An Orderly Account of Every Man Who Named Me This Week

There are men who speak because they have something to say, and there are men who speak because the silence frightens them. I have spent the better part of this week listening to a great deal of the latter, and I find that I owe each of them a moment of my considered attention -- not out of obligation, mind you, but because an unanswered ledger entry has a way of growing interest.

The Ghost of Death By Me has graced me with more words than any single man here deserves, which tells me more about him than it does about me. He speaks of milkshakes and destiny and pummeling, and he has gone to the considerable trouble of staging what I understand was meant to be an intimidating tableau -- a bruised and bloodied figure presented as proof of his capability. I have noted it. I have also noted that a man who needs props to make his point has already lost the argument. The Ghost of Death By Me is not without ability; I will grant him that small courtesy. But ability and discipline are two different accounts, and he has spent his freely while I have been saving mine.

Sweet Baby Ken Howard saw fit to contribute several words to this conversation, most of them anatomical, none of them structural. Ken Howard, I heard you. That is all I have to say about Ken Howard.

Ethan Deathwish Locklear 2 -- and I will use that name in full because the man deserves the dignity of being addressed directly -- has offered me something that resembles an alliance, built on a shared contempt for the Ghost of Death By Me and, if I read it correctly, the cooperative dismemberment of a hot dog vendor. Ethan Deathwish Locklear 2, I do not know you well enough to ride beside you, but I know a man who came to his own conclusions without being told what to think, and that is not nothing. I will remember the gesture.

As for the Ghost of Death By Me's claim that I belong on the same rung as Ethan Deathwish Locklear 2 -- that I am a jobber, a loser, a man who cannot see the competitive profile of his opposition -- I want him to sit with this thought between now and Friday: every man who has ever underestimated my preparation has paid for it in full, in the ring, in front of witnesses, with their shoulders on the mat. I do not require a milkshake. I do not require a setup. I require only that the bell rings and the work begins.

The audience in that building will have paid for a contest. I intend to give them one. The Ghost of Death By Me will not.