The precious HBO comedy Eastbound and Down informs the story of Kenny Powers, an obnoxious yet in some way capitivating Southern guy who falls from grace after his baseball profession increases in flames.
When the program debuted, its star and co-creator Danny McBride informed NPR that Powers was basically motivated by John Rocker, a real-life previous MLB pitcher whose credibility nose-dived after a questionable 1999 Sports Illustrated interview. (Fun truth: McBride and Rocker were born in the exact same medical facility in Statesboro, GA.)
Rocker was greatly slammed in his day, and appropriately so– however in spite of his struggling past, some individuals could not assist however love him.
10 years after his retirement, VICE fulfilled John Rocker in Cooperstown, NY, the home of the National Baseball Hall of Fame. Rocker stated he ‘d “seen a couple of episodes” of Eastbound. When asked how he feels about contrasts in between him and Kenny Powers, he stated, “It’s great. A minimum of they make it amusing.” He appeared to choose manufacturer Will Ferrell’s SNL impressions of him.
Rocker was 24 when he was brought up to the big leagues.
“I can keep in mind the very first day I was on the major league field,” he stated with an appearance of fond memories. He described that he had actually dedicated to this dream every day for a years– given that he was virtually 14 years of ages.
“My approach was, I need to do something every day to play in the major leagues,” he stated, whether it was exercising, extending, practicing, checking out a book or publication about baseball, seeing a video game, or keeping some other effective practice. When he lastly made it, he believed, “They can’t ever take this far from me.”
At the peak of his profession, nevertheless, John did that eventful Sports Illustrated interview. His racist, homophobic, and xenophobic remarks about New York City and its locals would go on to haunt him for years.
“The media depicts me in an unfavorable light,” he informed VICE. “There’s not a story much sexier than bigotry. Why are they so adamantly adhered to it?”
He rejected that his remarks had anything to do with his retiring from the major leagues. Rather, he stated, it was a shoulder injury. “They identified the pinched nerve on my neck, however no one had anything to repair it. It would take me 30 minutes of extending and 15 minutes of tossing to get loose to toss one inning and toss 86 miles an hour.”
“What began to be an arthroscopic offer ended up being a four-and-a-half-hour surgical treatment,” he continued. 2 of his rotator cuff muscles were 85% torn and his labrum was detached the bone, amongst lots of other problems. “My shoulder was simply ruined,” he stated. “You could not pitch like that.”
Where is John Rocker today? When he appeared on Survivor
