Being Carl Everett

...from the diary of the M's new clubhouse presence/LF/DH...
"Feb. 19
Joe Mama? What sort of crass sobriquet is this? Jamie Moyer, my one-time nemesis, the living embodiment of all that is NOT Carl Everett, and this is what you get, folks. Not 'guile' not 'intelligence,' just the studied indifference towards the team's new starting catcher and the sort of vulgar neologism that Ozzie used to create in chicago simply by mangling the english language.
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I'll be grateful not to hear about a certain south American nation at every turn - I may not always see eye to eye with Mr. Hargrove, but he does not subject his charges to repetitive reminders of his heritage.
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Bloomquist is just the sort of homespun yokel I've been defined against my entire career. Many will say his 'hustle' and quiet confidence evince a better, or at least older, form of baseball before oversized egos got involved. Make no mistake: this means before more talented (often black) players showed up. His is not a quiet confidence, it is the absence of confidence. William hasn't earned confidence yet; how could he: he is the not-so-proud possessor of a .341 career slugging average, if the adjective 'slugging' can fairly be applied to such a figure. He a blank non-entity upon which fans who never played above high-school imbue with such meaning - he is what they believe they were. They're not far wrong. Yes, I play the game differently. I'm good at it, for one. If I celebrate 'too much' it's only because I'm passably familiar with success - ie., cause for celebration. The objection is always 'pretend like you've been there before' or words to the effect that a truly confident player needn't resort to theatrics. To paraphrase Whitman, you say I contradict myself? Very well then, I contradict myself. I am large, I contain a multitude of extra-base hits...I shall sound my barbaric yawp throughout the AL west, and there's not a damned thing you, Willie Ballgame, Mike Hargrove, or the entire nation of Venezuela can do about it."