Sexson: Guessing Doesn’t Work

If you live in Seattle, or follow baseball at all, you know that signing Richie Sexson to a 4-year, $50 million contract was just one of many bad decisions by Mariners’ management. Honorable mentions include: a) signing Carlos Silva to a 4-year, $48 million dollar contract, b) replacing Jose Guillen with Brad Wilkerson (of the Strikeout Hall of Fame — the other member is Richie Sexson), who, by the way, is now a Toronto Blue Jay, and c) paying Jose Vidro to DH. Well hallelujah, Mariners! Yesterday, you did the right thing by releasing Richie Sexson. Sure, you’re going to eat at least $6 million this year on him regardless of what you do with him, but at least you can get some young talent some at-bats, or, I don’t know, try to win.

Considering the nearly monumental struggles of Sexson over the past three seasons, I ventured out to talk to some people close to Sexson to try and gain some insight as to how Richie is going to react to the news of his release. I was amazed at what I learned.

During an interview with local optomitrist Dr. Richard Gentry, he mentioned that he’d, “talked to [Richie Sexson] several times over the last three years during his regular, and emergency, appointments about lasik eye surgery, or at the very least, wearing contract lenses. Every time I’d suggest it he’d dismiss me with a wave of his hand, like he was shooing a dog away. ” When we asked Dr. Gentry the reasoning behind Richie’s refusal to improve his vision, he responded, “That stupid sonofabitch told me he enjoyed going up to the plate guessing on each pitch. And that he was still basking in the glory of pulling the wool over the owners’ eyes, getting them to sign him to a huge, albeit undeserved, contract. ‘It was the HGH,’ [Richie] told me.”

I couldn’t believe that Sexson had admitted this to his eye doctor, let alone anyone at all. Common sense says that if he was that chummy with his eye doctor, who he saw once every six months, unless there was an emergency (note: we learned during our discussion with Dr. Gentry that the “emergency” visits Richie made to the eye doctor often occurred in the days after he had struck out four times in one game. “[Sexson] insisted that getting his pupils dialated helped him pick up the ball better for the next couple of days,” Gentry recalled.), then it was likely that he’d spilled more beans to closer people. With that logic, we struck out to find a close childhood friend of Richie Sexson, Jamal Winters.

After searching for a couple of weeks we managed to track down Jamal. “I grew up wit’ Richie, man! He a strong cat who gonna bounce back fine.” When asked how he thinks Richie will handle the release, Jamal said, “I ain’t worried ’bout his game, bro, but that crazy bast*rd be sippin’ on some sizzurp all the time, man! He always on the sauce.” Curious, we followed up.

“Jamal,” I said, “what do you mean ‘he always on the sauce’? Are you saying he has a drinking problem?”

“Nah, man,” he scoffs. “It ain’t always booze, amigo, he been into some hard sh*t before.”

“How hard?”

“How hard you wanna get, holmes? Roids and HGH, bro! He once ate ’shrooms before a doubleheader too, man! There, I said it. I said it. That’s all I’m gonna say. Get the f–k outta here.”

And the f–k outta there I got. Quick, cause I think he was pulling out a gun. Now, I’m in the midst of uncovering a whole new side of Richie Sexson; a dark side. Frankly, it’s a side that most Seattleites have long suspected lurking around behind the facade of strikeouts and Tom Foolery on the baseball diamond.

With the Mariners being on the road the day of his dismissal, we ventured out to an infamous baseball haunt right near Safeco Field, Sluggers, in search of commentary on Richie Sexson.

One regular Sluggers patron who requested not to be named stated, “yeah, I saw him out at a club once. Man, is he tall in person! He seems smaller at the plate. He was so hammered though. I gave him a little sh*t about him striking out like four times the day before against the Angels, and he looked at me with these f–ked up, red, crazy eyes and took a huge swing at me! Obviously he missed, but c’mon. He’s a big dude.”

I have a feeling that I’ve just seen the tip of the iceberg in the story that is Richie Sexson. My next step? I’m off to track down Dan Dickau, fellow alumnus of Richie’s at Prairie High School, in Brush Prairie, WA. Stay tuned.

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