strawberry's coked up again, must be time for baseball

by mg at 06:18 AM on April 06, 2001

The 2001 baseball season started up this week and, coincidentally, Daryl Strawberry, the ex-Yankee slugger, was back on the cocaine. An 8 time All-star, Strawberry is used to running and around the bases after a monstrous home run. Now he runs from the law.

Last week Strawberry disappeared from a Florida hospital where he was attending drug rehabilitation. He was found four days later by some friends and returned to police custody. He will most likely face jail time for breaking the terms of his probation stemming from a drug possession conviction last year. "News of the ex-Yankee's return came hours after police said they were investigating reports that Strawberry had been kidnapped and was being held for $50,000 ransom."

It is quite a sad and bizarre story, and there doesn't seem to be an explanation for Strawberry's constant troubles. Or is there?

There was an episode of The Simpsons that had all the members of the Springfield Nuclear Power Plant softball team being replaced by "ringers." One of those ringers was Daryl Strawberry, who replaced Homer in right field. Right before the big game each of the ringers inexplicably befalls a terrible tragedy; one suffering from radiation poisoning and another hypnotized into believing he is a chicken. Every player has something bad happen to them, except Strawberry. See where I am going here?

That's right, this last decade has really been nothing more than one long Simpsons episode, and Strawberry is, in fact, doing just fine in real life. All the drug problems, the run-ins with the law, and the colon cancer are merely a plot device created by Matt Groening and crew. There is bound to be a Simpsons episode next fall that has the softball team trying for the championship repeat and Strawberry's actions are all explained in a very comical and ironic manner. I'm sure of it.

In somewhat related news, the average salary for major league baseball players this season is $2,264,403. Alex Rodriguez, baseball's highest paid player at $21 million (plus bonuses) earns about $130,000 per game. If averaged out over the course of a year, Rodriguez makes $57,534 per day. The average household income in the United States is $54,842 per year. Rodriguez's yearly salary is just short of the entire Minnesota Twins' team, which is the league’s lowest at $24.4 million.

If Strawberry were still playing baseball and making at least the league average, it would have taken him just 4 games to make the $50,000 necessary to pay his "ransom."