The Day After: notes from the Dodgers' clubhouse
Oh, what our glorious profession has come to …
Done cleaning out his locker, Manny Ramirez was chased by a pack of reporters as he walked from the clubhouse to the stadium elevator.
"Paparazzi," said Diamond Leung of the Riverside Press Enterprise.
Diamond and I followed the crowd, but did so walking, as if not running made our chase any less shameful.
Waiting for the elevator, Manny was surrounded by a semi-circle of reporters holding television cameras and notebooks. He made it clear he wasn’t talking.
"Are you going to miss us?" I asked.
He smiled, but kept quiet.
"So you were nice to us for two months, but now that the season’s over, you won’t talk to us anymore?" I asked.
Manny finally gave in. Kind of.
"I’ll send you guys a Christmas card," he said.
He walked into the elevator and as the door was closing, said, "See you guys."
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Juan Pierre declined to be interviewed.
"See you in the spring," I said.
"We’ll see," he replied.
Later in the day, I spoke to his agent, Mark Pieper, who said Pierre wanted to be traded.
"Juan wants to acknowledge the other players and how well they’re playing," Pieper said. "They have a winning formula. It’s clear the team went in a different direction, maybe twice with Andruw and Manny. If there’s a better fit he would hope the team would explore that."
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With his father standing nearby, Nomar Garciaparra packed up his belongings.
Garciaparra, who will be a free agent this winter, said he hadn’t thought about retirement. He acknowledged that his declining health could be a factor in his decision.
"I love it here," the Southern California native said. "There’s no question I love it here. I love this organization."
Does that mean he’d like to be back with the Dodgers if he doesn’t retire?
"It’s not my choice," he said. "It’s not that easy. I wish it was that easy."
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Andre Ethier said he had no thoughts on the season.
"It’s too early," he said.
What did he take out of the season?
"These are pointless questions to be asking right now," he said.
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Hiroki Kuroda said he would be spending his winter in Japan.
"It was a tough year," he said. "Every time I took the mound, I did so as an unknown quantity."
-- Dylan Hernandez
Photo: Manny Ramirez clears out his locker at Dodger Stadium. Credit: Ric Francis / Associated Press
