DISGRACELAND - Bonus Episode: The Punk-Rock Dock Ellis, Canseco the Troll, and "a Gorilla in a Zoo"

Episode Date: June 13, 2024

This week in the After Party, Jake talks the super-fame of José Canseco, the exploits of Dock Ellis, performance... altering? drugs, this week's DISGRACELAND episode on José Canseco, and of course your emails, texts, DMs, and voicemails. What athletes embody the rock star vibe? Get in touch at 617-906-6638, [e-mail], or on socials @disgracelandpod, and come join the After Party.To hear an extended version of the After Party with stories about José Canseco's legendary trolling, and more from the DISGRACELAND community, become a Disgraceland All Access member at disgracelandpod.com/membership. To learn more about listener data and our privacy practices visit: https://www.audacyinc.com/privacy-policy Learn more about your ad choices. Visit https://podcastchoices.com/adchoicesSee omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.

This is exactly right. Double Elvis. Hey, Discos, you can listen to an extended version of this after-party episode by becoming a member of Disgraceland All Access. Just go to disgracelandpod.com slash membership for more details and to sign up. Hey, what's up, everybody? Welcome to Disgraceland, which is brought to you by Double Elvis. This week, we have a brand new episode on Jose Canseco.

That's in our Disgraceland feed. and for our all-access members in our Patreon and Apple subscription feeds. If you haven't heard our recent episode on Chris Cornell, you can check that out now over there. Make sure you're all signed up for our all-access content, either on Apple Podcasts or on Patreon, to hear that Chris Cornell episode,

along with any other exclusive episodes and content that we have over there. Got a new exclusive episode on Waylon Jennings coming in just a few weeks. And over in the feed for The Singer's Talk, that's the show from my company, Double Elvis in partnership with volume.com. and which host Jason Thomas Gordon talks with some of the most iconic singers about their voices.

We have a brand new episode this week with Belinda Carlisle of the Go-Go's. So go check that out. All right, that's the singers talk. Hey, Discos, need a little more disgrace land in your life? Just a touch to get you through? Yeah, me too. This is the podcast that comes after the podcast. Welcome to Disgraceland, the After Party.

Welcome to the Disgraceland bonus episode. a little thing we like to call the after party. This is the show after the show, the party after the party, the bridge to get you from one full episode of disgrace land to the other, the backyard to dig into the dirt. On this bonus episode, we are talking about

this week's brand new full episode on Jose Canseco, the sources that we used, which helped us uncover many wild stories that we weren't able to fit into the actual episode. We're talking about Doc Ellis's no-hitter. We're talking about athletes that could have been rock stars,

and of course, We've got your voicemails and texts, and as always, a whole lot of rosy. All right, this goes, let's get. Jose Canseco was more like a superhero cartoon character to me growing up that he was a baseball player. We didn't know it then, but we know now that he was the avatar for steroid abuse in the MLB. And that, of course, is mightily disgraceful, but selfishly speaking from where I sit now from here, Jose Canteco's antics, which we detail in this week's full episode of Disgracan, gave us one of the greatest characters in sports history.

So for that, I'm thankful. I'm thankful for the steroids. But with Jose, you got the steroids, the body, the looks, Madonna, baseballs bouncing off of his head in the outfield, 40 homers, 40 stolen bases all in the same season. And then you got all the public relations drama, ratting out other ballplayers. If you wrote about the character of Jose Cansecoe in a screenplay,

you'd likely never sell it because it's all just too unbelievable. And there are many, many, many, unbelievable characters in stories from baseball's history and just sports history in general. I was thinking about Jose this week, of course, and that got me into a wormhole on strange and dark stories from baseball history. And I came upon the story. A story I'd heard before mentioned. I'd never really read about it, something that had come up at parties before, way before

my time. But I'd heard mention of this story before, the story of Doc Ellis from the Pittsburgh Pirates, who threw a no-hitter 54 years ago, just happens to be 54 years ago this week on June 12, 1970. Now, lots of pictures have thrown no-hitters, but Doc Ellis threw his no-hitter in 1970 while tripping his brains out on LSD. I'm sorry, it just sounds funny coming out of my mouth. As the story goes, Doc was hanging. hanging out with a friend in Los Angeles while the pirates were in Southern California to take on the Padres in San Diego.

