Manny Ramirez welcomed back with applause, questions

SAN DIEGO — The chants at Petco Park started the moment Manny Ramirez stepped into the on-deck circle.

Ma-nny! Ma-nny!

Petco Park, where only three years ago suspected drug cheat Barry Bonds had a syringe thrown in his direction.

Yet now there were grown men in the box seats along the first-base line wearing fake dreadlocks. They held up signs and pointed their cameras at the player with the loose-fitting uniform. Their hero was back, having served a 50-game suspension for violating baseball's drug policy, caught with a prescription for a banned substance called HCG.

Ma-nny! Ma-nny!

When his name was announced Friday over the public address system, the capacity crowd erupted. A crescendo of boos was soon drowned out by the chants of fans in Dodger-blue shirts, chanting until nothing else mattered as baseball's latest star to be linked to performance-enhancing drugs came to the plate.

Ma-nny! Ma-nny!

It was a release of sorts on a day that began with Ramirez, wearing Dodger-blue tinted sunglasses, meeting with reporters.

Asked Friday to detail his steroid use, Ramirez replied, "First I want to say that God is good and good is God. I don't want to get into my medical records right now."

Ramirez was 0 for 3 with a walk before the leaving the game in the sixth inning as the Dodgers beat the Padres, 6-3.

Along the way, he received numerous standing ovations from fans who made the two-hour trek from Los Angeles and appeared to fill half of the stadium -- a stadium that has rarely seen sellouts of late.

"Everywhere I go, man, people are there for me," Ramirez said. "They give me their support. It hasn't been that bad."

After the game, the praise continued.

"I was kind of nervous," he said. "I hadn't played in two months. I knew it was going to be crazy, but thanks to fans of L.A., they made it so easy for me to go and play."

That Ramirez hasn't explained the events that led to his exile, which began May 7, mattered little.

At the news conference, he apologized to his fans and to his teammates, explaining that he felt he had to do so for "not being there for them. For not playing the game. Because I'm a huge part of the Dodgers, you know, and I'm proud to wear that uniform.

"And when I say I'm sorry, I let those fans down that go out there to see me."