I BE FICTION.

“Fuck Dave Chappelle, Rick James was a real ‘G.’”

-DAM-FUNK

Darryl Strawberry was my baseball hero growing up as a kid. Left handed, skinny, and at one point in his career played for the New York Mets. It was like everything I was and wanted to be. I actually got the chance to meet him in 97/98 while he was playing for the New York Yankees. I lost my shit when I shook his hand. I told him about each card that I had of his. 83’ rookie of the year, 89’ MVP, silver slugger in 90’, etc. He just chuckled and said “oh yea…”. The dude thought I was the craziest 9 year old ever. As he autographed my hat I told him he was my favorite player. He said “Thanks, I appreciate that man” and peaced.

I remember watching Sport Center one night when they announced that Darryl Strawberry was kicked out of the MLB for cocaine. (Strawberry’s lasted game was played October 17th, 1999)

I always knew that he had been involved in some sort of drug use throughout his career but I never knew how serious and intense it was until I read a article by Tom Verducci.

Sports Illustrated Magazine February 27, 1995 The Dead End Kids How it All Went Wrong for Darryl Strawberry & Dwight Gooden article by Tom Verducci.

Strawberry confesses his rock star lifestyle saying:

“It became a lifestyle for me,” Strawberry says. “Drink, do coke, get women, do something freaky…all that stuff. I did it for so long. I played games when I was drunk, or just getting off a drunk or all-night partying or coming down off amphetamines.

After reading the SI article I began digging for more interesting interviews involving Strawberry. I came across one by Millard Baker March 5th, 2009 on thinksteroids.com.

This time Strawberry expressing his thoughts about if he had the chance to take steroids while he was in the major leagues.

Hell yeah, I would have used them. Are you kidding me? I mean, come on. We’re competitive creatures and we have tremendous drive, high tolerance, all these things. I’m not saying that was the right thing to do. But if that was going on in the ’80s, that probably would have been in my system, too. I wouldn’t have denied it because you guys know I don’t deny anything.”

 Strawberry then continues giving a more in depth description of his life style while in the major leagues saying:

“We were the boys of summer. The drunk, speed-freak, sneaking-a-smoke boys of summer,” writes onetime home-run legend Darryl Strawberry in “Straw: Finding My Way,” out in April from Ecco. “[An] infamous rolling frat party … drinking, drugs, fights, gambling, groupies.” […]

Beer “was the foundation of our alcoholic lifestyle,” he writes. “We hauled around more Bud than the Clydesdales. The beer was just to get the party started and maybe take the edge off the speed and coke.”

The team’s mantra on the road, he writes, was to “tear up your best bars and nightclubs and take your finest women … The only hard part for us was choosing which hottie to take back to your hotel room. Lots of times you … picked two or three.”

Although he doesn’t name names, Strawberry relates how team members picked out girls from the stands for quickies. He once watched a pitcher march a frisky fan to a private room for oral sex: “I was jealous. When I saw her heading back to her seat, I gave her a sign. She smiled, turned right back around, and met me in that same little room … I had to be quick and run back out on the field.”

To hit a avg of .259 and have a total of 335hr in 16 seasons while partying as hard as Keith Richards  is pretty impressive, you have to admit. Still very unfortunate that we will never know what Darryl Strawberry could’ve ultimately done without the drug abuse. Strawberry still rains supreme as being one of the original bad boys of the MLB and my favorite baseball player to walk onto the field.

Got milk?

A funky NYC night