So Doc wakes up in his friend's apartment after a day of tripping on LSD. He found the stash and he decided to drop another hit. Now, this is before he realized, apparently, that he was that day's starter for the Pittsburgh Pirates versus the San Diego Padres. So he drops the acid unwittingly knowing that he's pitching that day. But then he finds out, I guess, and he hightails it down. to San Diego. He barely makes it in time to the game. I mean, honestly, it's a miracle that he even made it to the stadium while tripping. It's just, it's impossible to do anything. Anyways, he made it, and he made his way into the starting lineup on the mound for the pirates. And that day,

his pitching was erratic, but effective. Okay, he walked eight through nine innings. Okay, he walked eight batters. He struck out six. He dodged balls that were put into play. that were nowhere near him. He claims that he saw Jimmy Hendrick step into the batter's box, wielding a Stratocaster for a bat, and that he struck him out. Doc hit a batter, but he did not give up a hit, remarkably. After all this, of course, Doc Ellis, possibly more famous for going on a year later to win the World Series with the Pirates in 1971. He then retired in the early 80s, and he told this story about pitching the no-hitter on acid, this remarkable story. Of course, Doc has his detractors, those who claim that he's full of shit, that this never happened,

that he made it all up. But if you listen to Doc's depiction of how he felt that day on the mound, and if you yourself have ever taken LSD, you can't help but come away from his story with a feeling of familiarity and a belief that Doc's story is true. I'm all for keeping baseball and sports in general, just keeping it pure, keeping a level playing field. You know, long before Doc Ellis and his LSD and Jose Konseko and his steroids, drugs and or elicit substances, they've always been part of the game. And as such, have given us great stories. Now, Doc and Jose being, of course, exhibits A and B, Jose was a punk in a lot of ways. Like I said before, like I mentioned in the full episode, the ratting out of other players, this brutal, you know.

And Doc, on the other hand, was punk rock. He was righteous. He was a true raconteur. you know, before punk rock even existed. He challenged the powers that be in baseball in the best possible way, calling out the league for its then systemic racism, refusing to conform as a player.

Doc was pretty punk rock, okay? Again, before we even had a name for it, before punk existed. And he was definitely, in his way, a rock star. And it got me thinking this obvious question, and I love this question. And again, it's an obvious thing to ask, but what athletes would have made the best rock stars?

What athletes had that rock star vibe? Or have? It can be a current athlete as well. I can be any jock from any era. Doc Ellis, Dennis Rodman, Patrick Mahomes, Dionne Sanders, of course. I mean, Michael Jordan, come on. I heard someone in our Patreon chat today.

I asked this question, and someone remarked that Peyton and Eli Manning are the Eddie and Alex Van Halen of football, which I think is a stretch. But I can kind of, if I bend my brain just right, I can kind of see what they mean. But I want to know what you guys think. Which athletes, let me know, 617-906-66-66-3-8.

Which athletes do you think could have been rock stars or just which athletes embodied that or embody that rock star vibe? 617-906-66-38. voicemail and text, I'll be back in a flash. So part of the Doc Ellis story that I uncovered today is the story of how he gave back after he left baseball. Doc Ellis was an addict, and he went through recovery after retiring, and he started his second career as a drug counselor with a focus on helping prisoners get clean. I found this story to be super comforting, to be inspiring.

I don't know if you guys have heard me talking about this lately, but it's something that's really occupying my brain. I find myself seeking out these charitable stories of goodwill when I'm in these dark story or coming out of these dark story wormholes. As you know, from listening to disgrace land, more often than not, we hit a number. note of redemption and the conclusion of our stories, but we seldom go deep into the acts of grace demonstrated by these subjects instead, of course, focusing on the disgrace. But on my own, late at night with the glow of the monitor, the phone giving me a headache, sort of, you know, just fucking wrapped in the darkness of researching or writing another episode about a disgraced figure for the dark side of entertainment, I find myself, like I said, seeking these stories

of grace out. It's a salve. It's a cleanse. It's a, it's a remote. It's a remote. It's a that there is a lot of good in the world, and the good goes unrecognized. The good goes unmentioned more often than not. And I do believe, even though the bad is being shouted at us by the loudest voices in the room, I do truly believe that the good outweighs the bad in this world. And when it came to Doc Ellis, I was happy that I didn't even have to dig too deep to find that good. He's a fascinating guy, and I encourage you to check him out. Pretty sure I'll be doing an episode on doc at some point. Story's just too damn good.

