Beating up Hanley Ramirez's shoulder

As you all know, Hanley Ramirez has had shoulder difficulties in the past.  It seems to be his Achilles Heel.  So naturally when he is playing against the Marlins in an exhibition game he was inadvertently struck on the shoulder.

Pretty much everyone involved concurred that playing against Hanley Ramirez felt strange. Perhaps the strangest moment of all occurred in the sixth inning when pitcher Jason Standridge was involved in a bumping incident with Ramirez.

While covering third and making a throw to second, Standridge's elbow came down on Ramirez's shoulder, hard enough that both players appeared to be in some pain at first.

''I didn't know where to go first,'' said Gonzalez, who was torn between checking out the Marlins pitcher or Ramirez, who was playing for the Dominicans.

'Do I go see Standridge or do I go see Hanley? Me and [trainer] Sean Cunningham walk out, and he looks at me like, `OK, where are we going? Do we go see Hanley or do we go see Standridge.' ''

Gonzalez and Cunningham decided ultimately to go to the mound and check on the pitcher.

''But they're both fine,'' Gonzalez said.

I've got an idea -- how about checking on both.  

The Marlins are paying Hanley $5.5 million to play ball this season, the Dominican Republic sure isn't.  And the Fish have the right to recall him anytime from his national team.  It seems to me if the Marlins want to check on both of their players, and they are both the Marlins players, they can do whatever they want.

And anyway, I doubt Felipe Alou would mind.  He would understand.