Manuel "Manny" Aristides Ramírez Onelcida (born May 30, 1972, in Santo Domingo, Dominican Republic) is a Dominican-American Major League Baseball Outfielder, who is currently a free agent. A nine-time Silver Slugger, and one of 25 people to have hit over 500 career home runs, he is well recognized for his strong offensive abilities. His 21 career grand slams are tied with Alex Rodriguez for most by any active player, and the second-most all-time, behind Lou Gehrig's 23. His 28 career postseason home runs are also the most by any player in MLB history. Ramirez has been a fixture in the All-Star Game, and is a 12-time All-Star. Ramirez was allegedly among a group of 104 major league players who tested positive for performance-enhancing drugs during 2003 survey testing. In 2009, Ramirez was suspended 50 games for violating Major League Baseball's Performance Enhancing Drug policy for taking human chorionic gonadotropin (hCG), a women's fertility drug typically used by steroid users to restart their body's natural testosterone production as they come off a steroid cycle. Growing up in Washington Heights, New York City, New York, Ramirez attended George Washington High School, New York, leaving at the age of 19 years old without graduating. He was a 3-time All-City selection in baseball and as a high school senior was named New York City Public School Player of the Year in 1991, while batting .615 with 14 home runs in 22 games. He was inducted into the New York City Public School Athletic Hall of Fame in 1999. The Cleveland Indians selected Ramirez with the 13th pick of the 1991 draft and assigned to the Rookie-level Burlington Indians for his professional debut. He was named the Appalachian League MVP and was selected by Baseball America as short-season Player of the Year while slugging 19 homers and driving in 63 runs in 59 games, while leading the league in slugging and total bases. With the Single-A Kinston Indians in 1992, Ramirez battled injuries but still hit .278 with 13 homers and 63 RBI in 81 games and was named as the No.3 Prospect and the "Most Exciting Player in the Carolina League" by Baseball America. In 1993, Ramirez was named "Minor League Player of the Year" by Baseball America while combining to hit .333 with 31 homers and 115 RBI in 129 games with the Double-A Canton-Akron Indians and Triple-A Charlotte Knights.
In 2007, he had the highest fielding percentage, .990, among left fielders in the American League, tied for second in the Major League; he was ranked 6th highest in range factor of all AL left fielders, 1.72, 16th in both leagues, but had the lowest zone rating of Major League left fielders with 100+ games: .713. He made two errors during the 2007 season in left field, and tied for 5th overall in the Majors in assists from left field. In the postseason, Ramirez hit a walk-off 3-run home run in Game 2 of the American League Division Series against the Los Angeles Angels of Anaheim. In the fourth inning of the series' final game, Ramirez combined with teammate David Ortiz to hit back-to-back home runs off pitcher Jered Weaver. This home run tied him with Bernie Williams for first place all-time in postseason home runs. On October 13, Ramirez hit his 23rd postseason home run, passing Bernie Williams for the most all-time. He helped the Red Sox to reach and win the 2007 World Series, where they swept the Colorado Rockies. In the 2007 postseason, Ramirez batted .348 with 4 home runs and 16 RBI. On May 31, 2008, Ramirez hit his 500th home run, against Baltimore Orioles pitcher Chad Bradford at Camden Yards in the 7th inning on the first pitch, becoming the 24th player in MLB history to do so. He joined two other Red Sox players, Jimmie Foxx and Ted Williams in this exclusive home run club. On June 5, during a game at Fenway against the Tampa Bay Rays, an altercation between Manny Ramirez and Kevin Youkilis resulted from Ramirez objecting to what he believed was excessive - and chronic - complaining about the strike zone by Youkilis in the dugout, as well as the first baseman's penchant for throwing equipment after at-bats. Before the fifth inning - and after the Red Sox-Rays punching session - Ramirez was caught on NESN cameras slapping Youkilis. Ramirez and Youkilis exchanged words and had to be separated by teammates, coaches, and training staff. Youkilis headed out to the field still barking at Ramirez, while Ramirez was escorted into the tunnel leading to the clubhouse by bench coach Brad Mills and trainer Paul Lessard. According to three sources, Ramirez had provoked Youkilis telling him to "cut that [expletive] out." Later in the season, during the series with the Houston Astros, Ramirez had a physical altercation with Red Sox traveling secretary Jack McCormick. The two were arguing over Ramirez's large game-day request for 16 tickets to the game in Houston, when Ramirez reportedly pushed McCormick to the ground after saying "Just do your job." The two were quickly separated and Ramirez later apologized for his behavior. The matter was dealt with internally and Ramirez was fined.