Now, as for other stories, beyond baseball. Last week, we dealt with the story of Tom Ripley in our first meeting of the Disgraced Land Book Club. Okay, this thing sprung up on our Patreon chat. And we all jumped on a Zoom last week, and we had a great conversation about Patricia Highsmith and her novel, The Talented Mr. Ripley. We obviously got into the film with Jude Law and Matt Damon, and we even talked about the Netflix series, Ripley. We're kind of in the Ripley universe. Great stories. Great stories there.

I had a lot of fun doing this, guys. If you're listening, thanks again. It was a blast to get to meet some of you guys, even though virtually get to put a face to the name, face to the avatar that I see on Instagram and I see you guys in the community chat. Like I said, on Patreon. Just great to connect. We have a second book club. We're going to do it in July. We don't have a date picked out yet, but we'll zero in on that date in the next couple of days. If you want to get ahead, the book that we're reading is Tell No One by Harlan Coben. That is a fantastic page turner. It is the definition of a page turner.

You're going to want to read this book. If you have read the book already, read it again. It's worth it. It's that good. It's that fucking good. Trust me. You know, you've read it. Anyways, we'll be announcing a date for the second meeting of the disgraceousand book club very shortly.

All right, this week, we, of course, launched this episode on Jose Konseco. Let's talk about the sources that we use for this episode, articles, newspaper articles, magazine articles, so many articles. Lots of sports writing, fascinating figure. Lots of people wanted to write Jose Konseco. This is the late 1980s, early 1990s, and Jose was a fixture in the news. Now, if you're not old enough to remember firsthand, this is the age of the baseball player as an undeniable cultural icon.

It's sad that it's not that way anymore, but just trust me. That's what it was like. Not that we hadn't had iconic baseball players in the past before the 80s. Of course we did. Babe Ruth, Joe DiMaggio, Hank Aaron, Ted Williams. The list goes on. Willie Mays, Reggie Jackson. But in the 80s and the 90s, you had Bo Jackson, okay?

Who was in these ubiquitous Nike commercials that were awesome. Bo Jackson and Bo Diddley. I mean, come on. You had Mark McGuire. You had Sammy Sosa. You had Jose Canseco. Again, these sort of like superhero characters, guys who are mashing taters like we'd never seen before. These guys turned baseball into such a spectacle

that people who didn't even like baseball were watching baseball. Okay, it was like a reality show before reality shows. Audiences tuned in to see who would take the lead in the home run race every night. It was awesome. It was awesome. The players did this largely, though,

with the help of steroids, which is not awesome. But we didn't know it at the time, so you can't blame us, right? Anyways, go listen to our Jose Cansego episode. You're going to hear more about that, the steroid era, specifically Jose's relationship with steroids.

And my point here is that Jose Canseco, for one, was incredible fodder for newspapers and magazines and not just because he was a great player, but also because he had this sort of thing going on with Madonna, later got trolled by fans in this amazing incident that I'm not going to rehash here, but it's in the episode, you've got to check it out. He was unapologetic about his steroid use,

which, you know, I go both ways on. It's a very complicated issue. here with Jose. But Jose Konseco, you know, he was in, as they say, the show. And Jose himself also was the show in a lot of ways. That's, I guess, the point I'm trying to make. So we didn't have to go far to find great articles, great sports writing on Jose Konseko. Sports Illustrated, there's a great article titled The Summer of His Discontent written by longtime Boston journalist Peter Gammon's great baseball writer. Boston journalist doesn't do Peter credit. He's, he's like the, one of the greatest baseball writers of all time. Pretty sure he's in the Hall of Fame. Yeah, he's definitely in

the Hall of Fame, where he should be if he's not. Anyways, you get an up close and personal look at how Jose felt, in his words, as a gorilla in a zoo with all the fans and haters, mainly in the cops who are clocking his every move. I mean, Jose got into a lot of trouble, as you're going to hear in this episode. Excuse me. Now when it comes to books, Jose Kinseko did write a book, or he got some help writing a book called Juiced Wild Times, rampant roids, smash hits and how baseball got big, key word there big. We approached this cautiously, this book.

We did not take it all as gospel because, well, was written by an unreliable narrator, Jose Canseco. But the whole story about what happened inside Madonna's place, that came directly from Jose and not in the book in an online interview. You've got to take some of this stuff, like I said, with a grain of salt, compare it and contrast it with what's been written out there by other reputable authors and publications.

