| Players Behaving Badly.com Denny McLain The Life and Crimes of a 30 Game Winner |
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Post Baseball Career of Lies and Crimes
In his post-baseball career, his weight ballooned to 300 pounds. McLain continued to earn side money at clubs playing the organ, which his father taught him
to play. McLain also earned quite a bit of money hustling golf, easily attracting 'marks' due to his past baseball fame.
McLain then started to get involved in felonious activities; he reportedly once accepted over $100,000 to fly a wanted felon out of the country. He was
imprisoned for drug trafficking, embezzlement, and racketeering with Anthony Spilotro and later John Gotti Jr. Attorney Lawrence R. Greene represented
McLain before the United States Court of Appeals for the 11th Circuit in Atlanta, where his RICO conviction obtained in the United States District Court for the
Central District of Florida at Tampa was reversed. Between his stints in prison and rehabilitation in the mid-1980s to the early 1990s, McLain could be found
on various sports shows on talk radio and occasionally on panel-format sports shows on network television in the Detroit area. He could also be found signing
autographs at a metro Detroit 7-Eleven store at the corner of Mound Road and Metro Parkway in Sterling Heights, Michigan, where he was employed on
work-release. During the Detroit Tigers 2006 playoff run, McLain was the baseball analyst for Drew and Mike on WRIF radio in Detroit.
In 2007, McLain released his autobiography "I Told You I Wasn't Perfect", co-authored by longtime Detroit sportscaster and author Eli Zaret.
In his post-baseball career, his weight ballooned to 300 pounds. McLain continued to earn side money at clubs playing the organ, which his father taught him
to play. McLain also earned quite a bit of money hustling golf, easily attracting 'marks' due to his past baseball fame.
McLain then started to get involved in felonious activities; he reportedly once accepted over $100,000 to fly a wanted felon out of the country. He was
imprisoned for drug trafficking, embezzlement, and racketeering with Anthony Spilotro and later John Gotti Jr. Attorney Lawrence R. Greene represented
McLain before the United States Court of Appeals for the 11th Circuit in Atlanta, where his RICO conviction obtained in the United States District Court for the
Central District of Florida at Tampa was reversed. Between his stints in prison and rehabilitation in the mid-1980s to the early 1990s, McLain could be found
on various sports shows on talk radio and occasionally on panel-format sports shows on network television in the Detroit area. He could also be found signing
autographs at a metro Detroit 7-Eleven store at the corner of Mound Road and Metro Parkway in Sterling Heights, Michigan, where he was employed on
work-release. During the Detroit Tigers 2006 playoff run, McLain was the baseball analyst for Drew and Mike on WRIF radio in Detroit.
In 2007, McLain released his autobiography "I Told You I Wasn't Perfect", co-authored by longtime Detroit sportscaster and author Eli Zaret.
Downfall of McLain's Baseball Career
In addition to arm trouble, allegations of bookmaking and associations with gamblers and underworld criminals shortened
Denny McLain's career. Early in his career, McLain’s interest in betting on horses was piqued by Chuck Dressen, one of his
first managers. McLain’s descent into his gambling obsession was further precipitated by an offhand remark made during an
interview—that he drank about a case of Pepsi a day. (When he pitched, he was known to down a Pepsi between innings.) A
representative from Pepsi then offered McLain a contract with the company, just for doing a few endorsements. McLain soon
realized that he and the Pepsi rep shared an affinity for gambling; when the two realized how much money they were losing,
and that they could earn so much more by ‘taking the action’ on bets, they attempted to set up a bookmaking operation as
hands-off, silent partners.
After Sports Illustrated broke a story about McLain's nefarious activities, he was suspended by Commissioner Bowie Kuhn
for the first three months of the 1970 season; McLain received another suspension later that year for carrying a gun on a
team flight. Also, Sports Illustrated reported that a foot injury suffered by McLain late in 1967 had been caused when an
organized crime figure stomped on it for McLain's failure to pay off on a bet. (McLain missed six starts because of this injury,
coming back to pitch and lose the Tigers' final game of the season against the California Angels, which cost his team the
1967 pennant.) McLain’s ‘official’ story of what caused the injury kept changing—often a sign of prevarication or duplicity: he
once claimed that he had kicked his locker after a particularly disappointing start, another time that he had fallen asleep
watching television and then wrenched his toes against some furniture when he woke up in the dark, and another time that
he had kicked some garbage cans being ‘terrorized’ by squirrels.
He attempted a comeback with the Washington Senators the following year, but went 10-22. (He thus earned the dubious
distinction of being the only player to go from leading his league in wins [24, in 1969] to two years later leading his league in
losses.) McLain last played in the majors in 1972 at age 28, after briefly pitching for the Oakland A's and Atlanta Braves,
going 4-7 with a 6.37 ERA. The Braves, who had acquired McLain from Oakland in a trade for future Hall of Famer Orlando
Cepeda, released McLain on March 26, 1973.
In addition to arm trouble, allegations of bookmaking and associations with gamblers and underworld criminals shortened
Denny McLain's career. Early in his career, McLain’s interest in betting on horses was piqued by Chuck Dressen, one of his
first managers. McLain’s descent into his gambling obsession was further precipitated by an offhand remark made during an
interview—that he drank about a case of Pepsi a day. (When he pitched, he was known to down a Pepsi between innings.) A
representative from Pepsi then offered McLain a contract with the company, just for doing a few endorsements. McLain soon
realized that he and the Pepsi rep shared an affinity for gambling; when the two realized how much money they were losing,
and that they could earn so much more by ‘taking the action’ on bets, they attempted to set up a bookmaking operation as
hands-off, silent partners.
After Sports Illustrated broke a story about McLain's nefarious activities, he was suspended by Commissioner Bowie Kuhn
for the first three months of the 1970 season; McLain received another suspension later that year for carrying a gun on a
team flight. Also, Sports Illustrated reported that a foot injury suffered by McLain late in 1967 had been caused when an
organized crime figure stomped on it for McLain's failure to pay off on a bet. (McLain missed six starts because of this injury,
coming back to pitch and lose the Tigers' final game of the season against the California Angels, which cost his team the
1967 pennant.) McLain’s ‘official’ story of what caused the injury kept changing—often a sign of prevarication or duplicity: he
once claimed that he had kicked his locker after a particularly disappointing start, another time that he had fallen asleep
watching television and then wrenched his toes against some furniture when he woke up in the dark, and another time that
he had kicked some garbage cans being ‘terrorized’ by squirrels.
He attempted a comeback with the Washington Senators the following year, but went 10-22. (He thus earned the dubious
distinction of being the only player to go from leading his league in wins [24, in 1969] to two years later leading his league in
losses.) McLain last played in the majors in 1972 at age 28, after briefly pitching for the Oakland A's and Atlanta Braves,
going 4-7 with a 6.37 ERA. The Braves, who had acquired McLain from Oakland in a trade for future Hall of Famer Orlando
Cepeda, released McLain on March 26, 1973.
