Woke up this morning to wall-to-wall coverage of Manny Ramirez's "it's not the end of the world'' comment from yesterday afternoon. On Mike and Mike in the Morning on ESPN Radio and ESPN2, the two were talking about it, calling experts about it and taking calls and e-mails about it. My first instinct was to defend Ramirez, because it seemed, once again, as if fans, especially Red Sox fans (and you know who you are and how you are) were pinning the blame on Ramirez when the Red Sox lose and pretty much taking him for granted when they win (for example, in 2004, when he was the World Series MVP and a monster day in and day out throughout the playoffs, the mantle of hero was pinned on Mr. Bloody Sock).

Also, the depictions of him as some kind of baseball idiot savant, some kind of RBI-producing Rain Man, always has struck me as demeaning and patronizing, and ignorant of how, crazy as it sounds, he didn't come out of the womb swinging a bat (to paraphrase an old Isiah Thomas quote) and actually worked hard throughout his life to get to the majors and become one of the most devastating hitters of this era.

But that's neither here nor there. With all this ranting and raving about millionaire ballplayers who don't bleed hard enough for their team (pun completely intended), I figured it was worth it to see how the Boston papers were handling this controversy. And lo and behold, here in today's Boston Globe ... ready for this? Some perspective. And evidence that the one killer quote was pulled completely out of context, and blown way the hell out of proportion.

And for me to say that, someone who despises when athletes hide behind the "quoted out of context'' line, that's saying something. But Ramirez's quote was neatly snipped and removed from any context, any flow of his thoughts, any larger picture or point.

Here's what the Globe quoted him as saying, in the sixth and seventh paragraphs of its story on the breaking of his lengthy silence with the reporters, on the off-day of the ALCS:

"We're just going to go have fun and play the game," he said. "That's it. If we go play hard and the thing doesn't come like it's supposed to come, we'll move on. We'll come next year. Why should we panic? We've got a great team. If it doesn't happen, good. We'll come next year and try to do it again.

"We're confident every day. It doesn't matter how things go for you. We're not going to give up. We're just going to go and play the game, like I've said, and move on. If it doesn't happen, so who cares? There's always next year. It's not like the end of the world or something." 

Is it just me, or does the whole bit about not panicking, having confidence in what a great team this is, and not giving up sort of change the way everything else sounds?

I think it's just me. Or maybe no one has really seen or heard the surrounding quotes.

Or what preceded it: it seems that this dovetailed out of a huge (and, to me, pointless) discussion of his watching and raising his arms after his home run in Game 4, while the Sox were being pounded. Apparently, the Indians didn't like. Why they should have cared isn't clear, since they won the game and are one win away from the Series, but those "unwritten rules'' (these rules; unfortunately, we're making you pay to read this) say they're supposed to care. Ask Casey Blake.

So this all starts with Ramirez having to defend his being happy that he didn't let his team get shut out in a playoff game, and spirals into him saying he wasn't going to lose his mind over the possible outcome to Game 5, into one sentence from that speech being ripped from the midst of it and used to beat him over the head in a nationwide forum on his professionalism.

Then there's this, from that same Globe story:

Ramírez, unlike some of his teammates, hasn't slowed this offseason. He started hot in the ALDS and continued hot in the ALCS. He has been on base in 19 of his 31 postseason plate appearances. He has hit four home runs, tying David Ortiz for the most by a member of the Red Sox in one postseason. He is hitting .429 with a .613 on-base percentage and a 1.000 slugging percentage. He has 10 walks. He is patient, taking pitches, and at the same time, he is mashing the ball.

But dammit, he's being too flashy while he does it. And he's not offering to sacrifice a kidney for the Red Sox to win tonight.