lot more great men and phenomenal people in the game than not ...
Then go home and raise your own damn kids with your own set of values, integrity and morals. Be accountable to them and responsible for them and stop blaming video games or the 25-year-old kid from the Dominican who can hit a baseball 455 feet but you don't know and never will, for the "problems of today's youth". It starts and ends under your own roof. Your kids idolize the people you allow them to, and believe things you don't refute or discuss, and that's no one's fault but your own.
...
Meanwhile, Comcast SportsNet interviews Jonathan Papelbon about Mannygate.
... I don't know who that guy is. He quit on me, he quit on our team ...
This is the deal, regardless of what you take and regardless what you put in your body, every year at Spring Training they give us a long list in Spanish and in English of what you can do and what you can't do. There are no excuses.
Cameron Martin tells the Sports Guy what he can do with his maudlin back-from-the-future piece about how he has to explain to his kid that everybody on the 2004 Sox juiced up:
Grow a pair, Greenwich boy, and stop acting like a dumb, naive homer.
Dan Kennedy, meanwhile, tries to pinpoint exactly when Manny started shooting steroids taking fertility treatments. He narrows it down to the end of the 2007 season, not sure of the month and day yet.
Manny being A-Rod? Manny Ramirez will be suspended 50 games for positive drug test, the Los Angeles Times reports.
The Herald posts some excerpts from a Jonathan Papelbon interview with Esquire, including one in which he called MbM a "cancer."
Red is especially enamored of the Bot's claims he wouldn't be afraid to lay down some smack even on David Ortiz if need be.
Michael DiMella wonders if Scott Boras is in charge of selling off the dreaded one's condo at the Ritz, because it just went on sale for $1.6 million more than it did the last time Manny tried offloading it:
... No takers the first time...ok, let's just bump the price 23%! Hmmm.....Sounds an awful lot like Scott Boras is now advising Manny on real estate deals as well. If at first you don't get the offer you want, just raise your price! ...
Worcester offers contract to Manny Ramirez:
Worcester, MA January 27, 2009 -- The Worcester Tornadoes Professional Baseball Team has offered a contract to free agent outfielder Manny Ramirez for two years worth $24,000. The deal would pay the 12-time Major League Baseball All-Star approximately $3,000 during each month of the Can-Am Baseball Season. Unlike Major League Baseball, the Can-Am League operates with a salary cap, and the deal for Ramirez would be on par with other veterans in the league.
Sure, he wasn't perfect, but let's not forget what he achieved while he was here, Denton says, wagging his finger at all the new Manny haters out there:
Last time I checked, Manny Ramirez hadn't killed anyone. He wasn't named in the Mitchell Report for pumping his body full of steroids. He didn't cheat on his taxes or his wife. He never even rolled his vehicle over on the way home from the strip joint. So how did he become the most hated player in baseball? ...
In which Big Schill calls out Manny Ramirez. It's gone from 38 Pitches, but the thing about RSS is that nothing's ever really deleted, so Pink Hat Hell reposts the whole thing and adds in commentary on what Schilling can do with his undead post.
You'd think a former sportscaster who sued a cartoonist (successfully) for calling him a drunk might think twice before accusing a professional baseball player of throwing games. You'd think wrong.
Via Rich Levine, who argues that Lobel must be stopped, and not just because the column shows he has problems stringing sentences together coherently.
Red Sock blows the lid of the doddering announcer's latest Ramirez ranting:
... But what of the specific claim that Manny forgot which knee was bothering him? It might be worthy of a chuckle if it did not come after more than 10 years of insults and unwarranted nastiness from both the Boston and national media.
Yesterday I tried to find out where it had originated from.
It turns out that McCarver was repeating that exact same story more than two years ago! ...
Rob refutes Bill Simmons on the issue of Manny Ramirez:
... Just to put a few facts out there: Manny Ramirez is a grown man. He's a goofy bastard, but he's no child. He hired Scott Boras, not the other way around. And as much influence as Boras may have wielded, it was still Manny who gave the green light in the end. It was still Manny who took three strikes in Yankee Stadium. It was still Manny who shoved a Red Sox employee to the ground, slapped Kevin Youkilis in public, demanded a trade, and faked injury in the middle of a pennant race. ...
He adds:
... The most irritating part of Simmons' rant is that he tries to come off as the voice of all Sox fans. He thinks himself Tribunus Plebis (tribune of the people) of Red Sox Nation. But it's difficult to have the pulse of a New England fanbase from Los Angeles. ...
From today's CHB column on Manny Ramirez:
"Trust me when I tell you that Sox wins and losses have zero bearing on my happiness."
Help keep Universal Hub going. If you like what we're up to and want to help out, please consider a (completely non-deductible) contribution.
