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A monologue from the play by Eric Simonson
REGGIE
Why?! Why do I gotta do that?! Why do I gotta do anything you tell me? But then I do. I do everything you tell me to. I ride the bus that I hate, I room with guys who hate me,
I play when you say play, and I ride the bench when you say don’t, even though the fans want to see me and it makes no sense whatsoever. I keep quiet—I keep quiet and I do what I’m told.
And I will continue to do that all year long, and I won’t ask to be traded ’cause that’s what I agree to do, and thank God Almighty that I am a good, Christian, Man! That’s right. Jesus!
Jesus Christ got my mind right! And he hears my suffering! He hears my prayers! [He dr ops to his knees] It makes me cry, the way I’m treated on this team. The Yankees are Ruth and DiMaggio and Mantle and Gehrig.
I’m a n*gger to you, and I just don’t know how to be no Elston Howard. I’m making seven hundred thousand dollars a year, I drive a Rolls-Royce, and I got homes on both ends of this great country and you treat me like dirt.
I’ve got an IQ of one hundred sixty, and you can’t mess me because you’ve never seen anything like me, and you sure as hell never had anyone like me on the Yankees. I won’t fight you, Billy Martin!
I’ll do whatever you tell me to do on the field, because that is my contract with you, but you can not make me give up on myself! You can not make me give up on me! See you at the ballpark.
