Crime in Sports - #26 - Crack Gets You Murder Time - The Unluckiness of Willie Mays Aikens

Episode Date: July 26, 2016

This week, we take a deep look at a man with an upbringing so horrible, that he could challenge anyone is CIS history. When your mother is a prostitute, and you grow up with no plumbing, the ...only thing left to do is... Crack. A lot of crack. This is guy who was deemed too crazy, even for Mexico. It's a fun adventure through the the wildness of the sex crazed, coke fueled 1980's, that leads to some not so fun consequences in the 1990's. Hear how a guy can go from a World Series hero, to a target of the federal government. This is a wild one, with an ending that will surprise you!Hit a World Series home run, round the bases, and snort a giant pile of cocaine, with Willie Mays Aikens!! Check us out, every Tuesday. We will continue to bring you the biggest idiots in sports history!Hosted by James Pietragallo & Jimmie Whisman New episodes every Tuesday!!Please subscribe, rate, and review!Listen on Apple Podcasts, Spotify, Stitcher, or wherever you listen to podcasts!Head to shutupandgivememurder.com for all things Crime in Sports!For merchandise: crimeinsports.threadless.comCheck out James and Jimmie's other show: Small Town Murder Follow us on social media!Facebook: facebook.com/crimeinsportsInstagram: instagram.com/smalltownmurderTwitter: twitter.com/MurderSmall Contact the show: crimeinsports@gmail.comDonate on Patreon: patreon.com/crimeinsportsPayPal: paypal.me/crimeinsports See Privacy Policy at https://art19.com/privacy and California Privacy Notice at https://art19.com/privacy#do-not-sell-my-info.

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Starting point is 00:00:00 Hey Prime members, you can listen to Crime and Sports early and ad-free on Amazon Music. Download the app today. Discover all the best in audiobooks, podcasts, and originals featuring authentic Canadian voices and celebrity talent like Brendan Fraser and Luke Kirby's latest sci-fi adventure, The Downloaded. A first listen is waiting for you when you start your free trial at audible.ca. Queen of the courtroom is back. How did I know that? I have crystal ball in my head. New cases. Leave her alone. So, uh... This is not a so. This is a period. Classic Judy.
Starting point is 00:00:52 It's streaming. You can say anything. It's an all-new season. Judy Justice. Only on Freebie. Hello and welcome back to Crime and Sports. Yay! Yes, indeed. Thank you so much for joining us today my name is james
Starting point is 00:01:27 petra gallo this is my co-host i'm jimmy wissman and we are very excited to be with you today i want to thank everybody first of all a few people we want to thank in particular yeah we'll just use their twitter handles make it easy because that's what they're kind of going on that have just been just been really trying to get us out there on Twitter and we thank you guys so much. A guy, J.A. Mason 14, you've been loving our stuff. Thank you so much. Is that the soldier? Yes, yes. Thank you for that too.
Starting point is 00:01:54 Thanks for your service. That too. At King Eric 1980, you've been cool. At Spartan Blues, thank you. At Boris Ranting, we love you dude. He's a UK guy, right? From Australia. Love that guy. Thank you. At Boris Ranting. We love you, dude. He's a UK guy, right? Yeah, from Australia. That's the guy that's on TV. Oh, yeah, yeah.
Starting point is 00:02:07 From Australia. Love that guy. Thank you so much. And a special thank you to the Red Card podcast there at Red Card Live. Yeah. Another UK soccer podcast. And they've been loving us. And, dude, your stuff is great, too.
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Starting point is 00:02:59 So Frankie the crime and sports dog is going to chew up Jason Williams a little. We're going to give you some before and after pictures. We'll show you Frankie enjoying him. And that's pretty funny stuff. So also, thank you guys for new iTunes reviews. All you new listeners out there, old listeners, if you haven't done an iTunes review yet, please, please, please do the iTunes review. We beg of you guys.
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Starting point is 00:03:43 you guys the amount of listens have ticked up. We've more than doubled in the past five weeks and I can't thank you guys enough. Two weeks. It's been crazy. It's been insane. Thank you guys.
Starting point is 00:03:53 And also too, there's a Patreon page, Patreon slash Crime and Sports. But that, you can give us a few bucks if you want. But iTunes reviews are free. We really don't want your money.
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Starting point is 00:04:11 cool stuff and buy Frankie real dog toys instead of Jason Williams action figures, which is great. And also, I could use health insurance. So let's get on that.
Starting point is 00:04:18 I half expected like ears, like people-shaped body parts when he said it's fair to notice. And then this thing shows up. It's pretty bitchy.
Starting point is 00:04:26 A wallaby corpse or something. So let us get into this. This week. First of all, too, I hope you guys enjoyed Ben Kramer and I guess Randy Lanier and Don Arano and all that whole thing.
Starting point is 00:04:36 Everybody that was involved. That was a wild, wild little adventure we went on last week. This week is just as equal of a wild adventure. Just as much.'s it's awesome this story is crazy uh it's a guy named willie mays akins all right now he's a baseball player
Starting point is 00:04:52 he's got willie mays in his name which is hilarious he's not related to willie mays at all as we'll get into here uh willie mays akins this guy led quite the life uh let's get into him quick here because it's it's a it's a crazy story the note cards are thick like so deep fucking war and peace today yeah so we want to get through it the bible not keep you guys for like four hours or make this a five-parter or anything so let's get into it willie mays akins he was born october 14th 1954 all right he's from seneca, South Carolina. The area he is from, I cannot overstate the poorness of this area. It's incredibly poor. It is South, like, imagine pre-civil rights and even after civil rights.
Starting point is 00:05:35 It's like, he went to segregated schools. Really? Until he was 12. You know what I mean? Sports teams were segregated until he was 12. I mean, it's that kind of area. It's poor. These people lived like sharecroppers they were like they give like eddie johnson and keith wright runs for their money as far as shit childhoods and shit environments and the boxer that uh and point tommy morrison yeah also yeah yeah he was this is kind of like
Starting point is 00:06:01 like the like the black equivalent to tommy to Tommy Morrison in the south rather than the midwest. What did his dad do? He has no idea because he had never met his father, Willie Mays Akins. Never knew him, never knew who he was, never met him at all. Here's where it is. You abandon the little fucker, it's going to ruin his life. Oh, but don't worry, Jimmy. He did have a completely amazingly abusive alcoholic stepfather, though, that stepped right in there.
Starting point is 00:06:27 Perfect. And took over for him. Just picked up where everybody left off. He beat the shit out of everybody in sight. The kids, the sister, the brother, the mom, the grandmother. He's smacking everybody around. Sounds like my life. Said he would get home on a Friday, get paid on Friday.
Starting point is 00:06:40 Said he'd have no money by Saturday. Holy shit. He'd just be sitting there with a jug of moonshine. Wow. And just drinking all weekend. And he'd hear them throwing up Saturday. He'd just be sitting there with a jug of moonshine. Wow. And just drinking all weekend. He'd hear them throwing up and they'd be beating the shit out of him. Fantastic. We're talking like a one-bedroom shack.
Starting point is 00:06:53 Yeah. A shack that's... You can hear everything. Oh, and it's so fucking horrible. This place is so disgusting. It had no running water, no plumbing. They had an outhouse, Jimmy. The floor, you could see through
Starting point is 00:07:05 the floorboards the dirt on the ground like it's barely even a house basically wow it's just like a shelter on sticks yeah it's it's a huge it's a giant cardboard box he's camping every day he's got the best homeless setup ever that's what it is like as if he was a bum the other bums would envy what he had they'd be like that's great but as far as houses go not so fantastic um yeah you can see the ground that which he he called it a shack everybody called it a shack this is in seneca uh it's the it's they called it the worst house in the worst part of seneca's worst area he basically grew up in haiti it's basically haiti the bruce hill section of seneca it's horrible apparently uh his name will section of Seneca. It's horrible, apparently. His name, Willie Mays.
Starting point is 00:07:47 Apparently, his uncle's name was Willie. That's where the Willie came from. There's legend that, you know, the doctor thought he was going to be a great baseball player. All that horse shit. Right. For what the real story seems to be from the basic deal, his Willie was his uncle's name. And they said, let's name him after Uncle Willie. It's like his mom's brother's name or something.
Starting point is 00:08:04 And then Dr. Mays was like the was the doctor the guy that delivered him the one that kind of took care of his mom or whatever
Starting point is 00:08:11 family practice yeah he was like the town country doctor type of thing so they stuck that in there Willie Mays whatever
Starting point is 00:08:18 so there you go Willie Mays Akins I don't know where the hell the Akins came from I guess it was his father who knows
Starting point is 00:08:23 it's one of his mother's married names she's got a couple of? It's one of his mother's married names. She's got a couple of names and that's one of them. So she was married to the guy long enough to get pregnant and then he took off. Maybe she just grabbed the name. I don't know because his mother's a whack job from when we find out.
Starting point is 00:08:34 She gets better later, but mother, alcoholic, drug addict, shocker. Weird. Prostitute. Great. Another shocker. Yeah, really nice. Making of a serial killer.
Starting point is 00:08:44 Absolutely. Mother was called an unaffectionate streetwalker she was called in in one um in one uh article here he said quote my stepfather was an alcoholic and my mother was a street lady that's pretty yeah pretty cut and dry right to the point right there not not real great at all for him um let's summon up two people in so few words it's so few words and so easy and perfect yeah sometimes the mother would do business in front of the kids in the shack oh no and there's stories in his book of like you know all they were all there and they could hear the alcoholic stepfather yeah you know on the mother there and then going at it and they were just on the other side. There's no lights so they're just sitting there.
Starting point is 00:09:25 Yeah, no electricity. If it was a candle it would be, you know. You'd see the shadow of them flickering from the candlelight. You could hear them. It's like,
Starting point is 00:09:31 that's horrific, man. Jesus. And there's no washing up after. No. It's just a dirty. No, there's no running water. It's just dirty people
Starting point is 00:09:38 getting dirtier. Yuck. It's disgusting. Yeah. Oh my God. You could smell it from the other side of the room.
Starting point is 00:09:43 The whole house, the whole room whole house the whole room would stink of vomit and prostitute and moonshine i saw this interview with him and the author of his book uh the book he releases at the later at later date and the author in the first two drafts i guess referred to his mother as a whore twice and it went and willie read them and it was fine with him you know whore went through third draft though willie said can you change one word for me and he said sure what and he said whore could you change it to harlot which i think is worse honestly i think it's worse which i thought 50s definition of a whore i'm just it's i'm laughing
Starting point is 00:10:21 because i'm expecting you know could you make soften it a little bit and he just call her a trollop? He just wanted to be more poetic, that's all. Because this guy's got flair. Harlot runs off the lips better than a whore. He's got flair. We'll do an in their own words right away on the top here. In their own words, Willie Mays Akins.
Starting point is 00:10:38 Quote, I grew up with a stepfather and mom that were alcoholics and were in and out of county jails and stuff. And I saw that at a young age and that stuff didn't stop me when i became an adult as far as experimenting or trying cocaine or whatever so no lesson learned whatsoever i see it so i do it you see it so you do it you see it and then you get money and then you're like i could do that now and i don't have to you know fuck people in front of my kids in the shack. I have running water. I can go wash my crotch off in the sink afterwards if I really want to. If it's a necessity for me. Or rinse my dick under some cold water.
Starting point is 00:11:20 In the house lived his mother, sister, grandmother, two cousins, and an alcoholic stepfather that beat all of them. It's like Willy Wonka and the Chocolate Factory. It's Charlie Bucket's house. It's like, as I was going to say, it's like depression. It's like willie wonk in the chocolate it's charlie bucket's house it's like it's like i was gonna say it's like depression it's like another time would everybody like some cabbage soup yeah this is 50 60s but it's really like 1929 dust bowl conditions it's disgusting jesus he got into church a little bit when he was a kid and this is a recurring theme with him he saw a neighbor family that wasn't a disaster yeah that. They were just poor, but they had like a family. They had buttons on their shirts. They had shoes, you know, and things. And so they would go to church every Sunday. And at 12, he asked if he could go to church with them. Oh, that's sweet. Yeah. Well, he just wanted, it's sweet. I'm rooting for this loser. He just
Starting point is 00:11:58 wanted to get out of the house, basically. That's all it was because he said he was. Hey, can I come to church with you guys and possibly get molested? Because it's better than listening to my alcoholic stepfather rail my whore mother. I'll probably get molested at home, too, but I'll be beaten savagely there also. The religious folk, they won't beat me. That's a much better day. It'll be a gentler diddling. We'll put it that way.
Starting point is 00:12:17 Much gentler diddling. He basically started playing sports at age seven to get out of the shack. He just wanted out, didn't give a shit. He liked football. He loved baseball the most. He played basketball.
Starting point is 00:12:31 He's such a good athlete. He makes the varsity baseball team in the eighth grade. Wow. He's a big kid. He's 6'2", 200 pounds when he's 15 years old. He's one of those kids that had a mustache. 200 pounds at 15? Yeah, he's a big, beefy guy.
Starting point is 00:12:43 Wow. He's always big and beefy and he fights his weight later on all right in his life here but horrible how do you gain weight when you're that poor um i don't know he's just big maybe it's just your body hanging on to the deposits because it doesn't know when you're going to get the next food plus a lot of his coaches too were feeding them and taking them to their houses for dinner and things like that because they felt bad they literally they literally had to buy him shoes. Wow. He didn't have shoes.
Starting point is 00:13:05 Like, he'd walk around, you know, with holes in his shoes. Not even cleats, just shoes. Oh, no, they had to buy him cleats, but he had no shoes. Well, he had, like, shoes, but they said his feet would be showing through in the bottom. He's like an old-timey, you know, vagabond hobo. Dragging his books on his belt. He's got a bindle with a little handkerchief on the end
Starting point is 00:13:24 with some beans in it, maybe. He's got a bindle with a little handkerchief on the end with some beans in it maybe. He's got like old tire treads sewn together as shoes. That's pretty good. Like an African. Yeah, milk cartons. With a string tied around him.
Starting point is 00:13:34 There's a... Some fucking... He knows what twine is. He's very versed in twine and box knots and all that shit. He has twined himself up an outfit.
Starting point is 00:13:42 How do you think he went to the prom, Jimmy? He made himself a twine tuxedo that no one said a word about. Twine is in his sock drawer. I guarantee it. I got my socks, my underwear, and I got my twine.
