Manny being Manny

After being hit on the wrist by Homer Bailey the night before, Manny was scratched from last night's lineup as a precautionary measure. And yet, he managed to hit a pinch-hit grand slam in the sixth inning -- on Manny Bobblehead giveaway night of all nights (check out Manny's opinions on the bobblehead here).

Classic Manny being Manny, right? Not just the comments with regards to his bobblehead, but also his incredible clutchiness. Last night marked the 22nd Grand Slam of Manny's career, 2nd all-time behind Lou Gehrig (23) on the career leader board. Only a handful of right-handed hitters -- Albert Pujols, Jimmie Foxx, Joe DiMaggio, Hank Aaron, Willie Mays and Roger Hornsby -- come to mind as being in Ramirez's class of talent. Only nine hitters in the history of baseball have a career OPS above 1.000; Pujols and Ramirez are the only two active players on that list and while Pujols is utterly great, he is still in the prime of his career and nowhere near the "decline" phase, while Manny is more likely than not facing the final contacts of his illustrious career. Sustaining those kind of numbers over 17 seasons is no easy feat (not even Todd Helton, whose played at Coors Field, much pre-humidor, his entire career can rival Ramirez's numbers).

In 174 ABs this season, Ramirez has a triple slash line of .348/.475/.681 (1.155 OPS) with 11 HR, 32 R, 37 RBI and 33 BB. Last year with the Dodgers, Ramirez hit .396/.489/..743 (1.232 OPS) with 36 R, 53 RBI, 17 HR in 222 PAs. Pretty consistent, no? At 37, Ramirez has shown no signs of slowing down (perhaps because of steroids) due to age.

You may think his outrageous 2009 numbers are bound to regress, but a lot of signs indicate otherwise. Take a look:

• Manny has a career 22.5 LD%; this season, his LD% is 22.8%. A rough xBABIP metric is .120+LD%. Thus, a player with a .225 LD rate would likely have a .345 BABIP.
  
• Speaking of BABIP, Manny's career BABIP and speed score are respectively .345 and 3.0. This season, those numbers respectively clock in at .369 and 2.6, again, respectively.
• Manny's has a career .270 ISO (despite a horrible season in 2007, where he posted a .199 ISO over 569 PAs [6.2% of his career]); this season, that figure sits at .314.
• Manny's career HR/FB rate is 21.9%; this season, Manny is hitting more FBs than last year and is sporting a 21.3% HR/FB rate.
• Manny's HRs this season average 410.5 FT in distance; the league average home run this season is under 400 FT in distance.
• Manny's K rate is down almost 2.6 points (11.8%) this season against his career rate.

So sure, the ISO, BABIP are most likely going to regress towards his career rates -- perhaps a little lower due to aging -- going forward on the season, but Manny is still nonetheless one of baseball's premier offensive threats. His pure awesomeness is no news to ANYONE (27 ADP this preseason), but his continued success is incredibly impressive. Steroids or not, Manny is one of the greatest hitters of all time. I'd probably argue Manny is a top ten player in the game's history, especially given the right-handedness, but I'm no expert on baseball pre-2003.