According to Bernie Miklasz, Pujols has told the media and the fans to stop calling him “El Hombre” because of possible disrespect to Cardinal great Stan Musial.
“I don’t want to be called that,” Pujols said. “There is one man that gets that respect, and that’s Stan Musial. He’s the Man. He’s the Man in St. Louis. And I know ‘El Hombre’ means ‘The Man’ in Spanish. But Stan is The Man. You can call me whatever else you want, but just don’t call me El Hombre.”
See the think about nicknames are, if you give one to yourself, its usually lame and is thus ignored. You have to be given a nickname, and then when you do get one, you really can’t say “stop calling me that”. Doesn’t work that way. It wasn’t yours to create, and you can’t take it away.
We aren’t saying we think Pujols is being mean or unjustified to ask, although we don’t see it as disrespectful to Musial, but it just doesn’t work that way…yes, even if you are Albert Pujols.
Maybe this will do it though, maybe people will stop calling him that. Probably not though. I know when I was in my younger days I had a nickname and I didn’t want to be called, so I politely asked that they quit it. My request fell on dead ears though and thats how I found out that some tattoo parlors will actually give a tattoo to someone that clearly doesn’t want it and how expensive laser removal is.