Starting point is 00:13:52 All right. I can make more underwear. Perfect. So there's a horrible story in his book. I read it and I went, oh, God. It's one of these stories that, you know, we're pricks.
Starting point is 00:14:04 You know what I mean? We do this and we make fun of everybody. I felt horrible when I read this. I really did. I can't wait to be a person right now. It's so bad because I just felt bad for that. I can picture this little kid. He's a little kid.
Starting point is 00:14:14 He's like 12 years old. We're about to find out how much of a human I am versus you because I never feel anything. No, no. That's my wife's biggest gripe about me is that I have no emotions. Oh, no. Yeah. You're a disaster. You're a sociopath. Absolute sociopath. So let's see if I feel something. Go ahead. I have high emotions
Starting point is 00:14:32 both ways. I hate you. I love you. I'm Italian. What do you want from me, man? I stick with, like, when I like somebody, I enjoy them. And that's, like, with you and my kids and my wife. I enjoy you guys very much. You guys are like my family. You guys are my family. My kids are like my family. They're are my family. My kids are like my family. They're like your family.
Starting point is 00:14:47 So you're like my family. They come around sometimes and put some desserts out, some cookies. But then if I don't like somebody, I just like, I don't give a fuck about them at all.
Starting point is 00:14:55 I have no emotion whatsoever. Go on. Okay. He's 12 years old. He's got holes in his shoes. All right. He's hungry. His mom's getting fucked
Starting point is 00:15:03 in the same room as him in the shack i mean let's let's really set the scene by dr mays probably too yeah so moonshine stepdad here fucking johnny moonshine comes into the room and apparently he is just lit up super drunk and he starts beating up the mom and willie steps into the middle of this like 12 years old he's yeah he's trying to protect. And in the book, too, he says he didn't, like, tend to his mom. Right.
Starting point is 00:15:28 Because he was like, he knew that wasn't what he was going to do. But he was just like, you're not going to beat my mom up anymore here. He's making a stand. Yeah. So apparently the stepfather had a knife, he sees. So the stepfather's got a knife. And the stepfather lunges at him and his mom. And his mom, like, knocks him out of the way.
Starting point is 00:15:44 Yeah. And his mom gets cut in her knocks him out of the way yeah and his mom gets cut in her neck look it's stabbed in the neck what the sliced so she's bleeding all over the place now it's nighttime it's dark in there they don't have any fucking lights there's no running water you can't even like wash it off you can't look at it so he picks his mom up bloody from this and carries her a mile down the street with holes in his shoes to the hospital and saves her life and they take care of her and she's okay how fucking heartbreaking is that that's just life altering forever that's and that's just an antic an anecdote that's not like this is when
Starting point is 00:16:18 my life changes the worst thing that happened to me this is on sunday this one month this one time my stepdad stabbed my mom in the neck. This isn't the worst thing. This is just another day. He's aiming for a jugular, by the way. He's trying to kill her. It's insane. Yeah, this guy's obviously... And he carried her a mile at 12 years old. Yeah, luckily he was 200 pounds. He was a giant kid, so it helped him a lot. So yeah, he started playing as many sports. His stepfather dies when he's 14, so... Oh, two years later, that guy's out. Yeah, thank goodness for that. I'm happy for that guy.
Starting point is 00:16:47 Fuck him. First guy, fuck off, you. For sure. I'm happy you're dead. I wish we would have gone to prison with Tom Payne is the only thing I would have wished more for him. That's what I want from Tom Payne. I would want him to die because he's such a piece of shit,
Starting point is 00:16:58 but I don't. I want him in our own little special area of the prison where we can send people we really hate. And we go, here you go, Tom. And we just push him in a room. It's just you, where we can send people we really hate and we go here you go tom and we just push them in a room it's just you tom pain and a dish and a dish we throw a dish towel to tom pain and push you in the door and lock it behind them enough said that's it and an episode of crime and sports playing that you get to hear why so he's angry we want him to be really angry about it because we mock him for sodomy.
Starting point is 00:17:26 I want it bad, Jimmy. This is what I want out of this whole thing. And it's too bad America's so stuck on civil rights. I know. Not civil rights. Civil liberties. Civil liberties, right. Everybody gets a fair shake. Fuck fair shake.
Starting point is 00:17:41 Well, they get a fair shake. Once you've had your fair shake, if you're a shack dad with a jug of moonshine, stabbing your mom, stabbing this poor kid's mom in the neck and terrorizing everybody, Tom Payne, you, sir. Fuck off.
Starting point is 00:17:59 You, sir, make it Tom Payne. Send him off. Go on. If you haven't listened to Tom Payne, check him out. There's a little placard over the door that says House Tom Payne? Send him off. Go on. If you haven't listened to Tom Payne, check him out. There's a little placard over the door that says House of Payne. Of all this, too,
Starting point is 00:18:11 he's got an awful stutter. Like a debilitating stutter. So that's a problem also. Hold on. Hold on, Mama. Don't die on me. She had to endure a mile of that shit. Almost there. Yeah, it's like... shit. I'm a mom almost there.
Starting point is 00:18:25 Yeah, it's like... By the time he finished the almost there, they were at the fucking hospital, so whatever. He's stuttering away, and he's very shy about this, too. He's very self-conscious, obviously, as a kid. That's brutal. You're big, first of all, and you can't talk. I mean, you're obviously more poor than everyone else there.
Starting point is 00:18:44 Everyone else has soles on their shoes. You know what I mean, you're obviously more poor than everyone else there. Everyone else has soles on their shoes. You know what I mean? And you're explaining to them the benefits of twine. Yeah, they're like, what's in your bindle, buddy? What you got there? Fucking sad. That's terrible. Kids are terribly mean. And with
Starting point is 00:19:00 all of this, he was still a good student. His basketball coach, Tom Shaver, which is his first silver-haired, middle-aged white man, here, Tom Sha this, he was still a good student. His basketball coach, Tom Shaver, which is his first silver-haired middle-aged white man here, Tom Shaver, he says that he's an excellent student, quote, good with the books. The principal, Harry Hamilton of Seneca High School, said, quote, he had a very high temper. Oftentimes when someone made him mad, he stuttered. When he got real mad, he couldn't talk at all. He just locked up.
Starting point is 00:19:24 He would snap, yeah. He just couldn't talk. all. He just, and he would fucking snap. He just locks up. He would snap, yeah. He just couldn't talk. It's amazing. Well, he's good at school too, probably, because it's like, he gets to focus on something and apply himself and not be in the fucking hell house.
Starting point is 00:19:36 That's it. And it's sports. He's in every sport. I mean, those sports, basketball, baseball, football, that's the whole year. That takes care of it all. You know,
Starting point is 00:19:42 the summer must have been rough on him. Oh, they had workouts in the summer for football, I hear later. But Coach Tom Shaver, the basketball coach, said, quote, you have to understand, Willie was a big boy, must have weighed 240. He was a tackle on the football team, but he could jump as high as anyone in the school. I wanted him under the basket, but he had a tendency to think he was a point guard. So he's this giant guy just trying to go down the court distributing. This big Charles Barkley lookalike. That's what he would look like.
Starting point is 00:20:08 A lot of guys, when they don't have a childhood, they tend to think of themselves as smaller than they really are because they're resorting back to trying to have a child. That's probably something he was doing. Oh, later on. Absolutely. We'll hear all about that. There's definitely something psychiatric going on. His baseball coach, Willie McNeil, is his silver-haired, middle-aged black man. Oh, I love it.
Starting point is 00:20:31 Yeah, he helps. He's the guy who buys him cleats, who takes him for dinner. He gets him later on into a great program here because he's also a South Carolina State alum, his coach, and Willie ends up getting a scholarship to South Carolina State University. How about that?
Starting point is 00:20:47 Full football scholarship. Didn't give a shit about baseball. Wow. Full football. So he thought, great, I'll go play football and I can play baseball too. I'll walk on the baseball team and that way I can play baseball. Because all he wanted to do was play baseball. I mean, I guess no one else was looking at him but South Carolina State.
Starting point is 00:21:02 Well, at that size, who's looking for a fucking guy that big to play baseball? Yeah, well, I mean, they just weren't. They didn't care about their program because one year after his freshman year, they dropped the baseball program completely. Oh, wow. Yeah, so that's a problem. Poor kid. The baseball coach here, Willie McNeil, he hooks him up with a guy named Willie Hughes.
Starting point is 00:21:23 What a shitload of Willies in the South. A lot of Willies, man. Everybody's named Willie, who is a scout for the baltimore orioles oh and use takes him over the sites y-o-u-s-e so youse we'll call him youse i think it's youse yeah uh so youse here takes him and gets him in with semi-pro baseball league in baltimore that's nice it's a little summer thing and uh basically he told him I'll get you a job. You know, you'll come up there. You'll do the deal.
Starting point is 00:21:48 It's like the blind side. Yeah. He said, I'll get you a job. I'll hook you up, find you a place to live. He said Reggie Jackson, I guess, played on that team back in the day. Oh, wow. And a couple other big major leaguers had played on that team. So it was like, hey, other guys have played here.
Starting point is 00:21:59 Scouts look at the team, whatever. There's a future here. There's a future. So come on here, whatever. And because his freshman year in college, he hit 360 with 12 homers. Holy on here whatever and uh because his freshman year in college he hit 360 with 12 homers holy shit ripped it up his freshman year in college he's a you know he can hit this guy absolutely that was not easy to find south carolina state 1974 statistics by the way um he's playing this semi-pro deal and uh uh use who's youse who's also silver-haired as they come here, tells him to drop out of college
Starting point is 00:22:27 and make himself eligible for the draft since they dropped the baseball program. That's all he was interested in anyway. He said, why don't you drop that? He said, I'm pretty sure you're going to be drafted by a major league team, he said. Wink, wink, kind of a deal. I might have some friends.
Starting point is 00:22:40 So that 1975 draft comes along. Two weeks before it, unbeknownst to willie mays akins youse quits his job with baltimore gets a job with the angels oh somebody had an inside track so yeah he gets so now the 75 draft the january draft comes around amateur draft and the angels he's he's sitting back going no one's picking needle 25 because that's when baltimore is yeah i got some time to chill for a while. And it turns out he gets picked number two. He's like, how the fuck did the Angels?
Starting point is 00:23:09 Overall? Yeah, overall, number two. Wow. He's like, how the hell did they know? Ironically enough, too, one of his teammates from South Carolina State was number one overall. A guy named Gene Richards, which is really weird. But yeah, he picks him and he's like, what the hell? Yowse calls him up and says, oh, by the way, I quit the boreals two weeks ago got a job with the angels guess where i work i drafted
Starting point is 00:23:28 you guess where you're going because he was like how the angels draft me he goes i drafted you idiot fucking you know who else coming to la babe no one else was really worth the shit it was known as one of the worst draft years in baseball history 75 number four overall was tom brookins who's a mediocre left side of the infield guy for the Tigers for a while. Is that about the best one in the draft? That was about the best thing you can come up with. I mean, later on, I think lower, that was first round, lower rounds, I think that was when Andre Dawson was drafted in like the 11th round. Later rounds, there was some guys. He stayed with the Cubs his whole career?
Starting point is 00:23:58 No, one year he was with the Cubs. What? Two years. Yeah, he was with the Expos for a long time. Oh, that's right. Yeah, he was an Expo for a long time when he was great. He had that MVP season in 97. Now I remember.
Starting point is 00:24:08 I mean, athletically and physically, he was amazing. That jerry curl was unbelievable. Oh, man, that arm was unbelievable. I loved his jerry curl. Him and Dave Winfield could fire it from the corner to the plate. It was unreal. Love it. So, 75, he reports to Angels training camp, weighing 252 pounds.
Starting point is 00:24:25 Holy shit. They had requested he show up at 220. So, not cool. There's a coach, though, that actually says, I'm going to get him down to 220, and by the end, it somehow gets him down like 30 pounds over a month. Now, mind you, this is a kid coming a country bumpkin, coming from poor life, going to
Starting point is 00:24:41 Los Angeles. Well, yeah. That's incredible. This is spring training, so it's Arizona. Oh, okay. At this point, he's in Arizona. But before that, it was, yeah, then he's going to go to Los Angeles if he makes the team. He's going to the place. The biggest market in America.
Starting point is 00:24:57 So he gets his signing bonus, moves his mother out of the shack, buys her a house with a floor and, you know, a toilet. That's sweet. Which is nice. Maybe some linoleum. Hey, Ma, why don't you go shit over there, please? Oh, Ma, a shitting hole.
Starting point is 00:25:09 And it goes right down. It's so hard. It's so firm and cold. It's amazing, though. You know she talks. She's from South Carolina, and she's born in the 30s. She talks like that. And I just press this handle, and it goes away? Absolutely. I defend that accent, Jimmy, because that's how she talks. I'm sorry.
Starting point is 00:25:25 Fuck that. I got family that talks exactly like that. Her name's Lucille. They call her Sealy. Oh, boy. No more whoring, Ma. No more whoring, Sealy. So, yeah.
Starting point is 00:25:33 Told her, though, that she needed to clean up her act if he wanted her, if she wanted his help. You want my help? No more whoring. He made decent money here. And the minors,
Starting point is 00:25:41 he comes up in 75, or 77, I'm sorry'm sorry briefly makes an appearance uh does not do well uh initially he does all right but then he ends up with uh 91 at bats he hits 198 so not great brutal uh not terrific not even 200 now goes back down to the minor 70 80 rips up the minors hits 336 with36 with 14 homers, 73 RBI, and 77 games at Salt Lake City. So that's... Wow. He's beastly down there. They bring him back up for 79.
Starting point is 00:26:12 Rod Carew is injured in the beginning of the season. Hurts his wrist. So he's out. This is right at the beginning of the season. He's going to be out a month to two months. All right. They put him in. He's a first baseman, Willie Mays.
Starting point is 00:26:23 Wow. They put Willie in. He's subbing for Rod Carew. He's subbing for a Hall of Famer, Rod Carew. If you know him from baseball, you know that weird stance he had, all crouched down,
Starting point is 00:26:31 3,000 hits, Hall of Fame. If you don't, if you're too young for that, you will know him from the Adam Sandler song, the Hanukkah song, Hall of Famer, Rod Carew,
Starting point is 00:26:40 he converted. If you're too young for that, go fuck yourself, die in a fire. Okay. Just kidding. Don't die in a fire. Keep listening to the show, but I'm jealous of your youth. He converted. If you're too young for that, go fuck yourself. Die in a fire. Okay. Just kidding. Don't die in a fire. Keep listening to the show,
Starting point is 00:26:48 but I'm jealous of your youth. All right, then. Moving on. So, 79. He ends up hitting 280, 21 homers, 81 ribbies, 869 OPS,
Starting point is 00:26:57 and only 379 at-bats in 1979. So that's a hell of a rookie year. Yeah, two months he's filled in for Rod Carew, actually. Two months. And then they moved him in and out of DH and shit like that. a rookie year. Yeah, two months he's filled in for Rod Curran. Two months. And then they moved him in and out of DH and shit like that. That's unbelievable. Yeah.