But what do you think? Was Jose Canseco a rock star? You know who was from that era? Bo Jackson. Definitely a rock star. Like I said before, Dion Sanders, 617-90666-66-3-8. Doesn't have to just be baseball. Guys, give me a call, leave me a voicemail, send me a text.

Let me know who you think, which athletes you think best embody that rock star vibe, who could have been rock stars had they been given a different set of talents. Like I said, I'm leaning into this Dionne Sanders take. That's an obvious one. But Bo Jackson was just a phenomenon when he came out. He was phenomenal, excuse me, when he came out, unlike anyone else. And I think, yeah, I think Jose, as dopey as he was, and for all the blunders he made, he was in his way, a rock star. 617-906-66-38.

Let me know what you think. You can send me a text at that number, or you can leave me a voicemail, just like Barry in the 904. Hey, Jake. Bairing from the 904 gives me a chance to solve some baseball R for bulking up. True, but also when you're going through the grind of 162 game season, including the playoffs,

you don't have time to hit the gym every boy the ability to recover as quickly from your workouts and stay big like that. What the steroids did for the guys, not necessarily making them big, but recovering from injury. You can't, no matter what you do, a X-ray vision or whatever,

being able to turn around on a 95-mile-an-hour fast defeat, drug. It's not something that you get from. You know, you can't just, hey, I'm a teacher how to turn on a fastball. It's God-given or whatever you believe in. A little player, it's a shame that his legacy was tainted with, you know, some of his actions. But then again, how much of that actually played into the kind of player he was on the field, you know, helping him to.

Man, just like I said, appreciate the episode. Give me a chance to wrap about a little bit of face. Thanks, Jake. Later. Yeah, man. Barry, I hear you, steroids aren't going to help you turn on a 90-mile-an-hour fastball, that's for sure. And I think hitting a fastball in the major leagues is probably the hardest thing to do in sports.

But steroids are going to help you mash that baseball over the mass freaking pike if you're at Fenway Park and you're juiced on the roids. So you've got a point. And then I kind of like where you're going there with, you know, as Jose's behavior as disgraceful as it is, How much of that was responsible for the player that he became, that sort of animal attitude that he brought to the field? It's a good question, 617-906-66-66-3-8. I don't think you get the one without the other. I hope that answers you a question.

The 909, let's hear from the 909, the one after 909. Jake, you magnificent bastard. I'm seeing Dylan in concerts. I did so in 1991. I was working for a country radio station, and Dylan was doing a series of shows with the Kentucky Headhunters as his opening act, which weird bill, and look up the Kentucky Headhunters. We won't go into it here. But when Dylan comes out, he is backlit the entire show, so his face is completely dark. You can't see him.

You can hear him. You see the band playing, but you cannot see Dylan. And to this day, I still don't know if it was him. So that's my Dylan story. Love your stuff. I'll be listening to you on the pod. Thanks, Jake. You know, I see where you go with this 909.

Scott, wow, you kind of blow in my mind, man. Dylan is just the guy to do what you're suggesting, which is actually put on a concert but not actually put on a concert and have somebody stand in for him. I'm going to look this up. I don't believe it to be true, of course, but I'm not totally writing it off.

And there's a precedent here from music history. If you know the story of the zombies in ZZ Top, check that out. Scott, I'm not going to burn it here because eventually I want to do an episode on it. But there's a very close comp to your Dylan theory. All right.

All right, let's do some text. 617-906-66-36-3-8. 412 is writing in and apologizing in 4-1-2. I'm not sure what you're apologizing for for being so harsh. You sent me a bunch of voice memos, not voice mails, audio clips, which I have not listened to.

And I think if I upset you, I apologize for that, not my intent. Send me a voicemail. 617-9066-36-38. Just call and just leave you. a message, man. 317 writes in, hey, for biggest villains

in music industry, I think we need to add Phil Specter to that list, love your podcast, and always keeping me entertained. This is Lauren, who lives in the 208, but still has a 317 area code.

