Initially shocked at being dealt to DC, “Lastings Milledge” (not to be confused with Lastings Milledge) tells Yard Work that he’s “looking forward to hanging out with Agent Zero and Sheriff Gonna Getcha in the city that will come to know and love him, even if he has to share a locker room with that cradle-robbing Soprano-wannabe LoDuca.”
What Lastings doesn™t understand is why no one on the Mets seemed to like him. Maybe he made some mistakes (which Lastings already apologized for, by the way), but young people make mistakes. Lastings is only 22. If everyone in the world was a perfect mature person at 22, then we would have socialized medicine, no traffic on the highways, perfect DirecTV reception 24/7, and a Fantastic Four movie that didn™t suck.
Lastings doesn™t know what he did to get former manager Willie Randolph so upset that he had to ride the pine all the time while guys like Marlon Anderson and Shawn Green played a lot of games down the stretch. Maybe Willie is jealous of Lastings™ youth and contagious exuberance. Maybe Willie learned how to hate his own people from his former coach, well-known racist Joe Torre. Or maybe he™s just dumb. Lastings heard stories about how Willie would play Jose Reyes in the leadoff spot in spite of a bad OBP, or bat David Wright low in the order because he was too young to be a real RBI guy (whatever that means), or bunt with Carlos Beltran early in games in order to move a runner along. Lastings just chalked those stories up to a rookie manager™s mistakes. Like he said in the last paragraph, people make mistakes. Lastings bought a Young Jeezy CD and that Outkast album where Andre 3000 tries to front like Prince. It happens. But now, with hindsight and first-hand experience in mind, it looks to Lastings like Willie™s just as dumb as those cracker-ass crackers (pardon Lastings™ inflammatory racially-tinged language) Billy Wagner and Paul LoDuca.