Starting point is 00:27:08 From Shaq Daddy and Whore Mama to that. From Moonshine Papa. Yeah. Moonshine Papa. So, 79 with the Angels, something interesting happens. He is in Minnesota, and he's in the team hotel there, and he's walking down the hallway, and some of his teammates are in a room. And they open the door, and they pop out, and they say,
Starting point is 00:27:30 come on in and hang out. And what's on the table? A big pile of cocaine. Hell yes. This is one of those moments. Remember we see these serendipitous moments when people that shouldn't cross paths cross paths, and they make this super horrible Voltron person. He's just looking for his room and all of
Starting point is 00:27:47 a sudden finds a big pile of cocaine this is one of those moments here with the cocaine where it's like oh willie no no anything no not the cocaine anything but that stuff uh yeah he does that willie he said it didn't really speak to him the first time he said it was all right but didn't he said he claims to not have done it again for the rest of the season. All right. Until that year, until the 1980 season. Now, December 6th, 1979, he's traded with Rance Mullenix to Kansas City for Al Cowens, who's a right fielder, was actually a pretty good player, second in the MVP vote in 77.
Starting point is 00:28:22 Hilarious here. MVP vote in 77. Hilarious here. In 1980 in Al Cowens' sidebar here. Al Cowens, sorry. He gets, 1980 he gets in a fight with a pitcher beans him, breaks his jaw. So he's out for a while. Next season
Starting point is 00:28:36 comes around. He's at the plate. He hits a double play ball or whatever. While the pitcher's turned around to watch the double play he comes up from behind him and just fucking clobbers him. Same pitcher? That pitcher. He never even ran to first base. He just hit the ball,
Starting point is 00:28:52 ran to the mound, and clocked the guy. He's like, I'm out. I'm going to drill this guy. So good that there was an arrest warrant out for him. He had to take off and run away, and then they ended up settling it with the two players shaking hands while doing the lineup card exchange before the next game. That's nice.
Starting point is 00:29:06 So basically that was his way of not getting arrested. There you go, Cowan. But, yeah, so now he's on Kansas City now. This is where problems, this is where great things and terrible things happen for him at the same time. Kansas City Royals. He's going from L.A. to the Midwest, which is interesting. Yeah. That's kind of what, but still, I mean, he's used to South Carolina, so whatever, it's fine. This to the Midwest, which is interesting. But still, he's used
Starting point is 00:29:25 to South Carolina, so whatever. It's fine. This is when he really started to party at this point in KC. This is when it became a part of his lifestyle and a part of his whole deal. I imagine they do a lot of shit like that in the Midwest. There was a lot of guys on the team that were... He said there were four or five teammates that used drugs, so that made him feel like he wasn't doing anything wrong. What year was this? This is 80. 80? Okay. He said a lot of teammates were doing drugs. So that made him feel like he wasn't doing anything wrong. What year was this? This is 80.
Starting point is 00:29:45 80? Okay. So he said a lot of teammates were doing it. So who's on that team? George Brett. George Brett? Is Reynolds there? Harold?
Starting point is 00:29:54 No, he's on the... No. Who are you talking about? I don't... I'm trying to... This is Willie Wilson. Okay. Those guys, Vita Blue.
Starting point is 00:30:01 George Brett's the best one on the team at that time. George Brett's the... I mean, George Brett's the best one on the team. George Brett's the, I mean, George Brett's the best one on the team for 20 years, for Christ's sake, or 18 years. So he basically feels
Starting point is 00:30:10 like he was just socializing with his teammates. That's what he felt like. That's what you're supposed to do as a major league player. They go have drinks, they do some coke, and they chase women.
Starting point is 00:30:17 Yeah. What's more natural than that? Yeah. You're thinking, right? Sounds good. That's a man. The season goes. He has a good second half
Starting point is 00:30:22 of the season, really comes on strong. World Series comes along. Kansas City goes all the way to the World Series. They get the revenge on the Yankees, sweeping them in the Championship Series. And so they play the Phillies in the 80 World Series. Game one is Willie's 26th birthday. He hits two home runs.
Starting point is 00:30:40 Holy shit. Happy birthday, Willie. Happy fucking birthday. Lost the game, but he hits two home runs. Who gives a shit? It's time to party. Happy birthday. You're, Willie. Happy fucking birthday. Lost the game, but he hits two home runs. Who gives a shit? It's time to party. Happy birthday. You're doing a
Starting point is 00:30:47 good job, kid. You know, it's like his second full year in the Two homers on his 26th birthday in the World Series. In Kansas City,
Starting point is 00:30:53 they were booing him kind of because he had a slow start in the beginning, so really this made him feel good that he was showing
Starting point is 00:30:58 himself. He did his part. Game three, he hits the first triple of his career. He's a slow fuck, first of
Starting point is 00:31:04 all. Oh, I'll bet. He has three career stolen bases the first triple of his career. He's a slow fuck, first of all. Oh, I'll bet. He has three career stolen bases. Three. They were in his first three years, and then never again. And it's... Plotting field or all that. You almost bet that that was just like,
Starting point is 00:31:17 they just assumed he wasn't going to run. And they're like, oh shit, he's actually going. You're like, oh shit, Willie took off. What's up with that? It was like a double steal, and they threw it to the guy, about the guy behind him, you you can throw behind willie he's the only guy where it's okay to throw behind the runner one of those deals cut him off so then he hits a game-winning single also which is a big deal in the 10th inning yeah that's a 10th inning
Starting point is 00:31:37 oh big extra all right yeah and at this he had he was trying to fly his mother in for the game and get her there in time to see any part of the game. She heard that in the car on the way over. Oh, that's not... She's never seen him play a game ever of anything. She almost did. She was whoring the whole time. Yeah, she was slutting it up.
Starting point is 00:31:53 She almost saw him be a hero. Game four, she's in the stands in Kansas City. He hits two more home runs. Wow. Becomes the first guy to have multi-homer. Sealy screaming about, that's my boy. And he's part... After these games, he is partying like, oh, you have no idea. Coke like crazy.
Starting point is 00:32:11 They're going nuts because he hits home runs, does a bunch of Coke. Coke comes out the next day, plays even better. He's like, this is great. He thinks he's figured it out. He thinks at this point, this is when he starts saying that he thinks it's a performance enhancing drug for him. Wow. He knows how much to take, you know, the night before so he gets, you know, to where he needs to be, which is goddamn insane. That's incredible.
Starting point is 00:32:33 They end up losing the series in six. Yeah. But he becomes a legend. You're a clutch World Series legend in Kansas City. And really, in baseball lore, you're a guy who played in one World Series and absolutely murdered it. And was a hero. You did everything you had to do he hit 400 with four homers and eight ribbies in that world series which
Starting point is 00:32:50 can't do much better than that i don't think four homers eight rbis not too shabby 400 and batted 400 holy shit up absolutely ripped it up he was a beast his off the field here's an in their own words later on about his off the field but you know in their own words quote i was living a destructive lifestyle and i had no plans of stopping what i was doing because i felt like i was having a good time i just decided that hey i'm gonna live my life the way i want to live my life and if i want to snort cocaine once in a while and go have some drinks well then i'm gonna do that and it's fucking working yeah he's like it's working for me. I can afford it.
Starting point is 00:33:26 I'm living a fun life. Everybody's telling me how great I am. I mean, they're all telling how great he is. This is the thing. It's like Clint Hurdle was on the team, and they said that he just kept saying, you're a bad man, you're a bad man. I mean, he's a kid, too.
Starting point is 00:33:38 They're telling him he's doing a great job. He's 26 years old. He's perfect. He's a young man. Absolutely. So in 1981, he's inducted into the first inaugural class of the mid-eastern athletic conference hall of fame which is the south carolina state doesn't get any more obscure than that basically he's a guy that made it to the pros
Starting point is 00:33:56 and had a good world series that went to the scc is that what you said oh okay south carolina state university so i mean they it's that's where the Mideastern Athletic Conference is. So he only played baseball one year there, but now he's a World Series hero. So Hall of Fame. That's our boy. It's in. So, I mean, they're telling him he's going down there. After the World Series, he went home.
Starting point is 00:34:15 They had a ticker tape parade in his hometown. After he lost. In his hometown. They had a big parade for him. I mean, well, it's a tiny town, and he made it. But he lost, and they're still running parades for him. Par mean, well, it's a tiny town, and he made it. But he lost, and they're still running parades for him. Parades, Jimmy, in the street. I mean, you can't get any more
Starting point is 00:34:29 you're doing the right thing, Willie, than we love you so much we've lined up cars as far as the eye can see, and we have the front, you know, the, I don't even know, the 4-H queen is waving at people. Whatever the fuck they do down there. And Celie's tired vagina
Starting point is 00:34:43 hanging over a fire truck on the front. Yeah, she's resting. She's going to rest it this week. So 1981, his championship, if you win the AL or NL championship, even when you go to the World Series,
Starting point is 00:34:57 whether you win or not, you get a ring from the team. So he had the AL championship ring and it gets stolen from his apartment in 1980. Oh, that's shitty. Or 1981. Yeah, and the funny thing is at the time he didn't even care.
Starting point is 00:35:09 Yeah. He was like, he said he wasn't sure if it was stolen by, or, you know, people coming in and out that were partying. Yeah. Because he was having parties and hanging out and, you know, or there was also a break-in. He's like, I don't know, somebody stole it from the break-in or stole it whenever. He said he didn't even report it stolen because they lost the World series and quote it didn't even have a diamond in it so i mean that's the kind of attitude he's got right now not a healthy good attitude kind of a shit attitude worthless piece of shit i'm telling you didn't even have a diamond here's another this guy's a quote machine by the way they
Starting point is 00:35:41 got a bunch of good in their own where here's another in their own words about drugs in the 80s. This is about Coke use in the 80s. Yeah. Quote, I knew somebody on each team getting high. They would turn me on to Coke when I was on the road, and I would do the same in KC. Steroids were considered okay in the 90s and 2000s, like cocaine was acceptable in the MLB in the 80s. Unquote. And that's a fact.
Starting point is 00:36:02 I know a guy who was an ex-mlb player talked about this a lot up until the 90s cocaine was huge people no one if someone was doing coke or whatever and you knew that that was their thing you mind your own fucking business if that gets them up for the game and they play well great shut your mouth because they were all doing greenies which are just fucking amphetamines anyway it's just you know it's speed right doing anyway so they were just considered that was getting yourself prepared that'sines anyway it's just you know it's speed you're doing anyway so they were just considered that was getting yourself prepared
Starting point is 00:36:26 that's amazing because it's 162 game season every day it's the same as jogging on a treadmill it's a grind so it's like
Starting point is 00:36:32 hey if you need that to get up it's an afternoon game after a night game and you went out and partied you didn't go to sleep until 5 in
Starting point is 00:36:37 the morning and now it's 1 in the afternoon and you're out playing left field in the sun as long as you're in the batter's box
Starting point is 00:36:42 when it's your turn you might need some energy so that's the way they look at it. Excuse me. Meanwhile, when shit like this happens and they're partying, I'm always in my head fascinated by what
Starting point is 00:36:53 music they're listening to. The number one song in 81 when he was partying was Kim Carn's Betty Davis Eyes. I don't think he was listening to Betty Davis Eyes. You think he was listening to Diana Ross and Lionel Richie's Endless Love? Kenny Rogers' Lady? No, no, he's not a Kenny Rogers guy.
Starting point is 00:37:09 Rick Springfield's Jesse's Girl? I see him as like an Isaac Hayes, mid-70s soul kind of guy, maybe. Maybe he's running with Dolly Parton's 9 to 5. Yeah, he's listening to Sly and the Family Stone. Smokey Robinson? Being With You? Maybe Blondie's rapture. Blondie was the shit then, man.
Starting point is 00:37:28 Yeah, I think he probably wanted to fuck Blondie, but I doubt he listened to Blondie's music. Anyway, go on. So, 81, they all, a fan
Starting point is 00:37:35 who's like a wealthy guy starts coming to the games and inviting the players back to his house to party. What this entailed was free cocaine for the players.
Starting point is 00:37:43 He's his Mark Busby. Free cocaine. I don't think Busby's sending us cocaine quite yet. Busby's sending us beers. He's just trying to entice us. That's true. Busby's grooming us. He's going to put a dish towel around our face at any moment, Jimmy. Watch out. If he didn't live in Australia,
Starting point is 00:38:00 I'd be frightened. Does a fan have a name? So, we don't get this guy's name here. He's a guy who I think there was a federal thing name so we don't get this guy's name alright he's a guy who I think there was a federal thing with it or something yeah with this guy I can't fucking imagine so
Starting point is 00:38:10 well they knew basically he said he remembered times when there were six players from the Royals going over at a time that's a quarter of the active roster
Starting point is 00:38:16 holy shit that's one fourth of the active roster yeah is going over to his house to party and do coke the starting line two thirds of the starting lineup
Starting point is 00:38:24 is in this dude's house blowing, just doing coke, just blowing lines all over the place. And Willie felt like as long as he played well, he wouldn't get in trouble because he gets off on that shit in the past. He's gotten off on so much shit in the past. And he even says, in their own words, about that. In their own words. He's such a yapper. He's a yapper,
Starting point is 00:38:40 this guy. He wrote a book and he talked because he was trying to get a... Alright, here. In their own words their own words quote well i had had stuff that happened to me before each time they would stop me on each time they would just slap me on the wrist and say hey willie slow it down or whatever i had done that time i never really got prosecuted before that i was kind of thinking that i could basically do anything and nothing would happen to me because Because I was a ball player, I got off on lots of things that I did. So that's his mindset. And it's been repeated to him.
Starting point is 00:39:10 I mean, that's the thing. Who knows how many times he's gotten pulled over, all fucked up, and they were like, oh, it's Willie. Good job on the World Series last year. And they let him go. This was not TMZ and Twitter and the cops weren't trying to. You weren't trying to bring in the famous guy. You wanted to be friends with the famous guy.
