Short Hops: Pedro Guerrero by Will Leitch

Will Leitch is a Contributing Editor at New York Magazine, the founder of Deadspin, and a St. Louis Cardinals fan. You can find him on here on Tumblr, and on Twitter at @williamfleitch. He selected Pedro Guerrero as a first baseman that epitomized the 1990s in first sackers.

Pedro Guerrero. The first baseman for some rather miserable Cardinals teams managed by Joe Torre, he was long past his prime by the time he came to St. Louis, thanks to age, a ruptured tendon and a lingering friendship with O.J. Simpson. He still had a decent couple of years, passably impersonating a power hitter, or at least what a power hitter looked like to Cardinals fans at the time, and reaching double digits in home runs TWICE. He also, on one evening in July 1990, when a ball was hit three feet to his right, is rumored to have twitched. He was replaced by Andres Gallarraga, then Gregg Jeffries, then John Mabry, then Dmitri Young, then Mark McGwire. After his career was over, he was arrested trying to buy 33 pounds of cocaine, but the charges were dropped because -- and I swear I am not kidding -- his lawyer successfully lobbied the judge to give him lenience because "his IQ was too low" to understand what he was doing. His friendship with O.J. ultimately soured, when Simpson called 911 on him in 1999, claiming that Pedro had abducted his girlfriend and was binging on cocaine with her. He is still alive, somehow.