For those of you who frequent my blog, you know of my unabashed passion for Texas Rangers baseball. Pitchers and catchers will be reporting to Surprise, Arizona and the kick-off of spring training in a little over 10 days.

Last Saturday at the Arlington Convention Center, the Rangers hosted their annual Winter Fan-Fest. Jamey Newberg recounted the events on Monday and what he said about Michael Young raises the bar of my regard for Young, his style and his leadership on the Rangers.

I'm starting to think that one reason I'm so drawn to him (Michael Young) as a player is that imperfect brilliance.

His imperfection, the thing that separates him from Alex Rodriguez and Vladimir Guerrero and Albert Pujols, is that he's a normal guy.

When he rose to the podium Friday night to accept his Player of the Year award, he turned back around and was clearly, legitimately stunned that the entire crowd had risen to its feet. And he put his head down, raised his eyebrows, and exhaled, the sort of look you'd see on his face if he'd just been buzzed up and in by Billy Wagner. The kind of look that someone has when they've just barely averted disaster -- not when they've earned a standing ovation.

(And then he told the crowd he knew we were standing only because our rear-ends were as sore as his was from sitting all night through a banquet.)

When the Rangers asked his wife, Cristina, to come up on the stage for the presentation of a diamond bracelet, Michael not only handed her the microphone but slid back a good 20 feet to let her have the stage to herself.

It was in keeping with what he said about being teammates with Mark Teixeira (who sent Michael a congratulatory letter from Arizona [where his wife is expecting their first child in the next few weeks] that was read to Michael and to the crowd, and included Teixeira's hope that the two of them will play together in Texas for a "very, very long time" and help bring a championship home): "I need Tex batting behind me. If Tex is hitting ninth, I want to hit eighth."

And when Michael sat back down at his table and they began to play a video tribute showing pictures and footage of every man ever to win the American League batting title, he didn't even look up to watch most of it.

He's too normal. In fact, he's almost abnormal in that he has no use for the spotlight or the statistics or the honors. He just wants to play baseball and win baseball games.

Michael Young is almost defective in a way. Superstars aren't supposed to act like that. He's not quite what you'd expect.

We're lucky.