Starting point is 00:39:24 Maybe Willie gave him a couple of tickets to the game for him and his kid and said, yeah, I'll give your kid an autographed ball and all that. No, good, thanks, Willie. And then they were buddies. That's how it worked back then. It's not how it works now. No. Now they're like, I got him.
Starting point is 00:39:36 I got him. I'm going to get paid for this story. That's what it is. Exactly. I got the tickets. He would basically, he'd give all the Royals, this fan would give all the Royals players free Coke. He'd come out with big giant plates of Coke.
Starting point is 00:39:47 And everybody else, he would have big parties, and everyone else that was there, accountants, lawyers, doctors, all these type of people, they'd have to pay for the Coke. But the Royals guys were there to draw in. It was like a casino. They were like greeters, basically. And they paid them in Coke. They're the appearing celebrity. Yeah, for his basement parties.
Starting point is 00:40:06 He said there was like a mini baseball museum in his basement that he would have these parties. It's insane. It's like that joke that... God damn it. The guy that opens for Berzy, you know.
Starting point is 00:40:20 Oh, Berzy. Yeah, Berzy's joke. If I had... I don't want to collect baseball cards. I want to collect the people. Oh, yeah, Lawrence Taylor in a cage. Come down to my basement and he's like, who's that?
Starting point is 00:40:28 That's Cal Ripken. You have Cal Ripken in your basement? Lawrence Taylor's like, get the fuck out of here. That's a great joke. Guys, listen to Paul Verzi. He's a really funny comic. Actually, too, I'll be opening for him.
Starting point is 00:40:37 I'll be featuring for him. There you go. He's headlining the Tempe Improv on September 21st. So come on out to that and say hi. Hello. All right, here we go. Sorry. Hey, when it comes up in conversation.
Starting point is 00:40:47 That was kind of the idea. I know. Thanks, Jimmy. You're a good guy like that. So let's see here. So he's 1982 we get to now. Now, 1982, 81, he has a good season on the field. Not great in average.
Starting point is 00:41:00 266, 17 home runs, 53 ribbies, 836 OPS, which is pretty good. 349 at-bats, doesn't play a ton. I think he had a little knee tweak in the beginning of the year. Short season. So, 82, two FBI agents come into the clubhouse to talk to the Royals players now. Because this is the time when, in America, for all you overseas listeners, in America in the 80s, the government and people went batshit over drugs. Insane over drugs.
Starting point is 00:41:31 I mean, that's all that mattered was don't do drugs, don't do drugs. It was fucking nuts. It was really over the top. And a lot of things happened because of that that we're going to get into. But this is the beginning of it. Two agents come in to talk to the players about gambling and drugs, basically, and like,
Starting point is 00:41:47 you know, hookers and shit like that. Basically saying, we're watching you. Right. So be careful. Trying to give them a rookie symposium.
Starting point is 00:41:52 For everybody. And so he named six, seven players that go to that fan's house to party. Oh, shit. The FBI agent did.
Starting point is 00:42:00 In front of everybody. Said, we know that. We see you guys. So he's basically saying, you know, you're not getting away with shit over here. We've been sitting out front. We know your cars.
Starting point is 00:42:09 We know your license plates. Yeah. So I guess Hal McRae, who's a future manager and at that time a pretty good player for the Royals, actually had a son that was in the majors too, Brian. He tried to talk to Willie and tell him to stop at this point and all that. There's no talking at this point. And he said this was the time he started to feel like he couldn't stop, too. This was when this was a part of his life. He knew how much to use.
Starting point is 00:42:33 He was a performance enhancer for him. Had his best season in 83 when he used the most cocaine, he said. Anytime he played baseball, that was the most coke he was using, the best season he ever had. If there's something that helps me write jokes better, I'm good. Fuck, if it's illegal, I'm going to do it. I'm going to find out how to do it, and I'm going to get it. And he says in interviews later, I didn't know shit about steroids.
Starting point is 00:42:55 He's like, I never heard of a steroid or anything in baseball back then. He said, if there were steroids, you'd go, hell yeah, I would have used steroids. Are you kidding me? He's like, double my salary? Are you nuts? My steroid was a white powder. And they don't even test you? It's not really illegal? It's just a sort of kind of, that's what he used steroid. Are you kidding me? It's like double my salary? Are you nuts? My steroid was a white powder. And they don't even test you? It's not really illegal?
Starting point is 00:43:06 It's just a sort of kind of, that's what it used to be. It's an unwritten rule. It was just an unwritten rule. Like, no, sorry, I'm going to make twice as much money. Fuck you and your unwritten rules. So this is the 83 season. He has a great season. 302, 23 homers, 72 ribbies, 9-12 OPS.
Starting point is 00:43:25 That's fantastic. Great season. Rips it up. August 9, 1983, the Royals GM tells the players that the FBI has informed him that several players are going to be interviewed in regard to a federal investigation of a cocaine case in Kansas. So get ready for that. So they're like, oh shit.
Starting point is 00:43:45 It's clearly about that fan. Yeah, it's... Four players' names come up in these documents here. It's a Kansas businessman. That's all they say. See, we never get his name. He must have turned informant. Probably.
Starting point is 00:43:57 Yeah, because they never give his name. That makes sense. They also say Johnson County attorney David Roselli. So he got fucked. But Kansas businessman here probably did six months and went off to a relocation somewhere. So investigation stemming from arrests made in Dodge City, Kansas, which is kind of funny. That sounds so 1700s.
Starting point is 00:44:19 Wyatt Earp was patrolling. I think Wyatt Earp made the arrest. You don't see a lot. Not a lot of Old West sheriffs. No. So the players are Jerry Martin, Willie Wilson. Willie Wilson, too? Willie Wilson, yeah.
Starting point is 00:44:31 Remember him? Willie Mays Akins and Vita Blue, who was an all-time great pitcher. Vita Blue, he's amazing. All four of them are down. All four of them are going down, are fucked for this, basically. They're being interviewed. They're being interviewed for now until October 14, 1983, when they're charged by the U.S. Attorney's Office. Oh, shit.
Starting point is 00:44:48 That's federal. That's federal with attempted cocaine possession. That's it. Well, at first they were charged with more. Yeah. In the end, what ends up happening is Assistant U.S. Attorney Amanda Mears said that the men were heard on phone calls intercepted by the FBI trying to buy cocaine. That's how fucking crazy they were about it. That's how crazy they were.
Starting point is 00:45:08 That they took taxpayer money, government taxpayer money. Hey, you were trying to buy cocaine. You tried to buy cocaine. How dare you? Not even you bought cocaine. Right, not even you had it on your person. Right. So, basically, on June 18th, it said Wilson, Willie Wilson, quote,
Starting point is 00:45:22 made a call to a residence in Johnson County for the purpose of obtaining a quarter ounce of cocaine. So they were trying to get some some coke. And on the arrest, he's got his own in his own words. Willie here, Willie, Willie Mays Aikens, not Willie Wilson. Willie says, quote, Well, I was really surprised. We didn't know the guy we knew was being watched. I had confidence that nothing was going to happen to us. we didn't know the guy we knew was being watched i had confidence that nothing was going to happen to us they ended up indicting all four of us because they had us on wiretap talking to this
Starting point is 00:45:48 guy that we knew trying to buy drugs from jesus fucked basically yeah so what they're they're trying to figure out what to do they're charged with a felony yeah so they contact the players association because they're like how far do we want to fight get our union and they say basically what would happen if a player got convicted of a felony who's active? And they said, well, you'd never play in the league again. And they went, okay, shit. So let's make a deal. So he's been not guilty. So no, let's make a deal.
Starting point is 00:46:11 So they made a deal. They're first-time offenders. They make a deal. It's all misdemeanor. Oh, that's nice. Vita Blue is actually convicted of actual cocaine possession. Wow. But it's still a misdemeanor in this particular case.
Starting point is 00:46:23 That's nice. And then they get attempted to whatever. So you would expect, what are they going to get for that? A misdemeanor, first? Some probation. Some probation. Six weeks of probation. You would think, right?
Starting point is 00:46:35 No. They get 90 days in jail. Oh, my God. They get 90 days in prison in Texas. In, like, federal prison? It's a minimum security prison, though. But it's not in Texas. They've got to leave the state to go.
Starting point is 00:46:46 So it's a federal one. But I mean, he says, this is great, the quote, another in their own words. He has this quote about everything I bring up. It's awesome. He says, quote, we had no idea we were going to go to jail. At our sentencing, the judge made an example of us.
Starting point is 00:46:57 He told us right then, you know, we're professional baseball players and we shouldn't be doing what we had done. No doubt. Kids look up to you. Yeah, you're in it. And that was the beginning beginning of that trying to shame these guys yeah so but at the prison he said it wasn't a deterrent because he said he was able to work out there was females at the prison there's women there awesome he said he's walking around holding people's hands
Starting point is 00:47:16 he said he had sex a whole bunch while he was there wow so i mean he's like what kind of deterrent is that i'm having sex that is awesome he's like you can't i'm i'm working out every day having sex he's like it was like a vacation yeah it was like it was what it was if it was anywhere but texas it would be like if they had that if he was there if this was like guantanamo yeah like an island in cuba but he was allowed to have sex and walk around everybody out yeah what a fucking great life party that's called a resort why do i want to go back to work? Yeah.
Starting point is 00:47:46 This is great. Called a resort. So they're released after 81 days. They get out on March 22nd, 1984. 81 days for good behavior. They get nine days off for good behavior. He was supposed to report to the Blue Jays training camp. He does that.
Starting point is 00:47:59 The players are suspended now for one year at this point, even though he's going to camp. The suspensions are reduced. They make a deal with them to make speeches and blah, blah, blah, blah, blah. Want some of that shit and give money to charity. Right. But the biggest thing that they have to do is quit doing this shit. And they have to quit doing coke, which we'll see.
Starting point is 00:48:19 Then I have to. What do you think is going to happen, guys? His mother's a prostitute. Moonshine Daddy beat his ass. There's a neck wound. It's a mess, guys. He has no shoes on. And this stuff helps him.
Starting point is 00:48:30 And this helps him. And it's making him money. So suspensions are reduced. Players are reinstated on May 15, 1984. This is funny here. In 85 now, he's traded to the Blue Jays for the 85 season who did he get traded for he was traded to toronto for jorge orta he has a shit season in 80 in 84 this is he doesn't start playing until may 15th so he didn't get spring training hasn't played in seven months he's
Starting point is 00:48:57 rusty he said you know that's a bad thing yeah there's an article in the ottawa citizen from march 22nd 85 later that's talking about the 84 season. It's called, Aikens puts bad season behind him. Because he hit 205 with 11 homers in 84. So not great. A little fluff piece. It's a total fluff piece all about Aikens having played for seven months.
Starting point is 00:49:19 It's fine. It was bad. I'm fine. I'm good now. I'm good now. Cocaine. That's it. And that I'm good now. Yeah. Cocaine. That's it. And that's what's going to happen.
Starting point is 00:49:26 Cocaine! So he's going to have a great year in 85. Ready to bounce back, right? Jimmy, you believe in him? Fucking yeah, I believe in him. What are you thinking, 30 homers this year? Absolutely, 32. 32, okay.
Starting point is 00:49:36 Now, April 27th, 1985, playing for the Blue Jays. He hits a home run in this game. Yeah. You know why that's significant, Jimmy? Because it's his last one. Last fucking Major League at-bat. So he does hit a home run in his game. You know why that's significant, Jimmy? Because it's his last one. Last fucking Major League at-bat. So he does hit a home run in his last Major League at-bat. His career's a walk-off home run.
Starting point is 00:49:51 So that's his career. So yeah, they release him on May 9th, 85. May 19th, 85, they re-sign him to a minor league deal. Shit can him down there. So he's a mess at this point. He's a total mess on his rungs. His life's spiraling out of control. He ends up, they release him after even from the minors.
Starting point is 00:50:08 He hooks on the Mets minor league, Tidewater Tides, which is a AAA team, for four games and does terribly there. So he's a disaster. And his baseball career is over at this point. Yeah. That's it. Totals career-wise, 271 average, 110 homers,
Starting point is 00:50:26 415 ribbies, 809 OPS, and three stolen bases. That stolen base stat is fucking brutal. He did lead the league in intentional walks in 1981.
Starting point is 00:50:37 Oh, that's nice. So they were afraid of him. He was Barry Bonds for a minute. Well, after 80, they were like, ooh, he's dangerous. You know, like, guy on second,
Starting point is 00:50:43 let's just walk him. He's got coke dripping off his back. Oh, he is jacked to the moon. Come on, he's looking like a maniac. Chewing on his teeth. Oh, absolutely. His molars are ground the fuck down. Now, around this time, here's his quote about this time, and in their own words,
Starting point is 00:50:59 quote, I was a tremendous junkie. When you are in a state of mind like that, you don't see yourself like that. You're in denial. You don't see that you've become selfish and you only think about yourself so he's he actually has to think about somebody else you don't see how selfish you are no he actually has to think about somebody else like the federal government because they're watching him they subpoena him oh shit to testify in in night. This is a big famous thing. It's the 1985 Pittsburgh drug trials. I don't know if you've ever heard of this, guys.
Starting point is 00:51:29 It's a big investigation in Pittsburgh. At that time, the Pittsburgh sports teams were known for huge amounts of cocaine. Pittsburgh drug trials were huge. So the Penguins, the Steelers, the Pirates? It was mainly the Steelers and the Pirates, especially the Pirates. The Steelers had it too, but the Pirates were, and even the football team. Dan Marino getting drafted late in 83, got way down to 25th, 24th, whatever it was overall,
Starting point is 00:51:53 was because there was rumors that he did a lot of coke. Oh, wow. Like Art Rooney, the owner of the Pittsburgh Steelers, had him investigated thoroughly by a detective, by a Pittsburgh detective a pittsburgh detective to see if he was and it's they investigated him for months they found out all he did was drink and party and do normal college kids shit finger checks right so anyway pittsburgh here this is he could have had a super bowl in pittsburgh oh god yeah 83 well
Starting point is 00:52:19 that was the end of the year that was funny too because that that not to get off on a tangent but terry bradshaw got hurt in the beginning of that year so marino would have used marino he would have been done bradshaw was done after that was an elbow injury fucking he would have been in and he would have been their hero yeah and didn't happen he's a hometown boy from pittsburgh went to pit they could have had sixberg in the 80s unbelievable what are you gonna do yep so this is this pittsburgh grand jury investigation leads to the suspension of 11 players. Wow. Akins testifies, Bite of Blue, Enos Campbell, Keith Hernandez, Jeffrey Leonard, Tim Raines, Lonnie Smith.
