Some days, Adrian Beltre is acutely aware of how close he is to becoming the 31st member of one of baseball's most illustrious fraternities. He can see the titanic silhouette of that number, "3,000," on the horizon, growing larger and nearer as he inches closer. But other days, he doesn't know how many hits he needs, or otherwise doesn't care.
If anything, the veteran has said he wants to get it over with. That's just how he operates, and it's not a surprise to anybody who's been around him long enough. But the mystique of Beltre is that despite that, he embodies so many different personas to the scores of people that have played with or against him, and to the lucky few who have had the opportunity to manage him.