The Mets' Billy Wagner isn't afraid to speak his mind

	Billy Wagner's outspoken nature makes him a perfect fit in New York. Jim McIsaac/Getty Images
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The studying was more interesting than he'd thought it'd be, Mets ace Pedro Martinez said while perched on a chair in the visitors' clubhouse at Milwaukee's Miller Park. He absolutely devoured the civics primers he'd bought to ready for his citizenship test, Martinez said, still talking about his winter pursuit to become an American citizen. Then, when he started in on how free speech was one of the freedoms that made him proudest to be an American, Billy Wagner couldn't help himself -- he broke in from his chair two lockers over.

"Which amendment is that?" Wagner asked Martinez. "Come on, which one?"

Wagner's a government buff, passionate about policy and its evolution. But this particular freedom and this specific amendment (Pedro did know the answer, the First) are, in Wagner's mind, especially important to study and to recall.

Especially if you're his teammate.

A plain-spoken -- and occasionally profane -- straight-talker, Wagner has spent his career bent on exercising his First Amendment right. A year ago he called out his dropping Phillies teammates for losing focus; a week ago he said he'd never had fun in Philadelphia; and even he figured that a set of his greatest verbal hits would run several CDs too long, conceding with a sigh, "There's been so many."

And yet, as dominant a stopper as he is, it may be his unplugged mouth that makes him so darn valuable.

"In this day and age, to be able to stand up and say something you believe in seems to be the hardest thing to do," said Wagner, who sadly is not  overstating things.

People in the sports world seem to have forgotten one of our first freedoms. Sure, athletes and coaches long haven't gotten the same leeway with their words -- and that's not just a reference to Mark Cuban blogging on officiating at the risk of punitive measures. What's truly depressing is that these athletes and owners, coaches and commissioners are letting the court of public opinion hand out muzzles, and they're taking them faster than Wagner and Martinez can ring up Ks.

More often than not these days, if an athlete shares what's on his mind, well then, Wagner said, "You're labeled a loudmouth and a jerk." Which Wagner has been. 

"If you believe in something, you shouldn't be afraid to stand up for it," he said. "Of course, you don't have many friends then."

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