I hear you, Lauren. I still have my 617 area code, and I don't live in the 617 anymore, and I hear you about Phil Specter as well. Check out the series we produced a couple years back called Blood on the Tracks. We did 10 episodes on Phil, and you're right,

one of the biggest villains ever. Also, chapter on Phil in my book, disgrace land musicians getting away with murder and behaving very badly speaking of books nine for nine texts in uh hey i want to send you a copy of my book i think it'll be right up your alley it's a compilation of tour stories from some great bands damned x crass generation x bronx tsol and about 50 more can i send you one where can i set it thanks gregg gregg sends a picture of his book with this awesome cover uh book is entitled hell on wheels by greggs gregg jacobs sounds very familiar I will be in touch and I will give you an address to send the book to you.

Thanks very much. Everyone check out Greg's book, Hell on Wheels. Hey, Jake, it's Kel from 7-8-1. You read my text last week on the podcast, and I was like, oh shit, that's so fucking cool. I think Jerry Lee Lewis is right up there. Are Kelly possibly worse? Of course, I learned this from your podcast. I've learned so much from listening to your podcast.

Anyways, this ties with what you were talking about with Chaos and Charles Manson, etc., awesome book. When I told my mom who was born in 1952 about Jerry Lee Lewis, And the thing he did, she had never heard that. And I feel like she didn't really believe me. She's from that boomer era where they ignore bad shit like that. It's so fucking crazy. I did not put anything past this government.

I love my country. Distress the government or any of Hollywood, et cetera. As a country, we really need to wake the fuck up. Keep spitting that truth, Jake. I love you. Disgraceland, Rocka Rolla. Thank you. Hey, thanks, Kel.

Appreciate that. Give your mom a hug. You know, I've been harsh to the boomers here in the past. And unnecessarily, I think, on my own. I want to just say that right now. And, you know, your mom, yeah, you know, I don't know your mom, but give her a hug, right? You can't go wrong. All right, we're going to get out of this block.

We're going to take a quick break, and we're going to be back in a flash. All right, we are back. And as I mentioned, at the top of the show, it seems like everywhere you look, there are insane stories about Jose Konseko. So many that we weren't able to fit them all into this week's episode, and we want to get into them now. But you know the drill. There's a caveat, and this is all happening over in the Disgraceland All-Axed version of this year after-party bonus episode. If you haven't signed up for all-access yet, here's the deal. Just go to disgracelandpod.com slash membership.

And for just $5 a month, even less, if you sign up for an annual membership, you will get exclusive weekly bonus content like the extended version of the after party that we're talking about right now. Plus, you're going to get exclusive scripted episodes every month like our episodes on Hunterrest Thompson, Lane Staley of Alice and Chan. Baskia, Chris Cornell, got a Waylon Jennings one coming next, all right? And you can also listen to every single episode of disgrace land in our archive absolutely ad-free. You can sign up either using Apple Podcasts or Patreon. And if you choose Patreon,

you're going to get immediate access to our members-only chat, which is always on, which includes not just your fellow discos in there, talking about movies and music and television and books, but also myself. I'm in there pretty much daily, and I'm talking with everybody as well. We get about four different threads going on at all times, at least. Disgracelampot.com slash membership.

Get in here with us this week, end of this week, Friday, in our Patreon All Access membership club in the chat. We're going to be revealing some new merch that we have. And we're going to give the All Access members. We're going to give them a first swing at buying this merch before anyone else so that in case it sells out, our All Access members, You know, they're getting that first bite at the apple. So again, you want in on that?

Disgraceland all access. Okay, disgracelandpod.com slash membership. Back in a flash. All right, let's recap, shall we? Number one, there is more after-party to listen to right now. All you got to do is go to disgracelandpod.com slash membership. Sign up to become an all-access member. But if that ain't your bag, the number two, right now in your feed.

This week's brand new episode on Jose Canseco, number three, coming tomorrow, a rewind episode on XXXTentacion. Number four next week in the disgrace and feed an episode on OJ Simpson. We're coming up on the 4th of July. What's more American than OJ Simpson? Number five, my number is 617-906-66-6638. Call me on the telephone or text me number six.

Remember, no one cares about these stories more than you do, and well, that's a disgrace. And now my moment of bliss in honor of this week's episode on Jose Kinseko, me reading you, the phone book from Oakland, California, circa 1960. Richardson L. West Almeda.

341-679E. Richards P. 22 Elm. 3679. Richards. Paul. 54 Maine. 367-89. Ricardo P. 224th. 6-7-9. Rico Bono, Pau, 641-641-9-2.

Rico Bono, P, Steve, 22, 6-1-39799. Rico Boe L, Paul, West, and start mixing.