On July 31, 2008, Manny was traded to the Los Angeles Dodgers in a three-way deal, in which he was almost traded to the Florida Marlins. The Boston Red Sox acquired outfielder Jason Bay and minor league infielder Josh Wilson, and the Pittsburgh Pirates got infielder Andy LaRoche, and pitching prospect Bryan Morris from the Dodgers, and outfielder Brandon Moss and pitcher Craig Hansen from the Red Sox. Ramirez has always worn uniform number 24, but the Dodgers have retired that number in honor of Hall-of-Fame manager Walter Alston. Ramirez countered the Dodgers' suggestion of 28 by suggesting 34, but no Dodger has worn that number since Fernando Valenzuela. Ramirez finally accepted number 99, but the next day asked for 28, the Dodgers' original suggestion. However, the Dodgers' marketing department had already begun producing merchandise with number 99, so Ramirez stuck with that number. Ramirez was named the National League Player of the Month for August 2008. He hit .415 (44-for-106) with seven doubles, nine home runs, 25 RBI and 21 runs scored during the month. He finished the season with the Dodgers hitting a .396 batting average, 17 home runs, and 53 RBI. Ramirez finished the season with 37 home runs and 121 runs batted in. Among all major leaguers, he finished 3rd in batting average, 2nd in slugging percentage, and 3rd in OPS. WIth Ramirez in the line-up, the Dodgers won the National League West, then swept the Chicago Cubs in a division series before losing the National League Championship Series to the eventual World Series winner Philadelphia Phillies in five games. During the playoffs, Manny hit .520 with 4 home runs, 2 doubles, 11 walks and 10 RBI. Ramirez was fourth in the voting for the 2008 NL MVP award, with 138 points, behind Albert Pujols, Ryan Howard, and Ryan Braun. After the Dodgers lost in the playoffs, Manny was asked about his future. "Gas is up, and so am I", was his reply, indicating that he expected to be valued highly in the free agent market. After long and contentious negotiations that dragged into the start of spring training, Ramirez signed a two-year $45 million contract with Los Angeles on March 4.
On May 7, 2009, Ramirez was suspended 50 games for violating Major League Baseball's Performance Enhancing Drug policy. In the announcement provided by Major League Baseball, Ramirez was suspended for an unspecified violation of section 8.G.2 of the joint drug agreement. Shortly after his suspension was announced, Ramirez stated that he had seen a physician who unknowingly prescribed medication that is banned under the MLB drug policy. After consulting with the MLBPA Players' Association, Ramirez waived his right to challenge the suspension. According to an ESPN report, the drug used by Ramirez is human chorionic gonadotropin (hCG), a women's fertility drug typically used by steroid users to restart their body's natural testosterone production as they come off a steroid cycle. It is similar to Clomid, the drug Barry Bonds, Jason Giambi and others used as clients of BALCO. Ramirez during a minor league rehab assignment with Triple-A Albuquerque. During his suspension, Ramirez was allowed to workout at the Dodgers' facilities and he trained with Dodger coach Manny Mota. To get back into shape he was allowed a short rehab stint in the minor leagues. Ramirez played two games with the AAA Albuquerque Isotopes, where his appearance led to record crowds for the Isotopes. He played several games with the Single-A Inland Empire 66ers, homering in his first at-bat with the 66ers. Ramirez returned from his suspension and reclaimed his starting role with the Dodgers on July 3 against the San Diego Padres. On July 21, Ramirez hit his 537th career home run, passing Mickey Mantle for 15th place on the all-time home run list. On July 30, The New York Times reported that Ramirez tested positive for performance-enhancing drugs during Major League Baseball's 2003 survey testing. Ramirez, a member of the Boston Red Sox at the time, was among 104 major league players to test positive.
