LOS ANGELES — LA’s own Darryl Strawberry’s name popped back into the news cycle this week, and for once it wasn’t because of an “ex-athlete is in trouble” storyline. Quite the opposite. It was because the former Dodgers slugger picked up something you don’t usually see on a transaction line: a presidential pardon.
According to numerous media reports, Strawberry, now 63, said he got a call from President Donald Trump letting him know he was being pardoned for his 1995 tax-evasion case, a charge he long ago pled to, served home confinement for, and paid back taxes on. The White House framed it as recognition of how far he’s come since then, pointing to more than a decade of sobriety, his ministry work, and the recovery center he helps run.
Most national outlets quite reasonably focused on Strawberry the Met or Strawberry the Yankee, because those were the championship years. But Dodger fans know there was this very specific L.A. chapter wedged between his Queens superstardom and his Bronx revival. And for a hot minute, at least, it looked like he might be exactly the middle-of-the-order thumper the Dodgers thought they were signing.
Let’s rewind a second.
Strawberry signed with Los Angeles on Nov. 8, 1990, coming off that big Mets run of the ’80s (interrupted by Orel and the Dodgers in ’88). In his first season at Chavez Ravine he played 139 games, hit .265, got on base at a .361 clip and slugged .491. He mashed 28 homers and drove in 99, which at the time was the most by a Dodger since Pedro Guerrero’s 103 in 1983, and the 28 bombs set a club mark for a left-handed hitter in L.A.
After that big 1991 debut season, the relationship between Strawberry and the Dodgers got harder and messier. The club had brought him home on a five-year, $20.25 million deal thinking he would bridge them to the next wave of outfielders and keep them in the race every summer. Instead, the back injury in 1992, the surgery that followed, and the long absences in 1992–93 meant he played only 75 games over those two seasons, hitting 10 homers and driving in 37. The front office kept saying the same thing: he was in his prime when they signed him, the talent was real, the plan was sound. The body, and let’s be honest Darry himself) just did not cooperate. By the time 1994 rolled around, the Dodgers were winning with a younger outfield and Strawberry was trying to get healthy, stay sober, and do it in the middle of his hometown, which was not the easiest place to restart.
So the buyout in May 1994 really was a relief valve for everybody. The Dodgers called it a mutual decision. Strawberry’s reps said he needed a different environment to keep his recovery on track. Fred Claire talked about how emotional Strawberry was, how he felt he had let people down, and how the club had hoped for so much more when they signed him. That tells you a lot about that stretch. It was not a disaster on purpose. It was a star who gave them one strong year, then got pulled into injuries, no-shows, rehab, and the kind of headlines a team trying to win the division does not want. Which is why, when we talk about him now in light of the pardon, it actually makes sense to say both things at once: he had one real season in Dodger blue in 1991 that looked like the old Darryl, and after that, the story in Los Angeles became about struggle, second chances, and finally the need to leave to stay healthy.
And let’s face it, the 1990s were not a great era of Dodger baseball. 1988 was in the reariew and the revival of the 21st century was far in the distance. Strawberry’s acquistion was an example of the sort of lack of imagination that the front office had back then. It was a forgettable episode all the way around.
Because Strawberry’s story has always been the two-track kind. On one side there’s the freakish talent of the kid from Crenshaw High, who was supposed to rewrite the home run record book. On the other there’s the guy fighting addiction, bad decisions, and, in this case, a federal tax case from the late ’80s and early ’90s over unreported income from card shows and appearances. He could have faced a lot more time back then, but he took a deal, did six months of home confinement, and paid what he owed. Now, 30 years later, the president basically stamped “cleared” on that part of the file.
Strawberry called it “a man, President Trump, caring deeply for a friend,” and the White House echoed that, pointing to his Christian faith and his work helping people out of the same hole he once fell into. Whatever you think about how modern presidents use clemency, it’s hard to argue with the idea that Strawberry has spent the last decade trying to give away the grace he says he received.
So today you can file this one under “baseball lives are long.” And even those with troubled pasts eventually get a chance to walk in the light. The Mets have already retired his 18. Now the federal government has wiped away a case that followed him since the ‘90s. And tucked in that résumé is a season where he was the Dodgers’ most dangerous bat, 28 homers loud, trying to bring that New York thunder to Chavez Ravine. His career will forever remain a “what might have been” story, especially with the Dodgers.
However you remember him, Darryl Strawberry just got one more second chance. Baseball gives those out sometimes. Apparently Washington, D.C. does too.
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