Athlete Run-Ins: Fun With Mark Teixeira

One of our larger fears when we launched this whole Athlete Run-In series was that all the stories would be negative ones, in which athletes do something stupid or assholish, and we sit here and snicker and mock them and generally stay on the couch and make fun of people. Fortunately, as with the Matt Leinart story last week, some of the best ones are when athletes are unusually cool, accommodating and, get this, human.

Both of today's stories are nice guy athlete stories, because it's a Monday and we can't get worked up to be too negative on Mondays. First up: A jovial tale of mirth with Rangers first baseman Mark Teixeira, coming to us from Dallas' Reid Wakefield.

I was at a Jackopierce concert with my wife and spotted Mark Teixeira (there with a date - and, yes, he bobbed his head and sang along all night). During the show, Tex got up and headed towards the lobby, so I followed him out. My brother and I are huge Rangers fans and actually had a bet last season about whether or not Teixeira would hit 40 homers (I thought he would). I cornered Tex and explained to him that my brother had no faith (the final tally was 43 jacks); he agreed to rub it in by calling my brother on my cell. I was expecting some friendly banter, but instead the conversation consisted of one line: "Hey Trey, this is Mark Teixeira...shove it up your ass!" Sweet.

For the record, we do not recommend following athletes when they leave a concert. That said, we don't recommend going to Jackpierce concerts either.

Athlete Run-Ins: Matt Leinart's Surprise [Deadspin]

(By the way, even though the Win A Book! part of this contest is over, we still encourage you to send us your athlete run-in stories at tips@deadspin.com. If it's good, we'll run it on the site and, hell, we'll probably find something cool for you lying around here.)