1989 – Sports Illustrated publishes a story about Cincinnati Reds manager Pete Rose’s gambling activities. Rose will eventually agree to a lifetime ban from Major League Baseball as part of an agreement with Commissioner A. Bartlett Giamatti.
1989 – Commissioner Peter Ueberroth announces that he has begun an investigation into the behavior of Cincinnati Reds manager Pete Rose. Ueberroth doesn’t identify the allegations against Rose, but the Reds’ skipper will eventually be banished for his alleged involvement with gambling.
Mets phenom pitcher Dwight ‘Doc’ Gooden avoids suspension for substance abuse by agreeing to enter a drug rehab facility. The talented 22 year-old right-hander will make his first start on June 5 and will win 15 games for the team despite missing the first two months of the season.
After finding no other clubs interested in signing him, free agent pitcher and 20-game winner Jack Morris agrees to salary arbitration with the Tigers while at the same time accusing the major league owners of collusion against free agents. Morris had offered to sign a one-year contract, with salary to be determined by an arbitrator, with either the Yankees, Angels, Twins or Phillies, but was turned down by all four.
1986 – In Major League Baseball’s sternest disciplinary move since the 1919 Black Sox were banished for life, Commissioner Peter Ueberroth gives seven players who were admitted drug users a choice of a year’s suspension without pay or heavy fines and career-long drug testing, along with 100 hours of drug-related community service. Joaquin Andújar, Dale Berra, Enos Cabell, Keith Hernandez, Jeffrey Leonard, Dave Parker, and Lonnie Smith will be fined 10 percent of their annual salaries to drug abuse programs. The commissioner also doles out lesser penalties to 14 other players for their use of drugs.
The Yankees sign free-agent Al Holland, a well-traveled reliever who saved five games for three different teams last season. The one-year contract has a clause that requires the 33 year-old southpaw, one of the players granted immunity in exchange for their testimony in the last year’s Pittsburgh cocaine trials, to submit to drug tests.
1983 – One day after taking a job as director of sports promotions for the Claridge Hotel and Casino in Atlantic City, Mickey Mantle is ordered to sever his ties with Major League Baseball by Commissioner Bowie Kuhn. Mantle joins fellow Hall of Famer Willie Mays as players banned from baseball by Kuhn for involvement with legalized gambling.
On August 23, 1982, Gaylord Perry of the Seattle Mariners is caught putting a foreign substance on the ball. Long suspected of throwing a “spitball,” Perry is ejected from a game for the first and only time in his career. From Peter Gammons: Against the Red Sox. In the seventh inning, down 1-0 with the…
1973 – Cesar Cedeno is involved in the shooting death of 19-year-old Altagracia de la Cruz in Santo Domingo, DR. He would be acquitted of voluntary manslaughter but pled guilty to a lesser charge, fined and released.
Commissioner Bowie Kuhn announces the suspension of Detroit Tigers pitcher Denny McLain
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