When Joe Pepitone recollected bizarre pot-smoking incident with Mickey Mantle and Whitey Ford
Former New York Yankees first baseman Joe Pepitone raised eyebrows during an interview with Dan Epstein of Rolling Stone magazine in 2015 when he reiterated an offbeat pot-smoking incident involving Yankees legends Mickey Mantle and Whitey Ford.
While Pepitone may have first brought up the bizarre episode in his 1975 autobiography, he still had some hilarious anecdotes to share 40 years later.
He described the conversation he had with his then-Yankees teammate Mickey Mantle about pot and conceded that both Mickey and Whitey Ford seemingly enjoyed the substance.
Joe was quoted saying:
"Oh, yeah! He didn’t like that too much. In front of people, he’d tell them, 'That was b*****it, that would never happen!' But it was true! He came to my room, him and Whitey [Ford], and they could smell the s**t in the room.
"They said, 'We heard you do that s**t. What’s it like?' 'Well, try it!' 'Oh, no no no!' 'C’mon, take a hit!' They each took a hit; next thing I know, they’re talking to me about all kinds of s**t, and they’re laughing at anything I said."
Joe was absolutely confident that the pair had a ball after taking a hit of the marijuana.
"I could have had them jumping up and down on the bed, if I’d wanted to! [Laughs]," Joe said.
Joe didn't reveal much when he was asked about whether he knew if other ballplayers smoked marijuana too. Although he did concede that he was quite possibly the only one doing that stuff at the time.
Joe concluded by saying:
"Oh, I really don’t know. My thing was, I was a loner. When I went out at night, I loved to go out by myself. If I went out with my friends, I’d worry about them and pick up their checks because I wanted to make sure they were having a good time.
"Later on in my career when I would go back to New York, I would see some other ballplayers doing that s**t in clubs or whatever, but they weren’t people I really knew well.
"But on my team, at that time, I think I was probably the only one that was doing s**t. I wish some other guys on the team were doing it because then maybe I could have got that s**t for nothing!"
Joe Pepitone won three Gold Glove Awards during his time in the MLB
Joe Pepitone was signed by the New York Yankees as an amateur free agent in August 1958 and made his MLB debut shortly afterward. During his 11-year career in the major leagues, Pepitone also played for the Houston Astros, the Chicago Cubs, and the Atlanta Braves.
A live wire in the field, Pepitone won three coveted Gold Glove Awards. He was also voted into the MLB All-Star Team thrice.
Pepitone died earlier this year in March at his home in Kansas City, Missouri, at the age of 82.