On April 10, 2010, Ramirez recorded his 2,500th career base hit with an infield single against the Florida Marlins. On April 18 against the San Francisco Giants, Ramirez hit his 548th career home run to tie Mike Schmidt for the 14th place on the all-time home run list. He hit his 549th to pass Schmidt on May 28 against the Colorado Rockies. On June 19, he hit a home run in his second game back at Fenway Park. In 2010, Ramirez had three separate stints on the disabled list. When he returned from the third trip on August 21, he apparently had lost his starting job to Scott Podsednik. As a pinch hitter, he was ejected on August 29 by home plate umpire Gary Cederstrom one pitch into his at-bat for arguing a strike call. That appearance was his final one in a Dodger uniform. Ramirez was claimed on waivers by the Chicago White Sox. The Dodgers awarded Ramirez to the White Sox on August 30, receiving no prospects, but with the White Sox assuming the $3.8 million remaining on Ramirez's salary. He hit .261 with only 1 home run in his 24 games with the White Sox and then became a free agent at the conclusion of the season.
Originally from Santo Domingo, Dominican Republic, in 1985, Ramirez joined his parents who relocated from the Dominican Republic to Washington Heights, a predominantly Dominican neighborhood in New York City. He played outfield for George Washington High School from 1989–1991. In 2004, Ramirez missed a Red Sox game to become an American citizen. He entered the next game running onto the field to a standing ovation while carrying a small American flag held in his hand. He planted the flag in the left outfield corner of the field, in the shadow of the Green Monster, where it remained for the entire game. Ramirez has three sons: Manuelito "Manny" Ramirez (b. 1995) from a previous relationship; Manny Ramirez, Jr. (b. 2003), and Lucas Ramirez (b. February 2006) with his current wife Juliana. In the off-season, the family lives in Weston, Florida. Many stories depict Ramirez as a carefree individual whose concentration is dedicated solely to playing baseball. One story took place in his early years with the Cleveland Indians in June 1994. As teammates were gathered in the Indians clubhouse watching news of the O.J. Simpson Bronco chase, Ramirez asked what was going on. A player responded, "they are chasing O.J.", to which Ramirez responded in disbelief, "What did Chad do?" (in reference to their current teammate Chad Ogea). Ramirez has been described as a prima donna and has periodically displayed a lack of enthusiasm and/or concentration, with mental lapses in both the outfield or running the bases. These incidents are typically described as "Manny Moments" or "Manny Being Manny." The first known documented usage of the phrase "Manny Being Manny" is attributed to then-Indians manager Mike Hargrove, quoted in a 1995 Newsday article.
Michelle Sung Wie was born in October 11, 1989 is an American professional golfer who plays on the LPGA Tour. In 2006, she was named in a Time magazine article as "one of 100 people who shape our world." At age 10, she became the youngest player to qualify for USGA amateur championship. Wie would also become the youngest winner of the US Women's Amateur public links and the youngest to qualify for a LPGA tour event. Wie turned professional shortly before her 16th birthday, accompanied by an enormous amount of hype and endorsements. Wie was born in Honolulu, Hawaii. Her parents were immigrants from the Republic of Korea (South Korea) who came to the United States in the 1980s. Her father, Byung-wook Wie, is a former professor of transportation management at the University of Hawaii. Her mother was South Korea's women's amateur golf champion in 1985 and competed in a Miss Korea pageant. Her paternal grandfather, Dr. Sang Kyu Wie, a resident of Jangheung, Jeollanam-do, was an emeritus professor at Seoul National University. When she was born, since both of her parents had been Korean, Wie had been a dual citizen of both the Republic of Korea and the United States automatically. But, the Republic of Korea does not allow dual citizenship after the age of 21. Wie has opted for United States citizenship. Wie graduated from Punahou School in Honolulu, Hawaii in June, 2007. On December 19, 2006, she announced that she would be attending Stanford University where there are family ties. Her paternal grandfather was a visiting professor and an aunt and uncle are both graduates. She enrolled in September, 2007 as a freshman, but as a professional golfer, Wie is not eligible under NCAA rules to play for Stanford's golf team. During her first three years at Stanford, she attended only during the fall and winter quarters, running from late September through mid-March each year. She took leaves of absence during the rest of the year to play professional golf.
