Pascual Perez had a problem with punctuality and cocaine during his colorful 11-year major league career.
The pitcher was notoriously late for spring training while with the Yankees in the early 1990s, and the one spring he showed up just a little late, he commemorated it with a vanity license plate on his stretch limo that read ON TIME. He quickly tested positive for cocaine and was suspended for the entire 1992 season.
Although he was only 35 at the time, Perez never pitched — or even attempted to pitch — in the majors again.
Perez, 55, was found dead yesterday at his home in the Dominican Republic in an apparent robbery, police said.
His body was discovered with a severe head wound in the town of Don Gregorio, west of the Dominican capital of Santo Domingo. There was evidence that whoever killed him had been searching for money, said a prosecutor involved in the investigation. Police said there were several assailants and the house appeared to have been ransacked.
Perez’s ex-wife found him about 8:30 a.m. and investigators said he appeared to have been killed eight hours earlier. Police said he had a fractured skull from a blow to his head.
While his career was littered with drug suspensions and beanballs, the happy-go-lucky Perez may have been best known for getting lost on I-285 in Atlanta on his way to a game he was scheduled to start for the Braves in 1982.
Even though he had been to the ballpark before, Perez circled the city twice before stopping for gas. The attendant told him everyone, including Braves manager Joe Torre, was waiting for him at the ballpark.
“I feel like a heart attack,” Perez said at the time. “I think I get fired, maybe. Boss Torre say he fine me $100. I say, ‘What you say, $100?’ He smile, say, ‘Ciento pesos.’ I smile. Ciento pesos worth only 10 bucks.”
Perez went 64-62 while pitching for the Pirates, Braves and Expos before signing a three-year, $5.7 million contract with the pitching-poor Yankees before the 1990 season. But he couldn’t stay healthy and made just 17 starts in The Bronx over the next two seasons, going 3-6 despite a 2.87 ERA. His brother, Melido, pitched for the Yankees from 1992-95.
The night after Perez was suspended, a pair of reporters tracked him down at a strip club in Pompano Beach, Fla., and when they entered a smiling Perez beckoned them to his table. They spent several hours with him, interviewing him in the limo as it cruised around Fort Lauderdale.
In a rambling, often profane monologue, Perez vehemently denied using cocaine, saying he was targeted because he was not white and not from the U.S.
“They can come and test me again any time. Right now,” he said. “Let’s go. … God, if I’m lying, I should go blind. I’m tired of people looking at me like I killed someone in the street.”
When the night was over, Perez took the ON TIME license plate off the front of his limo and gave it to one of the reporters. He said he was getting a new one.
“Uno Mas Tiempo,” he said. “It means one more time. I’m not done yet.’’