Bobby Bonilla was in the house this morning, making it rain.

Bobby Bo, who now works for the Major League Baseball Players Association, was in the Nationals clubhouse at Space Coast Stadium with checks to hand out from the association to players (the union held a meeting with the players before practice).

"I'm here to put smiles on their faces," Bobby Bo said.

Bobby Bo put smiles on a lot of faces over his playing career. His reputation may have been burnt because of the problems he had in New York with the Mets, but at every other stop, he was a positive presence in the clubhouse and well-liked by fans.

They loved him when he first came up in Pittsburgh, and he had a big impact on the Orioles the year and a half he played in Baltimore, firing up what had been a dead clubhouse.

When he was with the Marlins and won a World Series in 1997, the chapter of the Baseball Writers Assocation of America voted him their good guy award. And I can say over the 15 years I've covered baseball, I never enjoyed covering a player more than Bobby Bo.

My experience has been that most of the time a guy is worse than the image people have of him. Bobby Bo is the exception to that rule.