Good evening. This is Dead Legends. First and foremost, congrats to Shohei Ohtani on signing the largest contract in baseball history.

For those of you wondering, it also buys about 271,317,829 bags of Funyuns.

Let's dive in.

Today's story is about a ballplayer who spent half-a-million dollars blackmailing umpires in the early 90's.

Lenny Dykstra has been hellbent on torching his reputation ever since he retired; writing bad checks to prostitutes, excessive drug use, and allegedly flying private on his employee's credit card are just a few of the scandals that Dykstra has been involved in.

Funny enough though, he had NEVER been involved in any controversy before getting to the big leagues; he was completely dedicated to making his baseball dreams a reality - no distractions.

Dykstra says he never even had a sip of alcohol until he got to the MLB.

The he broke into the league with the '85 Mets, a group of guys who were notorious for partying all night and crushing their opponents the next day.

Ironically, Lenny didn't even participate in the shenanigans when he was in New York, but he hated his manager, who refused to make him a starter despite his consistent performance.

Even after helping the Mets win a World Series in '86, Dykstra still couldn’t get the playing time he was looking for.

So after some complaining, Dykstra was traded to Philly in '89 and became an everyday player.

Unfortunately, that season didn't go too well for him; he had the worst batting average of his career - hitting only .222 with the Phillies.

He knew that the following season was going to determine his next contract and the future of his career, so he did exactly what you’d expect: got on the juice.

When Dykstra started using 'roids, it was actually legal and he had a prescription for it.

And it worked like a charm! Just look at this insane transformation:

The next year, he hit .325 and made his first All-Star Game, which also resulted in a five-year, $13.3 million contract.

Shortly after, steroids were made illegal in the U.S. and banned in Major League Baseball.

Over the next two years, Lenny lost a bunch of money gambling, drunkenly crashed his car into a tree, and then re-injured his collar bone after colliding with an outfield wall.

He knew it was key to put up big numbers in '93, so he came up with a master plan.

Blackmail the umpires.

That's right, Dykstra says he spent $500K on private investigators to dig up dirt on almost every umpire in the league.

He knew who was cheating on their wife, who was betting on games, and he even threatened to out an umpire who he found out was gay.

Unsurprisingly, he led the league in walks that year.

He also finished second in the MVP race and locked in a four-year $25 million contract.

That made him the highest-paid Phillies player in history at that point.

Somehow, he still ended up going through all that cash - but that's a whole 'nother story.

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BASEBALL TRIVIA

STRANGE NAMES 

If you're just joining us, we play this game every day where we try to find the weirdest names throughout baseball history.

Why? Don't ask us, it's just something we like to do.

If you've been rocking with us for awhile now, you know what time it is.

Today's winner is:

Diddlebock became the manager for the St. Louis Browns in the 1896 season, appointed by owner Chris von der Ahe.

Before that, he had never played or managed in the major leagues; he was a sports writer.

The team, not well-liked at the time, but people were supportive of Diddlebock taking the reins.

This is, until a $30,000 deal for star players from Philly hit a financial snag; Von der Ahe blamed Diddlebock for the leak.

There are several versions of the events that led to Diddlebock’s firing, including a story where he was attacked by six men and arrived at the ballpark with a bruised face.

He only managed 17 games, and finished with a 7-10 record.

THE DEAD LEGENDS ARCHIVE

If you like this story, check out some of our past favorites:

• The Wild Horse: Yasiel Puig goes through hell to escape Cuba

• The Million-Dollar Dinger: Jay Bell makes a fan an instant millionaire with one swing

• The Bizarre Death of Len Koenecke: A failed season, a hijacked plane, and a self-defense murder