There was a time when everyone knew the name Darryl Strawberry.
He was a professional baseball star with the New York Mets and later with the Yankees, but then his life turned sour.
Strawberry was first charged with tax evasion, then he faced drug charges, then he was on the hook for probation violations, but after all these years, and all the pardons issued by various presidents, it was Donald Trump who set him free from his past.
Strawberry was drafted as the first overall pick in the 1980 Major League Baseball draft by the New York Mets.
It only took him until 1983 to make his debut with the team, and he quickly hit .257 with 26 home runs and put everyone on notice that he was in the league to stay.
In 1987 and 1988, he had back-to-back 39-home run seasons, hitting .284 and .269, respectively.
In the 1990s, Strawberry's star started to fade, and he ended his career with the Yankees in 1999, but not before becoming an eight-time All-Star and winning three World Series championships. He was also inducted into the New York Mets Hall of Fame.
In 1994, Strawberry was hit with tax evasion charges, to which he pleaded guilty, was sentenced to home confinement, and forced to pay his back taxes.
In 1999, he was arrested for solicitation of prostitution and possession of cocaine. He pleaded no contest and got off with probation and community service.
Strawberry violated his probation terms on numerous occasions, and he was finally sentenced to prison in 2002 for 11 months.
In 2010, he appeared on Trump’s Celebrity Apprentice, and he was fired in the third episode of the season.
Trump has made it a habit of pardoning people who were once on his show, including a very corrupt former governor -- who was a Democrat, by the way -- so it was no surprise to see him pardon Strawberry as well.
What was a surprise is that Strawberry made it through several Democrat presidential administrations without getting this nod, and he made no bones about his objections to the situation. He stated, "God just completely set me free when he gave me a pardon from President Donald J. Trump. Other presidents had opportunities, but they didn’t do it."
Strawberry now claims to have been clean and sober for more than 20 years, saying that his faith led him down this new path. Then he got a call from Trump earlier this month about the pardon, explaining, "We just talked about my baseball career in the 1980s and what kind of player I was. He was just telling me how great of a player I was… and he just kind of joked around that he couldn’t hit a baseball. I said, ’Well, the way you hit a golf ball, you can hit a baseball.’"
The former pro athlete then added, "He told me, ‘You know you did some very bad things.’ But he said, ’Today, the way your life is and what you’re doing, your faith and helping people and being sober, I’m giving you a full pardon. You’re going to be clean. I’m wiping everything out.’"
And that, my friends, is how Donald Trump set Darryl Strawberry free of his criminal and delinquent past.
