John Rocker

Full Name: John Loy Rocker	Primary Position: P
Height/Weight: 6' 4"/210	First Game: May 5, 1998
Birthdate: October 17, 1974	Final Game: May 14, 2003
Birthplace: Statesboro, Georgia	MLB Experience: 6 years
Bat/Throw: Right/Left

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1 Biography
2 Statistics
3 Transactions
4 Trivia
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[edit] Biography

John Loy Rocker (born October 17 1974) is a former American Major League Baseball relief pitcher, who played the better-known part of his career in 3 1/2 seasons with the Atlanta Braves, before being traded to the Cleveland Indians. He later played with the Texas Rangers and Tampa Bay Devil Rays. He is a native of Macon, Georgia and currently resides in Atlanta.

[edit] Early career

Rocker graduated from First Presbyterian Day School in Macon, Georgia, in 1993, where he starred as a dominating pitcher; he threw three no-hitters during high school. He was soon drafted by the Atlanta Braves. He started showing wild antics similar to those of Mark Fidrych from the beginning of his career. After a rocky minor league career - in his fourth season (1997), he was still at Double-A Greenville - he was converted into a reliever.

This worked well for him. The next year, he was promoted to the major-league club and ended up becoming the closer after an injury to Kerry Ligtenberg. He finished the 1998 season with an earned run average of 2.13 in 38 innings pitched.

1999 proved to be Rocker's best year. After becoming the Braves' full-time closer, he converted 38 saves and had an ERA of 2.49 in 74 games. It was at this point that he was starting to be seen by many sportswriters as one of the next great closers in baseball.

[edit] Controversy

While at his peak as Atlanta's closer, the former Mercer University star and Georgia native was heavily criticized for making statements that were considered racist, anti-homosexual and sexist. Speaking of New York City, Rocker told Sports Illustrated in January 2000: "It's the most hectic, nerve-racking city. Imagine having to take the 7 Train to the ballpark, looking like you're riding through Beirut next to some kid with purple hair, next to some queer with AIDS, right next to some dude who just got out of jail for the fourth time, right next to some 20-year-old mom with four kids. It's depressing." (Rocker's feud with New York City began in earnest during the 1999 National League Championship Series against the New York Mets, during which Mets fans allegedly threw batteries at him.) Also during the interview (conducted while driving to a speaking engagement in Atlanta), he spat on a Georgia 400 toll machine and mocked Asian women. Additionally, he referred to then-teammate Randall Simon as being a "fat monkey." He is also a notorious anti-Semite, once commenting about ESPN.com writer Jeff Pearlman by saying: "Jeff Pearlman is who he is: A liberal Jew from New York. He's one of their own, who spent a couple of hours with me, pulled things out of context, and you're trying to create a persona of an individual when you don't know them."

Although Rocker later apologized after speaking with Hank Aaron and Andrew Young, he later made additional controversial comments.Template:Fact For his comments, he was suspended without pay for the remainder of spring training and the first 28 games of the 2000 season, which on appeal was reduced to 14 games (without a spring-training suspension).

During the debacle, on The Tonight Show, Jay Leno had guests take baseball bats and whack a John Rocker dummy. Saturday Night Live lampooned the affair by having a skit about Rocker, much to the delight of the New York City crowd that it was filmed before. SNL's Weekend Update anchor Colin Quinn added, "I don't like the guy either, but he has been riding the 7 train." In Sports Night (Aaron Sorkin's short-lived TV series), Sorkin takes a shot at Rocker when fictional sportscasters Casey McCall (Peter Krause) and Dan Rydell (Josh Charles) agree on-air that, "John Rocker is a big honking dufus."

In June 2006, Rocker inserted himself into the Ozzie Guillen–Jay Mariotti controversy by defending his former teammate's right to say offensive things. "This is a free country. If he wants to use a lewd term, he should be able to use a lewd term," Rocker told the Chicago Tribune. "Can't you use a lewd term in America if you want?" [1]. Referring to sensitivity training he is quoted as saying "It was a farce, a way for the scared little man, Bud Selig, to get people off his [backside],". He claimed that when he attended mandatory sensitivity training, that he only stayed for 15 minutes. He also claimed he never paid the $500 fine that was levied against him.

[edit] Rocker's Return to NYC

On June 29, 2000, Rocker appeared in front of 46,987 fans at Shea Stadium for the first time since making the remarks. Over 700 police officers were summoned for the game (usually 60 are summoned) and 300 press passes were given out. A limit on beer sales was imposed. A special protective cover was erected over the Braves' bullpen in left field. During batting practice, fans were barred from sitting in the first four rows behind the Braves' dugout. A videotaped apology from Rocker was shown on Shea Stadium's 26-foot-tall screen in left-center field before the start of the game between the Mets and the Braves. The video was loudly booed. Signs stating NYC Says No to RocKKKer and Rocker's a Bigot could be seen throughout Shea.

In the 8th inning, Rocker came in to replace Jason Marquis on the mound. He was loudly booed and some objects were thrown, a large chant of "ASSHOLE, ASSHOLE!" began too, but nothing got out of hand. Rocker struck out Robin Ventura, retired Todd Zeile on a grounder to short, and got Jay Payton to ground out to third. The Braves went on to win, 6-4. Rocker left the stadium a half-hour after the rest of the team in a black van trailed by three security vehicles.