Wie began playing golf at the age of four. In 2000, at the age of ten, she became the youngest player ever to qualify for the Women's U.S. Amateur Public Links Championship. Eight years later, Wie's mark was broken by fellow Hawaiian Allisen Corpuz who qualified when she was five months younger than Wie had been when she set the record. In 2001, at the age of 11, she won both the Hawaii State Women’s Stroke Play Championship and the Jennie K. Wilson Women’s Invitational, the oldest and most prestigious women’s amateur tournament in Hawaii. She also advanced into match play at the Women's U.S. Amateur Public Links Championship. In 2002, she won the Hawaii State Open Women's Division by thirteen shots. She also became the youngest player to qualify for an LPGA event, the Takefuji Classic held in Wie's home state of Hawaii. While she went on to miss the cut, her record stood for five more years until it was broken in 2007 by 11-year-old Ariya Jutanugarn. At the 2003 Kraft Nabisco Championship, Wie became the youngest player to make an LPGA cut,. She carded a 66 in the 3rd round, tying the amateur record for a women's major championship and qualifying her to play in the final group of the championship. In June 2003, Wie won the Women's Amateur Public Links tournament, becoming the youngest person ever, male or female, to win a USGA adult event. Later that summer, she made the cut at the US Women's Open when she was still just 13, the youngest player ever to do so. Wie was given a sponsor's exemption to the 2004 Sony Open in Hawaii, becoming the fourth, and youngest, female to play a PGA Tour event. Her second round score of 68 was the lowest ever by a woman in a PGA Tour event, though she went on to miss the cut in the tournament.
Wie played her first professional event in the 2005 LPGA Samsung World Championship, where she was disqualified from a fourth-place finish for signing an incorrect scorecard. A journalist (Michael Bamberger) reported she had illegally dropped the ball closer to the hole than its original lie the day after she completed her third round. At her other professional event in 2005, the Casio World Open on the Japan Golf Tour, Wie shot four over par to miss the cut. 2006 started with the PGA Tour Sony Open at her home course, the Waialae Country Club, Hawaii where she again missed the cut, this time by four strokes. In the initial Rolex World Golf Rankings in February, 2006, Wie was placed third behind Annika Sörenstam and Paula Creamer. She rose to second place in July but her limited schedule meant she failed to play the minimum of 15 worldwide professional women's tournaments over a twenty-four month period and she was dropped from the rankings entirely. In August, 2006, the calculation of the rankings was revised such that any player who had accumulated points in fewer than 35 tournaments had her ranking calculated as if she had played in 35. After the change, Wie's ranking dropped to 7th. In her first two tournaments on the LPGA Tour in early 2006, Wie gained a third place finish in the Fields Open in Hawaii, finishing one stroke off the lead, and finished in a tie for third in the Kraft Nabisco Championship, finishing one stroke behind, again. May, 2006, saw her play the Asian Tour SK Telecom Open, becoming the second woman (after Se Ri Pak) to make the cut at a men's tournament in South Korea. Wie reportedly received US$700,000 in appearance fees at an event that offered only US$600,000 in total prize money. In all, she reportedly netted US$5 million in appearance and endorsement money for the two-week trip.
In June Wie played in Maryland at a sectional qualifier for the 2008 U.S. Women's Open. She finished in second place, earning one of the 35 qualification spots available.[46] She shot an eight-over-par 81 in the first round of 2008 U.S. Women's Open and ended up with a 10-over total of 156, missing the cut. July saw Wie playing on a sponsor exemption at the LPGA State Farm Classic. She was in the middle of her third round when it was realized she had failed to sign her second round scorecard. Event organizers waited until the conclusion of that round to notify her that she was disqualified in order to give her an opportunity to explain what had happened. She was one stroke off the lead at the time. Two days later Wie announced that she had accepted an invitation to play her eighth PGA Tour event in the alternate field Legends Reno-Tahoe Open. She shot rounds of 73 and 80, missing the cut by nine strokes. Wie had expressed her desire to attempt to earn membership on the LPGA Tour for the 2009 season by earning the equivalent of 80th place on the 2008 money list through her earnings at the events she played in through sponsor exemptions. When she failed to reach this goal, she entered an LPGA Sectional Qualifying Tournament. At the tournament, held from September 16 through 19 at the Mission Hills Country Club in Rancho Mirage, California, she finished tied for 4th place. This was sufficient to advance her to the LPGA Final Qualifying Tournament held in Daytona Beach, Florida in December, 2008. During the Final Qualifying Tournament, Wie finished in a tie for 7th place to make her eligible to play full time on the LPGA Tour in 2009.
After passing LPGA Qualifying School in December 2008, Wie declared that she still planned to play in tournaments against men. However for the second consecutive year, she did not receive a sponsor exemption to play in the Sony Open in Hawaii where she had played four years in a row from 2004 through 2007. Her first tournament as an LPGA member was the season-opening SBS Open at Turtle Bay where she shot 66, 70 to move into a tie with Angela Stanford going into the final round of the tournament. Wie held a three-stroke lead with eight holes remaining, but ended up losing to Stanford by three strokes. It was reported in early March, 2009, that Wie had left the William Morris Agency, the Hollywood talent agency that had represented her since she turned pro in 2005, and would be signing with sports agency IMG. In Wie's next two tournaments, the J Golf Phoenix LPGA International and the Kraft Nabisco Championship, she struggled to make the cut, finishing on the cut line after the second round both times. She finished tied for 57th and 67th respectively in the two events. In the Kraft Nabisco, a major on the LPGA Tour, she shot a score of 81 in both the second and third rounds. In mid-April, Wie traveled to Korea to play in a LPGA of Korea event, the Lotte Mart Open, for the first time. She finished tied for 36, earning $1,536. She spent the next two months playing in every available LPGA tournament, with results ranging from a tie for 3rd at the Sybase Classic to a tie for 54th at the State Farm Classic, the same event at which she was disqualified in 2008 for failing to sign her scorecard. At the second major of the year, the LPGA Championship, she finished tied for 23rd, her best finish in a major since 2006. During this tournament she also scored her first recorded hole-in-one as a professional.
The day after the end of the LPGA Championship, Wie participated in a sectional qualifying tournament for the 2009 U.S. Women's Open to be held during the first week in July. She joined 110 players at the Rockville, Maryland site, one of several sites around the country set up for qualifying purposes on that day. Wie missed qualifying after shoot rounds of 70 and 74. In August, at Rich Harvest Farms golf course in Sugar Grove, Illinois, Wie was a captain's pick for the United States team in Solheim Cup competition. She finished the tournament with a 3-0-1 performance in four matches. On November 15, 2009, Wie won her first professional individual tournament, the Lorena Ochoa Invitational in Guadalajara, Mexico, a limited field event on the LPGA Tour, posting a score of thirteen under par 275 for a two-stroke margin over fellow American Paula Creamer, and besting Jiyai Shin, Christie Kerr and Morgan Pressel by two strokes. It was Wie's 81st professional tournament and her 66th LPGA Tour event. She then finished second in the Ladies European Tour season-ending Dubai Ladies Masters tournament on December 9–12, 2009, shooting a 15-under-par 273, which put her three shots behind winner In Kyung Kim. On August 29, 2010, she posted a three-shot win over a full field at the CN Canadian Women's Open, held at St. Charles Country Club in Winnipeg, Manitoba, for her second career professional victory. In her next LPGA event, she finished second in the 54-hole P&G NW Arkansas Championship two weeks later, shooting 201 (-12) but losing to Yani Tseng by one stroke after giving up an overnight three-stroke lead.
