May 16, 2007

Dock Ellis is my favorite baseball player off all time...

Beaning Reggie Jackson in the face in apparent retaliation for Reggie's monstrous home run off Ellis in the 1971 All-Star game in Detroit.
No-hitting the San Diego Padres on June 12, 1970 despite being, as he would claim in 1984, under the influence of LSD throughout the course of the game. Ellis has claimed that the ball actually talked to him during the hallucination, advising him which pitches to throw. Curiously, if his name is presented in roll call style, it reads "Ellis, D." (LSD).
Attempting to hit every batter in the Cincinnati Reds lineup on May 1, 1974. In an effort to prove a point to teammates, Ellis hit Pete Rose, Joe Morgan, and Dan Driessen in the top of the first. The clean-up batter Tony Perez avoided Ellis' attempts, instead drawing a walk, and after two pitches aimed at the head of Johnny Bench, Ellis was removed from the game by manager Danny Murtaugh. Ellis' box score for the game reads: 0 IP, 0 H, 1 R, 1 ER, 1 BB, 0 K.
On May 5 1972, Dock Ellis engaged in an argument with a security guard who barred him from entering through the players' gate at Cincinnati's Riverfront Stadium and then maced him. The guard maintained that Ellis had failed to adequately identify himself, "made threatening gestures with a clenched fist," and was carrying a half-empty bottle of wine. Ellis denied that he had intended to punch the guard or was holding a bottle of wine and claimed he was denied entrance (and maced) despite showing his World Series ring as proof of identity.

1 comment:

Hayes said...

dock ellis is baseball incarnate...and/or pretty close to who i wished i was as 16! vive besbol!!