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The Big Blurt
I'm Frank Thomas and I just woke up for another day of slavery, another day of working for The Man for the sad $9.9 million he'll pay me for this year for whacking baseballs. I'm going back -- OK, I'm hitting the field, putting on that Chicago White Sox uniform again -- but I ain't liking it. I don't want to hear how much money your Uncle Fred made, lifetime, working in that coal mine all those years. I don't want to hear how Jonas Salk never even took out a patent on that polio vaccine. I don't want to see your list with the pay scales for teachers, firemen, wire walkers, philosophers, brain surgeons, artists, truck drivers, computer wizards or occupants of the first chair for the French horn at the New York Philharmonic. I'm a man and I know what I'm worth. I can hit that baseball. I have figured out how to get my hips rolling in my swing, to turn my wrists, to keep my shoulder low, to unload on any fastball, curveball, or sneaky change-up any pitcher might throw at me. It has taken years of hard work to learn to do what I do. I should be paid as much as this A-Rod guy, as much as this Jeter guy, as much as any guy out here. So don't talk to me about the sanctity of contracts. Don't talk to me about other people's problems with money. I'm Frank Thomas and maybe I signed what I signed, an $85 million contract that runs through the year 2006, more than enough money to last a lifetime, but times change and people change. I'm Frank Thomas and I want more. And I'm an idiot. Sports Illustrated senior writer Leigh Montville appears regularly on CNN/Sports Illustrated. The opinions expressed here are solely those of the writer.
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