[edit] Post-controversy

At first, Atlanta Braves fans were willing to support him. However, Rocker received intense taunting from opposing teams' fans, and continued to receive abuse from New York Mets fans. His pitching performance declined. In 2001, Rocker was traded to the Cleveland Indians, with whom he played in the 2001 ALDS against the Seattle Mariners. Some Mariners fans claimed that Rocker threw cups of sports drink on them to answer heckling before Game 2. He was later traded to the Texas Rangers, where he refused designation to the minor leagues because poor performance. In 2003, he played two games for the Tampa Bay Devil Rays before being released.

Rocker made his screen-acting debut in the 2002 horror comedy The Greenskeeper as a murderous golf-club groundskeeper.[2]

He took the 2004 season off to recover from surgery on his left shoulder. In 2005, he signed with the Long Island Ducks of the independent Atlantic League in an attempt to revive his career. In April 2005, he asked New Yorkers to "bury the hatchet", claiming his willingness to play in Long Island proved he had matured since his controversial comments.

However, after going 0-2 with a 6.50 ERA in 23 games, he was released on June 27, 2005. Through a statement released by the team said, "After pitching for two months with the Long Island Ducks, the consistency required to pitch at the major league level, and the consistency I demand from myself, are not where they should be... I have elected to take a step back and re-evaluate the options available to me."

In 2006, Rocker appeared on the Spike TV network's Pros vs. Joes, a program that pits retired professional athletes against amateurs. In March 2006, Rocker made tabloid headlines by being seen around town with African American sports writer and fitness model Alicia Marie who covered a Pros vs. Joes event where she interviewed Rocker for WideWebofSports.com. Alicia's Interview with Rocker

[edit] "Speak English"

Most recently, Rocker, along with his girlfriend, formed a "Speak English" campaign that promotes the "preservation of American heritage and American culture" by promoting the universal knowledge of English in America. Rocker appeared on The O'Reilly Factor on November 22, 2006 to promote his campaign and was recently interviewed by Will Leitch for the popular sports blog Deadspin.

[edit] Players Named in the Mitchell Report

John Rocker was named in the Mitchell Report -- In March 2007, Sports Illustrated reported that, according to the Applied Pharmacy Services database, former pitcher John Rocker received two prescriptions for human growth hormone (somatropin) between April and July 2003. Rocker initially denied the allegations, but his spokesperson later reportedly said that Rocker had been prescribed human growth hormone in connection with shoulder surgery.

[edit] Statistics

[edit] Pitching Stats

Year	Team		G	W	L	ERA	K	R	ER	SV	IP	H	HR	BB	IB	WP	HBP
1998	ATL	N	47	1	3	2.13	42	10	9	2	38	22	4	22	4	6	3
1999	ATL	N	74	4	5	2.49	104	24	20	38	72.1	47	5	37	4	7	1
2000	ATL	N	59	1	2	2.89	77	25	17	24	53	42	5	48	4	5	2
2001	CLE	A	38	3	7	5.45	43	23	21	4	34.2	33	2	25	3	6	3
2001	ATL	N	30	2	2	3.09	36	13	11	19	32	25	2	16	1	5	2
2001	Total		68	5	9	4.32	79	36	32	23	66.2	58	4	41	4	11	5
2002	TEX	A	30	2	3	6.66	30	19	18	1	24.1	29	5	13	1	0	0
2003	TB	A	2	0	0	9.00	0	1	1	0	1	2	0	3	0	0	1
Total	NL		210	8	12	2.63	259	72	57	83	195.1	136	16	123	13	23	8
Total	AL		70	5	10	6.00	73	43	40	5	60	64	7	41	4	6	4
Total			280	13	22	3.42	332	115	97	88	255.1	200	23	164	17	29	12

[edit] Fielding Stats

Year	Team		POS	G	INN	PO	A	ERR	DP	PB	SB	CS	PkO	AVG
1998	ATL	N	P	47	38	1	6	0	0	0	2	0	0	1.000
1999	ATL	N	P	74	72.1	1	10	0	0	2	3	1	0	1.000
2000	ATL	N	P	59	53	1	6	0	0	0	6	0	0	1.000
2001	CLE	A	P	38	34.2	2	4	3	0	0	7	1	1	.667
2001	ATL	N	P	30	32	1	4	1	0	1	0	0	0	.833
2001	Total		P	68	66.2	3	8	4	0	1	7	1	1	.733
2002	TEX	A	P	30	24.1	1	2	1	1	3	1	1	0	.750
2003	TB	A	P	2	1	0	0	0	0	0	0	0	0	.000
Total			P	280	255.1	7	32	5	1	6	19	3	1	.886

[edit] Batting Stats

Year	Team		G	AVG	OBP	SLG
1998	ATL	N	47	.000	.000	.000
1999	ATL	N	74	.000	.000	.000
2000	ATL	N	59	.000	.000	.000
2001	CLE	A	38	.000	.000	.000
2001	ATL	N	30	.000	.000	.000
2001	Total		68	.000	.000	.000
2002	TEX	A	30	.000	.000	.000
2003	TB	A	2	.000	.000	.000
Total	NL		210	.000	.000	.000
Total	AL		70	.000	.000	.000
Total			280	.000	.000	.000

[edit] Transactions

Selected by Atlanta Braves in the 18th round of the free-agent draft (June 3, 1993 - signed August 23, 1993).
Traded by Atlanta Braves with Troy Cameron to Cleveland Indians in exchange for Steve Karsay and Steve Reed (June 22, 2001).
Traded by Cleveland Indians to Texas Rangers in exchange for Dave Elder (December 18, 2001).
Released by Texas Rangers (October 3, 2002).
Signed by Tampa Bay Devil Rays (April 10, 2003).
Released by Tampa Bay Devil Rays (June 27, 2003).