Born in Havana, Cuba on July 2, 1964, Jose Canseco is one of the most colorful baseball players in recent memory. Canseco has...

  • been arrested for excessive speeding and handgun possession.
  • had a ball bounce off of his head and over the fence for a home run
  • seen his first wife go on a public rampage after a loss, calling his manager a "punk"
  • suggested that baseball use a bright orange ball that would be worth more runs when hit out of the park
  • gone on the disabled list after hurting himself pitching curveballs in a brief relief stint with the Texas Rangers
  • claimed that if he played outfield his whole career, he would have had 500 home runs and 600 errors.
  • been elected to the All-Star team without playing a single game in that season
Despite all this, Canseco, when healthy, is one of the most feared sluggers in the majors, and has compiled a list of accolades...

  • Became baseball's first 40-40 man in 1988 (hit 40 home runs and stole 40 bases in the same season)
  • Won the American League Rookie Of The Year award in 1986
  • Won the American League MVP in 1988
  • Became the first foreign-born player in history to hit the 400 home run plateau.
Through 1999, Canseco has hit 431 home runs in his career, which ranks 25th all-time, and driven in 1,309 which ranks 70th on the list. He has played for Oakland (where he and Mark McGwire were known as the Bash Brothers), Texas, Boston, Toronto, and Tampa Bay.

Addendum:

  1. In 1992 Jose Canseco was convicted of assault for intentionally crashing his car into the car of his first wife (community service).
  2. In 1997 he was convicted of beating his wife (counseling).
  3. Jose Canseco was the first pro athlete to get on Madonna (though Charles Barkley was waiting in the wings).
  4. He has an identical twin brother named Ozzie, who was drafted as a pitcher but found his calling as an inconsistent, minor-league slugger--so inconsistent that his career ranges from his outright release from a Korean league one year to an Atlantic League record 48 homeruns the next, only to fall apart again the next season.
  5. Jose and his brother were each jailed in November 2001 for beating up a couple of guys in a night club. They claim they did it in defence of a young lady. The brothers were sentenced to community service and fines for their roles in the brawl.
  6. In 2005, Jose released a book entitled "Juiced: Wild Times, Rampant 'Roids, Smash Hits, and How Baseball Got Big," which detailed quite a lot about steroid use in baseball. He not only outed himself as a steroid user, but also claimed to have personally injected dozens of other major leaguers. How much of it is truth and how much is fiction is still undecided.

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