THE NAIL FILE

Author

Matthew Garringer
August 14, 2023

Good evening. This is Dead Legends. The daily newsletter that loves baseball as much as Derek Jeter hates Joe Buck.

Let’s dive in.

Today’s story is about a cheating pitcher who got caught red handed in the middle of a game.

Since the dawn of baseball, players have tried to get an edge any way they can.

Whether it’s foreign substances or full-on steroids, there’s a lot of guys that operate by the old adage “if you ain’t cheatin’ you ain’t tryin’.”

There’s also another saying “cheaters never prosper,” and Joe Niekro learned that lesson the hard way on August 3, 1987.

Joe is less known than his Hall-of-Fame brother, Phil, but nonetheless, on that night, he provided us with one of the most memorable ejections in the history of the game.

It was an away game in California versus the Angels, and Niekro was serving up nasty knucks through the first four innings.

The score was 2-2.

Angels manager, John McNamara, thought Joe’s pitches were a little too nasty, and he asked the umpires to conduct a search of Joe to see if he was doctoring the baseball in some way.

At first, they didn’t find anything.

Niekro was selling it pretty well too, swearing up and down that he had nothing on him.

But then this happened.

Turns out, Joe was using an emery board (nail file) to scuff up the ball.

When the umpires asked him to empty his pockets, he flung the file, hoping that no one would notice - but literally EVERYONE noticed.

Niekro was immediately ejected and ended up getting suspended for 10 games because of this stunt, but now it’s what most people remember him for.

Our friends at Dugout Mugs turn baseball bats into drinkware, and sometimes they offer some pretty insane deals.

Today they’re running these cherry-stained mascot mugs for 20 bucks.

Usually, these go for $70.

Quick Links:

And of course, the other 21 MLB mascots are available too.

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:

Rags’ name itself is an oxymoron.

He’s pretty much a ghost on the internet, but what we know about him is that Faircloth spent five years in the minor leagues and just a couple innings in the big leagues.

His stats were definitely nothing to write home about, but he’ll always be remembered for his unique nickname.

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