Starting point is 00:52:53 Tim Raines is in that shit too? Yeah, Tim Raines and everything. Tim Raines did a lot of cocaine. I didn't realize that. Oh boy. There's a great thing from him in here. They testified about cocaine use in the majors. This was like a congressional inquiry type of deal where they sit them down they just want to find out what's going on steroids
Starting point is 00:53:08 you're under oath now you're going to talk asshole basically so hernandez keith hernandez who's the 79 mvp 86 mets world series champion uh first baseman said that uh said that he used it for about three years which is bullshit he used it for more than that and that about 40 percent of the players were using steroid or using cocaine at this time 40 40 which i don't know that might be then later on he said maybe that's a little high that seems high there's a shitload of guys yeah i'd say 20 probably i'm one i'll be a little over that probably 40 steep that's almost half the league that's steep that's any given night that's half the guy right that's a lot of Coke. There has to be a few guys that are older or Christians or whatever. So anyway, Tim Raines said that he kept a vial of Coke with a gram,
Starting point is 00:53:53 a vial with a gram of Coke in his uniform pocket. He snorted during games, and this is a famous thing, always slid headfirst in the bases because he didn't want to break the vial in his back pocket. It was affecting his base running that's amazing i want to slide this way but that coke i'll just like to keep off my coke uh there's an ex-pirate named john milner that said he bought amphetamines from willie mays and willie stargill which are greenies yeah which was probably true but he was bringing up hall of famers which was a big deal And that he used to buy Coke in the bathroom at Three Rivers Stadium
Starting point is 00:54:26 there in Pittsburgh. Even the Pirate Parrot mascot. The fucking mascot got implicated for selling Coke and hooking players up with dealers. Kevin Koch, the Pirate Parrot. He had it stuffed in his fucking...
Starting point is 00:54:41 I picture him being led away within handcuffs with the big head still on, like his big stupid parrot feet. A bunch of players get... They basically said a bunch of players were deemed to have been longtime users and distributed to other players, and they're suspended a year. Guys like Joaquin Andahar, Dale Barrett, who's Yogi's son.
Starting point is 00:55:00 Really? Yeah, yeah. Keith Hernandez, Dave Parker, who's a Hall of Famer. Yeah, that guy's great so all these guys they end up getting the suspensions lifted in exchange for 10 of their salary which is a fucking lot of money like keith hernandez sued and had an arbitrator and everything because that was like 90 000 for him he's like that's a lot of that's a big fine 90 grand they're trying to get the pay the players to pay back the government for the money they spent on the
Starting point is 00:55:24 trial this is for drug programs. It's for that. They give their money to that and submit to random drug testing and do 100 hours of drug-related community service. So, yeah. I don't want this to happen with steroids. Just fucking let them do it. I don't care. And I don't care if they did coke, too.
Starting point is 00:55:40 Yeah, this is ridiculous. They docked good and they played great. God, coke. Daryl Strawberry was amazing. Coke yourself up. Yeah, go crazy. I They docked good and they played great. God, Coke. Daryl Strawberry was amazing. Coke yourself up. Yeah, go crazy. I don't give a shit. In 87, based on this, in 87, the commissioner at the time, Peter Uberoth, declares baseball drug-free, which is hilarious.
Starting point is 00:55:56 It's the equivalent of George Bush standing on that carrier saying, mission accomplished. It's worse than that. It's like going to the Middle East and saying, it's sand-free free here no sand while you're on a pile of sand that is awesome because i mean this was doc gooden with his this was the heyday of coke and baseball right here i mean this was like everybody was doing everybody's a junkie this was recreational back then it was totally fine lonnie smith who was one of the players who was in that year club and said he was supposed to be submitted to random testing. This was in July of 87. This article came out.
Starting point is 00:56:30 He said he's supposed to be tested six to eight times a year, but hadn't been tested at all that year yet. And said, quote, there's plenty of drugs in baseball. Is it drug free? No. They should thank God that they didn't have HD television back then. Because those men were so gray. And so their skin was...
Starting point is 00:56:46 Huge eyes, gray, coke around the nostrils. Yeah, they were all the same colors. You could barely tell who was black and white. They were just so gray. Yeah. Eyes sunken back. They all looked terrible. Hugh Barat said,
Starting point is 00:56:55 the days of jewelry sales, agents, and friends in the clubhouse are over. Which is bullshit, because Mel Hall had the whole family of the 14-year-old girl he was hooking up with. Darryl Strawberry's pulling fans out of the stadium and fucking them in the clubhouse. No problem. So he's full of shit. Now, he can do nothing, basically, at this point. So he signs in Mexico.
Starting point is 00:57:15 Mexican League with the Puebla Angales, which I'm going to call them the Mexican Angels. They call them the Black Angels. All right. Whatever. Whatever. There's a ton of coke down there so the mexican angels uh here they pay him 2500 bucks a month in 86 to go down there and play which at least it's a job i guess some money he has the most beastly year in the history of anything
Starting point is 00:57:36 in 86 for the mexican angels they gotta steal basically uh he hit 454 with 46 home runs so he's taking advantage of the coke down there holy shit yeah yeah he's swimming in coke plus he's it's he's used to playing against major league talent that's a good theory of talent these guys are terrible he's raking i looked at like the rosters of some of these looking for like i was looking for like you know if there was anybody that knew that was down there or anything nobody it's It's 23 guys born in Mexico and, you know, two American guys. They got washed out of the league. They got washed out of AAA. They were like, I can make a few bucks more playing in Mexico.
Starting point is 00:58:14 They're throwing them beach balls down there and they're jacking them out of the park. Pretty much. So he plays there. Now, even the states pick up on him a little montreal gazette has an article in july 29th 1986 in the where are they now section that says willie mays akins where are they now and it says he's hitting 447 with 37 home runs and 107 rbi in the mexican league that doesn't scream to the federal government where is he now doing a shitload of coke tons of coke it's not your problem anymore it's another problem so he says that the mech this article also says that the
Starting point is 00:58:49 the mexican angels here have terrible attendance even with their lowest even with their average ticket price being 500 pesos which is 80 cents back then they still can't get people to go see these fucking games so they i don't know 80 cents heing home runs. I can go watch him just jack 46 home runs. It's amazing. Watch him run batting practice. Forget it. That's all he's doing all day is just batting practice. And it's it.
Starting point is 00:59:13 Just breaking. 1986, there's a bunch of articles of him. He just wants back in the majors. He's just like, look at me. I'm hitting great. I'm clean. I'm clean. I swear to God.
Starting point is 00:59:21 He says he's not in a program down there. But if he ever gets the urge, he'll call his sponsor back in Baltimore. I'm clean. I'm clean. I swear to God. He says he's not in a program down there, but if he ever gets the urge, he'll call his sponsor back in Baltimore. I'm okay. Quote, I've come too far to mess up now. He's on the straight and narrow, Jimmy. I don't believe him. First of all, any time you hear anyone bragging about sobriety in front of just not, like if you're at a meeting and you're bragging about your sobriety, that's where it's for. If you see someone out somewhere bragging about their sobriety, that motherfucker's in trouble. He's about to go off the deep end.
Starting point is 00:59:50 He needs to make a phone call. He's got problems. You're only doing that because you're reassuring yourself, I feel like. I'm okay. And then he's also quoted that right around that time, he's quoted as telling another newspaper, in their own words, has to be for this one, quote, I can never say that I won't use drugs again. The reason I did drugs is because I like drugs.
Starting point is 01:00:09 End quote. Simple as can be. I love a simple, straightforward quote. I can't say I'm never going to do it again. It's fucking great. I did it because I liked it, dumb fuck. Why do you think I did drugs? That sounds like he wanted coke right there.
Starting point is 01:00:21 Yeah. Like, why do you think I do it? Because I like it. You got any coke? I'll be right back. I can't say I'd never do it again. If like it. You got any coke? I'll be right back. I can't say I'd never do it again. If it's in your pocket right now,
Starting point is 01:00:27 I'll do it. Now, 86 major thing happens in the U.S. Len Bias dies. Oh, yeah, yeah. Len Bias was a number one draft pick college basketball player that died, I believe, the night he got drafted. He did.
Starting point is 01:00:40 Oh, cocaine overdose that night. Had a heart attack. That's right. He was touted as going to be the next to reign. He was going to be everything. Yeah. He's number one overall draft pick. He dies of a cocaine overdose, and the country goes fucking ballistic.
Starting point is 01:00:55 That shit. I remember. I was in elementary school. I was in, like, first grade, and they were just like, see, see, don't do that. They scared the shit out of him. Yeah. See, look, because they tried to phrase it. They tried to frame it like he was a good kid that never did it before and he was one night he decided to party
Starting point is 01:01:09 and he did you know the second a speckle touched his nostril his heart exploded this is over for him he did a lot of cocaine absolutely now we know he did coke all the time yeah he just did happen to do a shitload that night and party his life was about to change yeah sure and the fuck changed so at this point country goes nuts so nuts that congress passes new stricter sentencing guidelines this is when federal law becomes tight on cocaine and the funny thing is this because this had nothing to do with land bias this has to do with violence and because in the 80s were an incredibly violent time american cities murder rates were doubling tripling it was crazy and they're blaming it on crack so they had the anti-drug abuse act of 1986 made the penalties for crack 100 times worse than powder cocaine wow so basically if you got caught with a gram of crack you would get sentenced the same as if you got caught with a hundred grams of powder cocaine
Starting point is 01:02:04 that's where the stigma came from that crackheads are just terrible people. Exactly. Powder coke, that's almost four ounces of powder cocaine, 100 grams. That's almost a quarter pound of powder coke. Do you know how much fucking coke a QP of coke is? That's a shitload of coke. Shitload of coke. That's a lot of fucking coke, man.
Starting point is 01:02:20 If you had that, you would be like, oh, who's that guy selling coke to? If you had a gram of crack, which is not a lot right you'd be like a crackhead's gonna go crack he's cracking his brillo pad same thing right same equivalency so that's that's keep that in mind guys uh this is it's and also too it made it so the police would only concentrate on crack dealing yeah why lock a guy up for when he's gonna get out in a month we're gonna lock him up we'll get out in five years right fucking perfect he's going on for a long time there was undercover officers going around that would go to coke dealers
Starting point is 01:02:51 and would ask them to make them crack and then they would arrest them for crack unbelievable so that's what they were doing undercover officers were doing this left and right there was lawyers fighting this they were saying entrapments all over the place
Starting point is 01:03:04 that's insane because of this drug law because they could do it now and they were like fuck it well i don't want your coke make me some i'll just make me some crack okay now your sentence is that much more unbelievable you can fuck off yeah no doubt it's horrible so spring of 87 back to willie mays akins he's forced to turn down a $500,000 a year contract from Yakult of the Japanese League because the Japanese government will not let him enter the country because of his prior cocaine conviction. Wow. So he is fucking furious, as you can imagine. Yeah, absolutely.
Starting point is 01:03:37 He's probably just snorting. He's probably doing Scarface-level mountains of just burying his head in it. He's got it in his eyebrows. It's in his eyebrows, bro. It got it in his eyebrows it's in his eyebrows bro it's in his hair yeah it's in his ears he's picking it out with a q-tip it's ridiculous because he's got a dead hat that would kill me absolutely i hate japan forever i lost a half million dollars because of this shit yeah it's insane or do you look at it but he's not he wanted as a clean person you go this cost something. I need to clean up my act.
Starting point is 01:04:05 I need to live better. No, but this is from the past. He's like, they fucked me on that one. This is why he's blaming everybody on this. He's going to keep blaming people. Of course. Because in Japan, he said the walls are, it's a lot smaller parks there. He's like, I could have destroyed shit.
Starting point is 01:04:17 He said, I would have been making $3 million a year over there. Endorsements and all that shit. He said, I would have been a monster. And he would have been a monster over there. He would have been huge. So that's like, remember Mr. Baseball with Tom Selleck? Yeah. Washed up guy goes over there and he's a good fucking hitter.
Starting point is 01:04:29 Right. Because he's bigger and stronger. So, sorry Japan. We have Japanese listeners now. There are no, if you're 250 pounds there, you're a sumo wrestler. You are, man. So at this point, they don't sign him. He's pissed off.
Starting point is 01:04:41 Whatever he does causes him to, by June 20th, 1987, develop a severe, severe case of hepatitis. Wow. So now he's got hepatitis. Like, he's having a bad fucking year. He's playing for the, still playing for the Mexican Angels in 87. His season's over now because he's got hepatitis. I don't know if it was C because C he would have been fucked worse. But I think it was like a B or an A or whatever.
Starting point is 01:05:05 Whatever you can fucking knock out with some shit. 80-80 has his first daughter. That's good. The second comes in 89 with different women. He's got a girl, a woman named Maria
Starting point is 01:05:15 he has his first daughter named Lucia with or Lucilia or some shit like that after his mom. Lucilia. And then he has another daughter with a woman named Sarah, one named Sarita
Starting point is 01:05:24 and then another, a, and then Sarita. He's slinging that dick in Mexican chicks. Dude, this guy, second to cocaine. Not even second. Pussy comes before cocaine, this guy. He's fucking everything. Well, in America, how about that? In America, he played six seasons in the majors here.
Starting point is 01:05:42 He was doing well. Never got anybody pregnant. No. That's how fertile Mexican girls are. You go down there was doing well. Never got anybody pregnant. No. That's how fertile Mexican girls are. You go down there and squeeze a tit and they're pregnant.
Starting point is 01:05:49 He's going crazy with the coke and whores in Mexico. Because now, in the U.S., he had to at least put on a front because the press
Starting point is 01:05:56 would see him and shit out. Mexico, it's the Wild West. He can do anything he wants. He doesn't get, no one cares. Nobody talks. Hey, there's Willie
Starting point is 01:06:04 at the brothel. They don't give a shit. I mean, that's how it goes. My wife's Spanish and I. He doesn't get, no one cares. Nobody talks, nobody. Hey, there's Willie at the brothel. They don't give a shit. I mean, that's how it goes, man. My wife's Spanish and I've fucked her twice and we have two kids.
Starting point is 01:06:09 See? I wear rubber to ask her about her day. I'm not having any more children. It's over. You should, Jimmy.
