With the Turkey Day semi-holiday upon us (news never sleeps, cabrones), I'm finally able to whittle through months of back issues–finished the Esquire with Justin Timberlake on it, Reason with Rand Paul, the Harper's featuring a hilarious Thomas Frank essay on the popularity of self-help books, and many, many more. Men's Journal with that True Blood guy was okay, but it did have a fascinating interview with former baseball manager Bobby Valentine.
The magazine asked Valentine who's the toughest guy he knew, and he replied with Tommy Lasorda, the longtime Los Angeles Dodgers manager and longtime Fullerton resident.
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Because he once bitched out a reporter who asked a simple question about Dave Kingman? For antagonizing the San Francisco Giants all those years? Maybe dealing with Pedro Guerrero?
Nah, it's because Lasorda beat up a teen.
“He was tough with his fists,” Valentine said. “I saw him in front of his house one day hit
a kid who had been speeding by on a motorcycle. Knocked him across the
hood of a car.”
Lasorda, of course, has lived in Fullerton for nearly 50 years and nowhere else in that time. No need for Valentine to lie about the incident, so it leaves us with the image of Lasorda being as much of an asshole off the field as on–fun!
Okay, can't resist:
