ESPNTheMag.Com Presents: All-World Power Rankings

Who's the most irreverent baseball player ever?

by Amanda Ozment

MOST IRREVERENT BASEBALL PLAYER EVER? WE'LL TAKE BILL "SPACEMAN" LEE

[Ed's note: Not sure what All-World Power Rankings is? Please click here.]

Our cover this issue is Manny Ramirez. (Here's the feature.) Perhaps unsurprisingly, we've gotten some haters via e-mail about this choice; most people are like "He quit on his team!" It's a lil' bit true, but then what's awkward is, most of these e-mailers then say, "You should put Albert Pujols on the cover!" OK, two things: Sports Illustrated just did that (and did a nice job with it), and when Rick Reilly wrote this column, we got a zillion e-mails being like "Pujols is a user!" Are fans ever happy? (No.) To make this all fun again, we decided to jump off from Manny and rank the most irreverent baseball players of all-time. This should be cool.

TOP 5
RANK (YESTERDAY)		WHAT	WHY
	1 (10)	BILL "SPACEMAN" LEE	Best viewed as a " counter-culture symbol, " Bill Lee once said "if I am remembered by anyone, I would want it to be as a guy who cared about the planet and the welfare of his fellow man…and who would take you out at second if the game was on the line." Maybe he should have thought about that before he dressed up like an astronaut and took the mound. Bonus: want to know how Lee feels about Manny himself? Read 'dis.
	2 (35)	RICKEY HENDERSON	"Don't worry Rickey, you're still the best," said Hall of Famer Rickey Henderson…to himself after he struck out swinging, or so the story goes. Besides referring to himself in the 3rd person on a regular basis ("I never answer myself, so how can I be talking to myself?" Rickey once told a reporter), there is also this classic story from Dennis Eckersley.
	3 (62)	MARK "THE BIRD" FIDRYCH	Unlike Rickey, Fidrych was talking to himself and said so point blank in response to rumors that he had been talking to the baseball. Because THAT would be weird. He also did his own grounds-keeping, ran around shaking teammates' hands after an outstanding play, recently revealed that he may have missed his calling as a guest star on Magnum P.I., and explains it all here.
	4 (9)	AL "THE MAD HUNGARIAN" HRABOSKY	There aren't many people who can rock a Fu Manchu like Al "Mad Hungarian" Hrabosky. The "controlled hate routine" that he performed after pitches is what nightmares are made of: just ask Bill Madlock.
	5 (42)	TURK WENDELL	Wendell wore #99 in honor of Rick "Wild Thing" Vaughn. Right there, he's on the list. The fact that he accessorized his 99 jersey with a necklace made from the claws and teeth of animals he had hunted and killed, when coupled with the close attention that he paid to his own teeth ( he brushed them between innings as part of a bizarre good luck routine), secures his place in the top five.

HONORABLE MENTION
RANK (YESTERDAY)		WHAT	WHY
	82 (139)	DOCK ELLIS	Before a 1974 start against the Reds Dock Ellis famously said "We gonna get down. We gonna do the do. I'm going to hit these mother[expletive]s." Then he drilled Pete Rose, Don Dreissen and Joe Morgan with the ball…all just four short years after he threw a no-hitter on acid. He's best known, though, for being the winningest pitcher on the World Champion 1971 Pittsburgh Pirates roster.
	103 (1,870)	JIM PIERSALL	Jimmy's zany antics include climbing the flagpole at Fenway Park during a game, wearing a Beatles wig and playing air guitar during an at-bat, doing calisthetics and, at one point, a "war dance" to distract Ted Williams, in the outfield during a number of games. And, there was the time that he ran the bases backwards after hitting his 100th home run at the Polo Grounds.

RISING AND FALLING
MOVEMENT		WHAT
		PEDRO MARTINEZ (Someone hire this guy and he'll be zany!)
		MANNY RAMIREZ (Look, he'll always be zany, but there are a lot of zany people in LA, so it's a lil' less obvious)

For more All-World Power Rankings, CLICK HERE

Print Article . Email Article. Subscribe to The Magazine