Starting point is 01:06:14 They're like mogwai. Anyway, go. Touch of water as you're shooting out. So, September 10th, 1988,
Starting point is 01:06:21 the Mazatlan Deers, which is a team down there that he's going to play winter ball for, they cut Aikens from their winter ball team. The manager, Cananea Reyes, says, quote, Aikens, I assume this is translated because it's such a I cannot say it's translated, says, quote,
Starting point is 01:06:38 Aikens isn't a complete player, and only those who demonstrate great abilities will play on this team. Wow. So he's saying he's a shit player. You aren't the Yankees, though, bro. Wow. So he's saying he's a shit player and he can't field. You aren't the Yankees though, bro. No. You're the Deers.
Starting point is 01:06:47 Might have something to do with his lifestyle because let me give you a snippet. I love it. This is a snippet from his book here about being in Mexico.
Starting point is 01:06:55 A story from his book about playing in Mexico. He was playing for Mazatlan and he was on the road one of the road trips to a place named Culiacan which was considered a rough and tumble kind of place back then.
Starting point is 01:07:09 That's where the fucking cartels are now. Yeah, and then it was also shaky. So he said he always carried marijuana and cocaine with him, and he wore his sunglasses 24 hours a day. He's that guy now. He's got like a suitcase with weed and coke in it. He's like Hunter S. Thompson in Fear hunter s thompson except huge and black yeah and so he said this particular night he got high alone after the game and then he went to a whorehouse with his teammates as one is want to do you have to do that so takes a hooker home with him oh you don't grab the hooker takes her home she had a fur coat and a bra and
Starting point is 01:07:40 panties that's what she was wearing and oh sounds hot. An interesting look for a nice lady. They get back to the room. He goes in the bathroom, gets high again. This is how much he's getting high. He comes out. She's naked.
Starting point is 01:07:51 She says, and this is all in Spanish, but she says $200 and he says that's a little expensive, but what the fuck, basically. Gets the money, puts the money out
Starting point is 01:07:59 on the table for her. Goes back in the bathroom to get high again. Jesus. Yeah, it just comes back out and she's gone she's gone she left her bra there or something but like she's gone money's gone he's like shit he starts drinking tequila looking out at the city just like yeah that sucks with a limp coke dick limp coke dick little while goes by knock at the door he's like fuck you knock again they keep
Starting point is 01:08:21 knocking he gets up goes it goes and opens it two guns in his face oh no problems this guy comes in and it's the guy's it's the girl's pimp absolutely and she's saying he's saying where's the girl he thinks that she's looking around thinking that he was holding the girl hostage or something he's like dude i'm not i didn't do shit look at the bed it's undisturbed money and dipped she took my money i don't have anything and the guy's not believing him and then he's looking at him the guy says what's your name and he says willie and he's like okay and he goes i never touched the girl man and the guy says forget about the girl forget about the girl come here a minute have a drink and he pours a drink they pour drinks and he says are you willie mays akins and he says yes i
Starting point is 01:08:58 am and this is this is the best thing i've ever heard because Because this is a Mexican pimp who's trying to track down a scantily clad hooker in a shitty Mexican flop house. A rogue hooker. A rogue hooker in a Mexican flop house. When people open doors, he sticks guns in their face. He sits him down, and this is translated, obviously, because the way it is can only be in another language, and it's wonderful. The man looked at him and said, how is it that you arrived to be here? I was expecting him to say, Can you get me tickets? No, I really was just like, Shit, I don't know, man.
Starting point is 01:09:35 He was like, Fuck, really? He's got his gun. Are you Willie Mays Akins? Yeah. How did you get in this situation? So he goes to Port St. Lucie, Florida. Oh, no. Play for some senior league baseball team.
Starting point is 01:09:47 They finish in last place. It's some shit league down there. Didn't Chad Curtis try to do some shit like that? I think so. My wife's family lives down there. It's a nice little place, but it's not. Yeah, they're crazy for baseball down there. It's not fucking.
Starting point is 01:09:58 It's no metropolis. No, no, no. So basically, he goes down. He's still playing in Mexico. He's signed to the jalisco charos for 88 walisco who was owned by charo walis i don't care it's owned by charo i assume he hits 352 down there the brits will back me a uk they don't play that shit fuck that spanish they don't play that shit philipignon, motherfucker. They don't care. They love it.
Starting point is 01:10:28 So this team's whole team is suspended. Wow. The league suspends the team. Not the players, the team. They're like the Black Sox. They're not allowed to have a team. Not the players on the team. They just can't have it. It's just the uniforms.
Starting point is 01:10:38 It's suspended. Poor St. Lucie. So he's drafted by the Leon Bravos. Wow, he's still playing years yeah they're owned by i assume johnny bravo yeah brady's alter a alter ego he still hits 358 in 1990 now wow he's still ripping it the fuck up man it's crazy he hits he plays for the monterey industriales and hits 299 and 91 that's it for him after the 91 season, even his Mexican career is over. He's done with baseball at this point.
Starting point is 01:11:07 I imagine every time he's up at bat, that question is going through his head. How is it you have arrived to be here? How is it that you have arrived to be here? That should be everybody's question. He said it in like a sultry voice, too. That's a new segment on the show. Whatever the breaking point is of this guy's like you know he's hit the peak of rock bottom that's how is it that you have arrived it's going to be said in a spanish accent i'm
Starting point is 01:11:31 going to make up a i'm going to just like i made up the fucking in their own words i'm going to do a music for a little spanish music and we're going to have chickens in the background how is it that you have come to arrive here every time from now on new segment rock bottom so this is rock bottom here he moves back 1992 he moves back to kansas city uh-huh he's living in a condo on locust street it's called he's got some money in the bank still he's got a few hundred grand in the bank so you know he's doing a shitload of coke yeah he is smoking crack at amazing levels at this point he is he fucking like popeye with spinach just in the crack pipe constantly ripping it up he said that his they just sit inside all day his friends would come over and they get in and come in and out and
Starting point is 01:12:18 get high and it was like a crack house like a flop house basically is womanizing even more out of control wow all he cared about banging crack here's his just here's in their own words on crack he's got a good thing of how much he jimmy he loves crack he likes it he loves i've never seen someone love crack so much by the way and but have you seen it's so ugly it's so gross by the way it's a yellow rock it's it's so ugly. It's so gross. It's a yellow rock. It's so gross. Ever smelled it? It's the worst smelling thing ever. Yeah, it's vile shit.
Starting point is 01:12:48 How many times do you think he paid off the federales in Mexico? How many times do you think he got arrested for beating up a hooker, doing a bunch of coke, and ripping up a place, or doing some crazy shit, and he paid him off with a couple hundred bucks? That question is why he sat and poured a glass of tequila when $200 went missing. It's the same thing. Because he's just like, well, it's just another day. It happens.
Starting point is 01:13:08 It's the same reason why people will go to the West. Yeah. They burned all their bridges there. Where else to fucking go? You're either the brave or the fucked. It was one of the two. So, Uncrack, in their own words, he says, quote, I don't know if I can describe it.
Starting point is 01:13:22 There's a sensation that comes from it when you're hitting that pipe and you inhale it and you blow it out. It's a tremendous feeling. Other things in your life are not as important. There isn't anything more important than smoking the pipe. Wow. He loves crack. That's how food critics describe a delicious, perfectly cooked steak. I loved it.
Starting point is 01:13:45 That statement, he should be saying that about his children. His children. I don't give a shit if he says it. Says it about a fucking model airplane collection. I don't care. Doesn't fucking matter. Not crack, please. Unbelievable.
Starting point is 01:13:59 Early 1990, no, we're talking 1993 here. Has a beef with a girlfriend. One of his many, many, and're talking 1993 here, has a beef with a girlfriend, one of his many, many, and these are drug girls. These are girls that come over, do a bunch of coke, and fuck him. Terrible people. They're a mess just as much as he's a mess.
Starting point is 01:14:14 So, I mean, imagine just when they get in fights and break up, imagine the mess. I'm picturing just like, remember Dope Sick Love that you showed me? Oh, my favorite. They look just like those women. Oh, God, yeah. Just, it's a guy in his apartment.
Starting point is 01:14:28 That's all it is. Just fighting. He kicks her in the ass. She falls down. Wondering around screaming Dominic. If you have HBO Go, watch Dope Sick Love. It's on the documentary thing. It's the greatest documentary ever.
Starting point is 01:14:38 It's my favorite thing that James has given me. It's amazing. So, at this point. Was his name Dominic? Who? The boy in it? Wasn't it Dominic? No, no, no.
Starting point is 01:14:45 The one who wandered around the New York screen? Sebastian! Sebastian! Sebastian! Oh, it's amazing. Anyway, watch the movie. Go on. Crackheads living on the street as couples.
Starting point is 01:14:54 It's awesome and it's real. It's fantastic. It's very real. Extremely real. So this girlfriend, when she leaves, threatens to have a drug dealer kill him that she knows. So he goes out and buys a shotgun just to keep in the house. Just to have in case drug have a drug dealer kill him that she knows so he goes out and buys a shotgun just to keep in the house just to have in case drug dealers try to come how is it
Starting point is 01:15:09 that you have arrived to be here how is it that you have arrived to be here so 1993 uh he uh february of 1993 he's pulled over in a kansas city sub of Leawood. He has cocaine on him, obviously. Duh. He's charged with possession of cocaine, obviously. Duh. Says he's taking it to trial. He's not going to plead. Fuck you.
Starting point is 01:15:32 I'm not going to. He's still denying everything. He thinks he can get out of everything. Wow. You aren't in baseball anymore, bro. For that reason. So he thinks he can get out of it. He's fine.
Starting point is 01:15:42 He said he's got half a million dollars in the bank at this point. He loved his life. He was having a great time. Smoked as much crack and was with as many women as he could possibly be with, was the way he described this area. So, December of 1993,
Starting point is 01:15:58 there's a woman named Ginger Locke who comes into the picture. This is in Kansas City. L-O-C-K-E. L-O-C-K-E. And she pulls into his driveway, or pulls up to his driveway willie's outside hanging out with one of his buddies yeah she pulls up and says hey uh can one of you guys give me directions and he said sure i'm leaving anyway whatever follow me and make this turn gets in the car goes she didn't make
Starting point is 01:16:20 the turn so he pulled into a gas station was like hey you missed your turn and she turn. And she was like, oh, I'm sorry, blah, blah, blah. So he said, I'm Willie, by the way. Do you have a man? Because he's trying to pick her up, obviously. He's like, do you have a man? She said, sort of, but, you know, whatever. He said, well, here's my number. Wrote it down, gave it to her.
Starting point is 01:16:36 He turns back there. I'll catch you later. You know, I'm Willie Mays Akins. I picture him like Willie Mays Hayes, even though at this point he's 315 pounds. He's half fucking bald. Coked up. He's missing teeth. He's cracked out of his skull.
Starting point is 01:16:48 He's a disaster at this point. Now, of this woman, he says, quote, quote, in their own words, quote, I was basically trying to get into her pants. She wasn't all that good looking either, but at the time, all the girls were good looking to me. Doesn't give a fuck. He's just trying to bang this broad right so lock calls him four times over the next couple weeks gives him her beeper numbers you know building a rapport here um just you know going back and forth just saying hello uh akins pages her one day just to say what's up she said that she's
Starting point is 01:17:21 upset because one of her friends got her car impounded because she got pulled over and had some stuff in the car so willie says oh you're into that stuff or you know are you into that or blah blah blah you know beats around to the subject of are you cool basically what was in the car are we gonna do coke and fuck basically so she said yes i'm very much into that and he said well i can get you as much of that as you need. Oh, boy. Anytime. Oh, boy. You can hit me up.
Starting point is 01:17:46 Willie Mays, motherfucking Aikens, right? He should have said to her when she called him back, how is it you have a right to be here? How is it that you have a right to be here? Let me know. Because she is at rock bottom. She's with the fucking crackhead. So January 18th, 1994, she goes over to his apartment, or his house, his condo, and she wants to buy an eighth of Coke. she wants to buy an eighth of coke
Starting point is 01:18:05 to buy an eight ball yeah she's looking for whatever so akins pulls a bag out of his sock tosses it to her he's got it in a sock for christ's sake so he's got coke she said now he said do you want it hard or soft powder you want rock what do you want right she said this is her claim by the way she says hard so he's she claimed he brought out the baking soda. Cut up the crack. Cut the beaker and got the crack going and fucking whatever. So had it ready to go. Took the Pyrex out and was doing his thing.
Starting point is 01:18:33 Yeesh. So he said, I got to do it in the wrong words again because it's amazing. Quote, she told me she would give me some. It was all about getting stoned and getting some. So he said, she's saying I'm going to fuck you you and he's like cool whatever i'll just i'll make up the crap i'll make up some crack right so some time goes by january she asked him for more coke you know she uh this goes by he gets her some more same thing goes on again uh january end of the month she asked for more than he has on him so he's like shit uh tell you what drive me to
Starting point is 01:19:05 my dealer's house and we'll go get it so he goes and gets it uh gets her 36 lock is a bitch gets her 36 grams of coke right uh or get not at this point i'm sorry goes to the house makes the deal she gives him the money he goes in gets it gets her the coke right at this point she'd bought 36 grams of crack from him in total all combined okay so the next time 36 keep that number in mind because it's not 50 grams right only 36 grams so the next time this comes around she comes up with 1200 bucks and she says she wants an ounce which is 28 uh which is 28 grams people so she said uh so they went and bought it but it was powder he went to the dealer's house came out with powder she said you told me you're getting me crack what the fuck and he tried to go back in and exchange it like it's a fucking like it's cold you bought a shirt by accident i got the wrong size shoe can i exchange it no it's you
Starting point is 01:20:00 got coke you got a nine and a half this one's a little tight out of here dummy get the fuck out of my off of out of my yard. So they go back to his house, and they cook it up. He cooks it up for her, gives it to her. He claims that they had to stop at this point and go get a beaker, or go get a Pyrex and go do the whole thing. But I don't know. I think he probably had it in his house.
Starting point is 01:20:19 I feel like he did. I feel like he did. So March 1, 1994, he's arrested for selling crack undercover officer old ginger lock is a cop bitch she's a cop obviously and the reason why she needed more and 36 wasn't enough is because 50 grams around the corner 50 grams gets you a mandatory 10 years that's how much 50 gets you 10 years so she said not enough time yet let me entrap him further right by telling him i want to crash right unreal so and also fuck him he lived no oh she also he also lived within a thousand feet of a school so she tacked that oh no the
Starting point is 01:20:58 shotgun that he bought that was just oh no in his house in his house. No, he got charged with having a weapon in a drug deal. Oh, that's going to steep us down. And it wasn't anywhere. It wasn't even in the room. No. It was in the house, so it's a weapon. That's a five-year mandatory on that one, too. So now he's looking at 15 mandatory at this point.
