Following the unscrupulous mid-season sacking of manager Willie Randolph, announced via a 3:00 am press release, the New York Mets on Tuesday found themselves without a manager. But as expected, Major League Baseball veteran and New York Mets bench coach Jerry Manuel was soon promoted to the vacant position.

Manuel, apart from an encyclopaedic understanding of the game's nuances, is also known as one of MLB's most effective motivators. What's not so well known is his devotion to the father of the Indian nation, and how Manuel has inculcated the Mahatma Gandhi's [Images] values.

It began when Manuel realized that ultimately, players want truth from their instructors. This led him to seek out and inculcate the lessons of Martin Luther King Jr. It was while researching Dr King that Manuel learned of the civil rights leader's avid devotion to the Mahatma's teachings.

'Whatever [Dr King] was reading was good enough for me,' Manuel reportedly told The New York Times last year.

And so, he began his self-propelled quest to understand Mahatma Gandhi, a quest that saw him devour books, memoirs and films. He still makes time to read passages from Gandhi's autobiography. And every year, watches the film Gandhi, as a reminder of the great man's sway over millions of minds.

Manuel says he has always wanted to move men, to get them to reach a level they've never before seen. Who better to learn from then, than the leader of one of history's greatest mass movements?