The Last Word on Manny

At least for now.
Here's MLB's ultimate All-Star public-relations nightmare: Your starting National League left fielder, Manny Ramirez.
Don't dismiss the possibility.

• You've got to believe he's among the top three vote-getters among NL outfielders at this moment. (Early results haven't been released.)
• The electorate hasn't always been that attentive. The most recent egregious example of bad voting occurred last year. Kosuke Fukudome of the Cubs was one of the fans' NL outfield choices while posting pedestrian numbers at the All-Star break: a .279 average, 7 HR, 36 RBI, 8 SB. A better choice would have been the Cardinals' Ryan Ludwick (.289, 21 HR, 65 RBI at the same point.)
• For all their chest-thumping indignation, fans have never been truly outraged by steroids in any sport. Football, a game based on brute strength, goes on its merry way without the slightest public questioning of whether the offensive tackle and defensive end are juicing. MLB attendance keeps setting records. Last year, 41 million All-Star ballots were filed in the final 24 hours alone. Fans lamented the artifically inflated numbers of this baseball era in one breath and hopped on the Internet to vote in the next.

Ramirez won't play another game during the All-Star campaign this year, but think for a moment if things are close in the final weeks. Wouldn't MLB be compelled to engage in some good, old-fashioned Chicago and Louisiana accounting practices? Perhaps they'll put in a call to Blago or Edwin Edwards for some sage counsel.