Starting point is 01:21:20 Unreal. This is crazy. So in the midst of all this, on March 18th, there's a mistrial for his cocaine possession that he got pulled over for in February of 93. Because one juror refused to vote guilty. There was a mistrial. Somebody won some money on the Royals game. Somebody was like, no, 1980 is my favorite memory ever. That 10th inning walk-off single was the greatest thing i ever saw god damn it so assistant d.a sarah welch said she would try the case again she wants willie mays akins but she doesn't because this whole thing's going on and on march 26 1994 he's indicted
Starting point is 01:21:59 in federal court on five counts of selling crack and one count of using a gun in a drug deal like i said five year mandatory for that you think maybe he's humbled he's not going to be an idiot right no you would imagine right i'm a baseball player no well first of all here's his quote on this this is this this is beautiful this is my fate one of my top three in the crime and sports in their own words here. Quote, in their own words, I was living in a world of drugs. I thought I was good with the ladies. I didn't know what I looked like because I didn't look in mirrors. I used them to cut up coke.
Starting point is 01:22:34 Holy shit. Amazing. The only time I've ever seen my reflection is when it's clean. I don't know, man. And by then I'm fucked up. So you think he's going to try and stay clean while he's out on bond awaiting trial for this massive thing hanging over his head of course he will of course right wrong he tries to bribe a drug test administrator with a hundred dollars a hundred bucks is going to clean up your piece i
Starting point is 01:22:57 don't think so sir submit a false sample charged with bribery on top of everything because he's a fucking idiot so he's offered a deal at this point. Five years if he wears a wiretap and buys drugs from his dealers. He refuses. Oh, that a boy. Willie's a stand-up guy. Yeah, he is. I like Willie for this.
Starting point is 01:23:15 But he didn't do it to be a stand-up guy. No. That's the funny part. He did it because he's scared of his dealer. He thought he could beat him. Oh, all right, because he's a fucking delusional idiot. Fuck you. Because then right before the trial trial they offer him nine years and he doesn't have to right he doesn't have to cooperate at all right just nine years and we
Starting point is 01:23:32 won't go to trial he says nope not going to take that what even though i have 15 mandatory and i sold crack to an undercover officer four separate times i'm gonna fight it all logged in on camera and everything i'm gonna beat it i'm gonna fight it he's what he said he said i had the mentality i was gonna get out of it just like i got out everything else this is the federal government and this was a time when they didn't fuck around willie they don't fuck around no so on september 18th 1994 he's convicted of four counts of distributing crack cocaine and one count of using a gun in a drug transaction shit out of luck right we come to december 12th 1994 yep united states district court judge uh dean dean whipple says quote the thing that is so disappointing is that you were
Starting point is 01:24:16 a young man that pulled yourself to prominence in professional sports and you trashed it how sad you had the skills to go down in history and now your history will be overshadowed by this. You, sir, may fuck off. But I thank you because that statement
Starting point is 01:24:33 is our fucking mission statement for our podcast. That's the mission statement. You blew it, asshole. And you blew it, asshole is basically that in a nutshell. Paraphrase,
Starting point is 01:24:42 hey, dickhead, nice job. You fucked up. You fucked up. You fucked up. Fucked up to the tune of 20 years and 8 months in prison. Oh my God. 20 years and 8 months in prison because of the crack thing instead of the coke thing. If it was powder cocaine, same weight,
Starting point is 01:24:59 he would have gotten 2 1⁄2 years. Wow. 2 1⁄2, plus the gun, but 2 1⁄2. Yeah. But if it was... That's brutal. That's brutal. That is fucked up, honestly. 20 years. Wow. Two and a half, plus the gun, but two and a half. Yeah. But if it was, yeah. That's brutal. That's brutal.
Starting point is 01:25:07 That is fucked up, honestly. 20 years. Yeah. This pisses me off, honestly. Yeah, that's too steep.
Starting point is 01:25:14 And he even says, in their own words, quote, if she hadn't asked me to cook it up for her, I probably wouldn't have done that. If all she wanted
Starting point is 01:25:20 was cocaine, I would have taken the, she would have taken the powder and left. Unquote. If she didn't want directions, you would have never been in the situation
Starting point is 01:25:26 the first place. Yeah, you'd try to fuck her. You didn't give her your number, idiot. Well, she came to him on purpose because they were watching him.
Starting point is 01:25:32 Oh, okay, all right. Because a former girlfriend tipped them off about him. Totally. Probably the one that he bought the shotgun over. If it's a chick, he'll try to fuck her.
Starting point is 01:25:38 So, total, he sold her about 2.2 ounces of cocaine. Ah. So, yeah, that, with 2.2 ounces of cocaine, so yeah that that with 2.2 ounces of cocaine he got sentenced the same as if he sold 15 pounds of powder cocaine wow pounds wow european that's seven fucking kilos yeah seven kilos of cocaine that is a shitload of cocaine that's a that's you're talking about major ounces that's a huge distributor. Yeah. A kilo is 2.2 pounds.
Starting point is 01:26:06 That's insane. I mean, that's so... And that many ounces of crack... 15 pounds. 16 ounces in a pound. Right. But that many ounces of crack makes how much in a Ziploc baggie? Not high.
Starting point is 01:26:18 No. Not high at all. That's a lot of crack, though. 15... Or Coke. 15 pounds of Coke. Yeah. But turning it into crack is so small
Starting point is 01:26:27 it's even less coke yeah right right right and it makes nothing in a bag and he's getting 20 years for a he's getting sentenced for partial baking powder that's that's the thing we're talking about he's getting sentenced for armen hammer yeah that's unbelievable that's it's nuts so and he called it entrapment obviously because he said that we just got i'm still rooting on him so i mean you know yeah you feel bad for this fucking guy at this point because he's i mean good lord first of all he's got two kids right now in mexico he's fucking every whore here he's got i mean they're a mess he's his family who knows what his mom's doing now his sister who god jesus what happened to his sister i bad things if she saw her mother being a prostitute he's now in prison for all this time at this point the royals still hadn't won a world
Starting point is 01:27:11 series in a while i feel bad jimmy i feel bad his vagina is a wizard sleeve for all these people i feel terrible not nearly as bad as i feel for these fine people here. There are people named Willie Mays Aiken. No, he doesn't use the Mays himself. He just goes Willie Aikens. Willie Aikens is not a common-ass name. I feel bad for Willie Aikens, payroll associate at Chemonomics International in Upper Marlboro, Maryland. I feel bad for him, too. He's a payroll associate. I feel bad for Willie Aikens, a VP of operations at H&W Construction Company in Winchester, Virginia.
Starting point is 01:27:46 That sounds like a great gig. Willie Akins, building materials professional in Little Rock, Arkansas. Or a Coke dealer. Willie Akins, retired executive of the Boeing Company and a graduate of Columbia University. That guy figured out life, despite... Willie Akins, minor league hitting instructor with the... Oh, wow! Oh, my God!
Starting point is 01:28:03 Guess what happens later? We'll save that. All right. Go on. I love it, Jimmy. Let's see here. While he's in prison now, he signs up for the mandatory... It's like a 60-day rehab stint, mandatory deal.
Starting point is 01:28:20 Says it didn't do shit to help him, but he was bored. So he signed up for a 15-month program, then another 15 15 month program. So he did a shitload of rehab basically. Helps the 20 years go by. That's what it was. He was like, what else do I do? And it looked good. And he was trying to get out this whole time too. There's a sad story from prison where he, he mentors this young kid in baseball, this young murderer. Real quick, 15 months for one rehab stint 15 more months for another had he only gotten convicted for just cocaine he would have done more time in those two rehabs than in fucking prison total unbelievable 30 months that's what he would have got two and a half years if that was cocaine
Starting point is 01:28:56 nuts right he mentors this kid this guy the kid his name is ruben he calls him and uh for baseball and the kid's gonna get released in a year was a murderer, but he's a young kid. He's going to get his life on track. This guy murdered people. He's going to get out. He's helping him. This cat's selling a little bit of track. He's not, actually, because his roommate stabbed him to death for letting something get stolen while he was in the hole.
Starting point is 01:29:20 Literally, his cellmate stabbed him. My yank mag got yanked. How dare you? He's in prison now while he's in the prisons while he's in prison he's he's campaigning to bill clinton when he was in office he's writing letters to george bush trying to get pardoned trying to get pardons trying to be like it's just the crack law it's crazy mandatory this is fucked up he's writing congress he's writing anybody he can he's telling players are writing on his behalf hal mccray cal ripken wrote a letter now cal
Starting point is 01:29:46 ripken guys if you don't know who cal ripken is cal ripken is like getting a letter from i don't know he's basically from martin luther king he's not a real person in this country he played the most game he played over like 2600 baseball games in a row never took a day off is he's a machine he's a machine and he's clean as fuck clean as a whistle he's a machine. He's a machine. And he's clean as fuck. Clean as a whistle. He's known as like, it's like getting an endorsement from an actual apple pie, basically.
Starting point is 01:30:10 Like an apple pie wrote a letter for you. It's ridiculous. So he wrote a letter to the pardon board saying, quote, this man Willie, who overcame poverty
Starting point is 01:30:19 in childhood, who rose to fame as a professional athlete, who came so close to ruining his life with drugs, I think he came more than close. It was 20 years, Cal.
Starting point is 01:30:28 And has now set his feet on the path to recovery, has paid a heavy price for his self-destructive behavior. Willie should not be required to pay such a high price. The crime involved here involved no violence against others, no damage to anyone but Aikens himself. Agreed. Yeah. Agreed.
Starting point is 01:30:44 Yeah. So thank you Yeah. Agreed. So thank you, Cal Ripken. Cal left out the part that the man witnessed his mother getting banged by strange men. The man was beaten by Shack Daddy. The man was beaten.
Starting point is 01:30:55 It's horrible. He's come through so much. He had no shoes, Jimmy. How do you not expect him to do a bit of coke? He's going to do some cocaine. I mean, good God. Just to be like,
Starting point is 01:31:04 life's better now. Yay. Thank God. daddy oh my god so in march of 2008 congress approves this happened in december but it finally came down in march because they had time to get rid of in 97 in in 2008 oh he's been in jail for 11 years oh my god yeah uh congress approves the new guidelines for drug sentencing and makes it retroactive. This gets rid of the whole crack to cocaine insanity 100 times over. Opens up some prison bars. It basically puts 19,000 people that are in federal prison in the line of release at this point. Because it would be retroactively whatever.
Starting point is 01:31:43 So June 4th, he ends up, he gets his lawyer, they start the proceedings right away. There's people helping him because he's a famous case and all that. June 4th, 2008, he's released from federal prison in Jessup, Georgia.
Starting point is 01:31:56 He has to undergo counseling and spend 90 to 100 days in a Kansas City halfway house, which who gives a shit at this point? I mean, what the fuck? Who cares? He had two 15-month stints in rehab. Was it 90 days in a halfway house, which who gives a shit at this point? I mean, what the fuck, who cares? He had two 15-month stints in rehab.
Starting point is 01:32:06 Was it 90 days in a halfway house? What do you mean, in a halfway house? No, he said he had to do a halfway house. Oh,
Starting point is 01:32:12 he has to do 90 to 120 in a halfway house. Who gives a shit? He just did 11 and a half years. So, after his release, he returns to Kansas City. Hal McRae gets him a job
Starting point is 01:32:20 doing construction because that's all he could do at the time. He gets him a construction job. He's like digging manholes and shit like that. Doesn't seem to care. He seems to be happy
Starting point is 01:32:28 to be out. He's covered in mud in this one picture. He's playing whatever. But, you know, nice. Thank you, Hal McRae. Good job there.
Starting point is 01:32:35 2010. Now, Sarah is the woman he hooked up with in about 89. Had his second daughter with. And she stuck with him throughout. Oh, that's sweet. This is a happy story.
Starting point is 01:32:47 They reunite. They're back together. They end up getting married in a couple years actually. His first time married too. His first time married actually. She has lupus at this point. So she's very ill. In January I believe or December of 2010, January 2011
Starting point is 01:33:03 she gives birth to a daughter she's 42 they have another daughter and he said he just wanted to you know start from the beginning with a kid and see it all the way through and have some semblance of normal smoking crack and you know going to mexico even though they were raised there and all that shit so it makes sense right so she has a kid uh february 1st 2000 he's hired as a hitting instructor. 2011. 2011, I'm sorry. Hired as a hitting instructor, minor league coach by the Royals. Yeah. Thank you, Royals.
Starting point is 01:33:31 He's going to float around their minor league system, lower levels, rookie ball, and instruct them, give anti-drug speeches to incoming players. Because he knows. He's an example. I was in prison, guys. Let me tell you about some. So his daughter's born in 2011. Yeah, his daughter.
Starting point is 01:33:47 So there's your... That's the hitting instructor. That's your hitting instructor. It's actual Willie Mays. It's actually him. This is our first guy who has a LinkedIn page. This is from LinkedIn here. And it's him.
Starting point is 01:33:59 He's got a Facebook page. He's got a LinkedIn page. This motherfucker's a citizen right now, guys. So you Google him and you end up finding him. We don't know. That's awesome. We might fuck up. We don't know yet, but let's see here.
Starting point is 01:34:09 So we found him, actually. Yeah, looking on LinkedIn, which that was the first time that's ever happened. He was a victim of his own Google search. Yeah. So his child's born. He goes to spring training in Arizona in Surprise, Arizona with the Royals. Yeah. And he's's gonna go instruct
Starting point is 01:34:25 some shit he's there three days and his wife has a stroke oh no not good he has to fly back to kansas city and all that their team is totally cool that they're like take as much time as you need obviously she had a stroke you've been through enough she's paralyzed on her right side oh jesus so now he takes care of her he's got a small child yeah he's in he's like 60 years old he's got a small child and a paralyzed wife that he's taking care of here. I mean, this guy is... He's stricken with lupus. Yeah, he's paying penance.
Starting point is 01:34:52 Heavy price. He's paying a price here. Now, you can get some of the... His book came out in 2012, May 1st, 2012. It's called Willie Mays Aiken, Safe at Home. Finally, somebody with a simple fucking title. And also, finally, too.
