"During my time covering the majors for Sports Illustrated, I came to know -- and like -- Sheffield. He's a nice guy who plays hard and, I truly believe, wants badly to win. But for his myriad strengths as a ballplayer, Sheffield is the ultimate dangerous moron of our times. Throughout his seven-team, 20-year career, Sheffield has had an unprecedented run of compiling big numbers, expressing his delight over being in City X -- then whining about finances, feeling unappreciated, pissing off teammates, pissing off coaches, pissing off owners and pissing off fans."-Jeff Pearlman, in his increasingly must-read column on Page 2. If you haven't read Pearlman's Barry Bonds bio, I highly recommend it- he interviewed about 500 people who know Bonds, and about 495 of them concluded that he's the biggest asshole they've ever met.
How stupid was Sheffield's "you can't control me" speech? For Gary, "controlled" means having the Yankees pick up his $13 million option instead of letting him be a free agent, and then trading him. We should all be so controlled.