Starting point is 01:35:06 Not convoluted bullshit title. Finally, too. It's an accurate title. Yeah. Finally, Safe at Home. Safe at Home. It's co-written by Gregory Jordan there.
Starting point is 01:35:14 But still with a fucking play on words. Yeah. Whatever. One of the two. I'll take one out of two. Yeah. $25.95 in hardcover
Starting point is 01:35:22 on Amazon if you want that. How much? $25.95 hardcover. It's pretty solid. It's a hardcover for Amazon if you want that how much? 25.95 hardcover it's pretty solid it's a hardcover for that it's a real book yeah it's a real book
Starting point is 01:35:30 put it on your shelf so 2014 he starts working with this turnaround program which is a part of Catholic Charities and he said
Starting point is 01:35:38 they helped him a lot when he came out he's really religious now oh boy really religious he goes around makes speeches at churches and Christian high schools and shit like that he's really religious now oh boy really religious he goes around makes speeches at churches and christian high schools and shit like that he's very religious he gets all when you hear him
Starting point is 01:35:50 speak now he'll tell you about cocaine and then he'll veer it into a preach he knows how to wrap a preach into anything a rap a bible verse or a god thing or something i did a lot of coke but as they say in philippians let me tell you something boys now jesus the lord got me through it now but i mean if anybody got through some shit it's this guy now here's the interesting thing remember his his ring his al championship oh yeah stolen in 1980 that hunk of shit with no diamond okay so yeah with no diamond they got no diamond so November 2014 he set Akins is set to speak at a church it's the Gashland
Starting point is 01:36:27 Gashland yeesh that's a it sounds like a strip club in the Midwest sounds like somewhere that Celia worked at come to Indiana's
Starting point is 01:36:36 worst strip club Gashland the worst girls yeah yeah visible scar night Wednesday night visible C-section scars all night long all raised scars all the
Starting point is 01:36:47 time fucking horrible so um so basically uh he's supposed to speak at this it's the gashland united methodist church it's across from a pawn shop that's an interesting strip mall weird right there those two things in it so there's this reverend laura murphy she's in charge of handing out the flyers for the event of will Mays Aikens coming to speak. She goes into this pawn shop. It's the American Pawn Shop. It's on North Oak Trafficway in Kansas City. You guys stop in there and see them.
Starting point is 01:37:14 So she goes there with the flyers, right? She hands it out. The guy picks it up and they go, holy shit, we were just talking about this guy. This is Willie Mays Aikens. Why were you talking about him? They're like, why are you talking about him, right? So a few days later, they didn't say why. A few days later, a pawn shop employee comes into the church,
Starting point is 01:37:31 hands Reverend Laura Murphy a business card, and says, quote, my boss wants Willie to call him because we have his World Series ring. Wow. So she's like, what the hell, right? She gives it to Willie. Willie's like choked up. He's like, he never thought he'd see it again.
Starting point is 01:37:44 He thought it was wherever. I just did 11 years in in the pen and i'm five years out of that shit i'm now preaching oh this is she thought she said that he couldn't talk he was so happy she had to like brace himself right and that stuttering didn't help yeah so it turns out in the early 80s this championship ring was sold to the pawn shop the american pawn shop the owner phil bolano says that he doesn't traffic and stolen goods but it hadn't been reported stolen so because he said i never reported yeah never was reported stolen so he just he was told that it was acquired in a trade or a purchase or whatever so yeah people whatever the fuck so he said he never tried to sell it he's like i'm just gonna hang on he put it in his home in a cabinet, just kept it. And it's funny,
Starting point is 01:38:25 because he said Bellano, the owner of the pawn shop, he's a pawn shop guy. Yeah. You want to talk about the least sentimental person on the planet? The most crooked sons of bitches on earth. It's,
Starting point is 01:38:33 I'll buy your shit for 10% of what it's worth and sell it for 150% of what it's worth, because I'm insane. Right. So he says, quote, I'm not a... Because these are desperate people
Starting point is 01:38:41 that are my customers. They're crackheads. He said, quote, I'm not a collector of anything. I try to sell everything I have. I'm a pawnbroker. He'd sell you his three kids for the right price.
Starting point is 01:38:50 He says, so I don't keep anything. It's probably the only piece I've ever kept. Maybe I just figured someday he'd probably want it back. That's nice. That's nice. Not really, though. Uh-oh. Because he'd want it back for a price.
Starting point is 01:39:03 Oh, what a dick. What a dick. Akins goes into the he'd want it back for a price. Oh, what a dick. What a dick. Akins goes into the pawn shop. He has the business card, and he goes in there the next day because he got it at night. You have my ring? I'd love to have it. He's like, you know, you got my ring. Oh, my God.
Starting point is 01:39:14 And the guy says, I got it. $2,500. I knew it. $2,500. Oh, what a dirtbag. So Polano tells him, hey, that's what I have in it. No, you don't. No, you don't.
Starting point is 01:39:24 So Akins says, I don't have $2,500. I watch 25 i watch porn stars you son of a bitch i'm a minor league hitting instructor i make like 32 grand a year and i speak at churches i'm not rolling in dough here you know so bolano said well i don't have the ring on the premises anyway so whatever it's still at my house so we'll work something out so poor aikens leaves without his ring he leaves distraught he tells his friend there's a woman named kim accurso accurso who was used to watch his german shepherd when he'd go to spring training she'd watch his dog and she had a farm he'd go the dog would go run around on the farm it's a so whatever so kim accurso the german shepherd watcher here gets hears from willie the whole tale of how this
Starting point is 01:40:01 goes down yeah and so she asks him about the church does a little slide thing gets the name of it yeah finds the church goes across the street goes to the pawn shop does a little slick thing and gets it back pays less than didn't pay 2500 good abelano the sob story yeah who knows this lady probably put on some oh please blah blah if you can soften a pawn shop owner's heart you've done something something. That's the hardest man in America. She's awesome. She melted the ice. Never mind gangsters. Pawn shop owners will tell you to go fuck yourself.
Starting point is 01:40:30 So Bellano, the owner there, said, quote, I took less than I had in it, actually. She got a good deal. Good for her. Good for you, asshole. Good for her. He's still got money out of it. Let's not play. That money was long gone.
Starting point is 01:40:41 Yeah, yeah, yeah. From 25, 30 years ago. It's still a good, almost. From 35 years ago. There's no way he paid more than $100 for that thing. No, it money was long gone. Yeah, yeah, yeah. From 25, 30 years ago. It's still a good, almost. From 35 years ago. There's no way he paid more than 100 bucks for that thing. No, it's a crackhead. Yeah. He probably said, yeah, I don't even know if it's real.
Starting point is 01:40:50 Yeah. So she invites, a Curso invites Willie to Christmas Eve dinner with her family in 2014. Very nice. And gives it to him. Yeah. And does a whole nice thing, and he gets the ring back, and he's like, oh my God. It's an amazingly sweet, kind moment that we normally don't do here on this show.
Starting point is 01:41:09 And I have to say, guys, I am going to do something, because we had a happy ending. This man turned his life around, and he got it together, and he's trying his hardest, and he's paying for his difficulties. Reunited with this championship ring. I'm sorry, guys. I'm sorry about this happy ending because we pride ourselves on giving you an irredeemable scumbag every week and i promise you because last
Starting point is 01:41:31 week too you we felt bad for this randy lanier guy i promise you next week there will be a guy that you can hate to your grave that you'll want to be put in a cell with tom pain and a dish towel there's still people that are gonna hate this man they hate him, but we'll find you a rapist or something really hateable next week. Somebody like, you know, killed his girlfriend for no reason. We'll find you something good. He resorted to God and sounded... This is a great story, but I just feel bad it's ending happily.
Starting point is 01:41:55 I know people want to end with, ha-ha, that piece of shit. Happily, though. He's making 32 grand. Happily, as it could have ended from being in federal prison. He should have a nice nest egg, that's for sure. Oof, poor for sure poor bastard so if you want to see he's been all around too he's at like the signings aren't at great places too he does a book signing at a place called jess and jim's restaurant and it's like a big venue exactly it's at 517 east 135th street in kansas city if you're
Starting point is 01:42:19 sounds like it's got great ham and eggs i bet it does so uh yeah it said on the thing signing his new book and visiting with customers. It's coming around. Hey, guys. He'll come top off your coffee. Got any cocaine? I mean, want to sign your book signed? Is that cocaine?
Starting point is 01:42:32 Oh, it's just Splenda. Okay. Well, we'll just sign your book then. So he just, there was a Willie Mays Aikens game used bat on eBay. It was, it's still, it's on there right now. It's got time left on eBay. It's a Louisville slugger model p72 125 and it's only 29.99 buy it now how about that you like willie and you feel bad for
Starting point is 01:42:52 him buy his bat it won't help him any but he'll have a bat you can get one of those police substances spray on it and try to find the coke and you can fight him off if he ever changes his mind goes back to coke and tries to rob your house. It's funny. The listing says, a great find for any Willie Mays fan. No, it's not. No, it's not. That's a different person. That's hilarious. 29 bucks.
Starting point is 01:43:14 It ain't the real Willie Mays, bro. One of his bats sold for $54.28 in some Kansas City Historical Society auction thing. There were six bidders on it in March 6, 2016. That's decent. So right now, he's currently the minor league hitting instructor for the Royals. They won the World Series,
Starting point is 01:43:28 so he's got a ring now happening. He's doing just fine. Doing well. It's a lower level championship ring. But it's a championship ring. He's got a... I bet they gave him
Starting point is 01:43:37 a nice one. I'll bet you're right. They feel bad for him. He almost got him one in 80, so they'll get a pat on the ass. We'll give you the actual one. Yeah. No.
Starting point is 01:43:43 Fuck, man. This poor bastard so here he is he's doing better yeah he's got a stroked out half paralyzed wife and a little girl and two older daughters who feel kind of lukewarm about him because he was a terrible father and turning it around now isn't exactly going to sweeten everything for him so you know one of the very few that we've covered that has the ability to listen to this absolutely has the ability and we're not you're the first man that we're not saying fuck off we hate you right we don't hope you get stabbed in
Starting point is 01:44:10 prison we hope you live out your life in a nice fashion and please don't smoke any more crack and if he were to come over to your house for dinner on christmas he would have a great yes a great uh grace to say and i take that back if you're gonna smoke crack do it big go big big enough to where we can do a part two i mean rampage plow your car through a just a lot of a parade or like get one of those like hipster food festivals just plow your car right through it man nope just have them flying off you're playing grand theft auto just do that for me if you want to smoke crack again otherwise Panini stuck to your windshield absolutely so that is
Starting point is 01:44:47 that's it that is Mr. Willie Mays Akins what a trip he was yeah thank you guys for checking that out I want to remind you
Starting point is 01:44:55 again guys I'm not don't mean to strong arm you but iTunes reviews please they're so huge you can give us
Starting point is 01:45:00 a few bucks on Patreon if you want there's the there's rewards and stuff but like I said we don't want your money we want sponsors money more reviews closer we are to sponsors so to get us more money to get us note cards and more figurines of retired sports
Starting point is 01:45:15 criminals that frankie can shoot yes so thank you guys i want a willie mays akins i do too that would be awesome holy shit do they make them i will have to go now i don't think so because he stopped playing and they might make them now like yeah because mcfarland's all the retro yeah that's a good thing to look up i didn't see any and i was i was on like page 22 of the google search so i was pretty deep yeah this is i probably would have found it at some point i was finding bats and restaurant appearances but you never know so give it a shot but that's willie mays akins we hope you enjoyed it yeah and please guys spread the word we beg you you guys i can't thank you guys enough uk this
Starting point is 01:45:50 week the past week has gone insane like we five times over our normal listenership in the uk we can't thank you guys enough love having you absolutely we can't be nice to uk they don't they don't like you like to be you sons of bitches you lousy bastards we love you you warm pissed guinness drinking motherfuckers thank you so much we love the shit out of you cobblestone driving fucks we love you guys but yeah itunes reviews do that whole thing five stars and please spread the word we're not we have no network no we're not on a network we have we're getting a lot of listeners now but we still don't have a network we still don't have anybody pushing for us we don't have any of that shit. We have us and you guys mainly.
Starting point is 01:46:28 And it's all you guys. So thank you guys. We do stand-up on the side. That's all we do. We're not journalists. We're not journalists. We're comedians. I'm going to stand up live in downtown Phoenix with Burt Kreischer August 11th through the 13th.
Starting point is 01:46:38 Go see that. And I was just in Bakersfield with Jesse May Peluso. And a bunch of people after the show were telling criminal athlete assholes with me. So thank you guys if you're listening. Thank you guys. Thank you guys. Thanks for all the contact. Keep it coming.
Starting point is 01:46:52 Social media. Let's do the social media. It's at Crime and Sports on Twitter. Crime and Sports at gmail.com. Facebook.com slash Crime and Sports. Jimmy, you want to hit them with yours? At Wisman Sucks. W-H-I-S-M-A-N Sucks on Twitter, Instagram,
Starting point is 01:47:07 and Wisman Sucks on Snapchat, and it's so fucking fun. I'm a 13-year-old girl. I'm at Jimmy P. It's funny on whatever you can find me and find me on Facebook, do the whatever shit, so do that. Guys, thank you, guys. Crime and Sports Movement. Hey, Prime members, you can listen to Crime and Sports early
Starting point is 01:47:24 and ad-free on Amazon Music. Download the Amazon Music app today, or you can listen early and ad-free with Wondery Plus and Apple Podcasts. Before you go, tell us about yourself by completing a short survey at wondery.com slash survey. If you don't know when Crystal Pepsi was discontinued, what was in Al Capone's vault, or which famous meteorologist is Lenny Kravitz's second cousin, then you haven't spent enough time on Wikipedia. But that's okay. I am here for you. I'm Darcy Carden, and I'm inviting you to listen to my new podcast, WikiHole, from SmartList Media. Discover the craziest rabbit holes on Wikipedia
Starting point is 01:48:00 with me and my funny friends as we bring the cyber frontier directly to your tympanic membrane. And if you listen to my podcast, you'd learn that that's the sciency term for eardrum. We embark on a hyperlink roller coaster as we start out on a Wikipedia page and go from link to link to link to link, careening through trivia, oddities, and unexpected connections until we collectively shout, how the hell did we get here follow wiki hole on the wondery app or wherever you get your podcasts you can listen to wiki hole ad free by joining wondery plus in the wondery app or on apple podcasts

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