When I think about what makes America great, I immediately think of two things: Baseball and cocaine.

Yes, like mom and apple pie, nose candy and baseball represent all that is good with this great land of ours. Teamwork, hustle, desire, and the ability to stay up all night banging whores and listening to Parliament Funkadelic albums is what truly makes the US of A the greatest country in the world.

A select few of America's finest have had the ability to sublimely blend the best of both worlds; to both cut toot and stretch a double into a triple.

The 1970's dawned a new era in Major League Baseball. The previous generation's players had been ravenous alcoholics. They boozed until the wee hours of the morning and then fought their hangovers off with ample amounts of amphetamines before game time, only to start the cycle anew once the final out had been recorded. This way of thinking was challenged by the young players of the '70's. They wouldn't be saddled with hangovers caused by alcohol, the drug of their parent’s generation.

No, they would ride the white dragon and trip the light fantastic, arriving at the ball park with energy abound and an itchy nose.

With a tip of the cap and a runny nasal cavity, The Phat Phree salutes these paranoid warriors with the MLB All-Coke Head Team:

The Position Players:
C: DARRYL PORTER
	The 1982 World Series MVP (yes, you read that correctly), Porter was a talented catcher with a taste for party. In the winter of 1980, Porter would often stay awake all night, tweaking out of his gourd and clutching a shotgun; waiting for baseball commissioner Bowie Kuhn to break into his house. Needless to say, the massive amounts of cocaine he used made him a bit paranoid. But, he was a heck of an athlete and in America, that's all that really counts. He played 17 years in the big leagues with an exuberant passion for the game and was a hero to many young boys in the St. Louis area. On August 5, 2002, he was found dead in rural Missouri from "toxic effects of cocaine;" which is to say he died the way he lived, much like Steve Irwin.
1B: keith hernandez
	Our second member from the St. Louis Cardinals 1982 World Series championship team (this will be a trend here), Hernandez was able to parlay his slick fielding first basemen's mitt into another World Series title with the 1986 New York Mets (you'll see more of them later, too). Keith's penchant for the coke is supposedly the reason for him being sent to New York from St Louis, as the Cardinals front office got sick of small Columbian boys pooping out balloons in their clubhouse. Keith later fell victim to one of the side effects of massive recreational drug use: finding Julia Louis Dreyfus attractive.
2B: joe morgan
	A Hall of Fame second baseman, Morgan ingested so much cocaine into his system during his heyday that he is now nothing more than a walking invalid who was given a job broadcasting baseball simply so millions of Americans could laugh at him every week. With some of the shit that comes out of his mouth, he is a poster child for the harmful effects drugs can have on your mind and a walking reminder of why kids should just say no.
SS: dale berra
	After growing up under the bat shit crazy eye of his father Yogi, Dale Berra really had no choice but to start using coke. You try being raised by a man who not only was a famous athlete, but also made a living after baseball by just being ridiculous. Plus, Mickey Mantle was probably always over at their house, drunk off his ass and yelling about blow jobs. God, I could use a rail or two just thinking about it. I don't blame you, Dale. Gotta ease the pain somehow.
3b: ken caminiti
	The man's bloodstream was a virtual cornucopia of drugs. Cocaine, steroids, opiates, and alcohol: Caminiti loved them all. In only eight short years, he went from winning a Most Valuable Player award to dying on the side of a road in the Bronx while tweaking. And that, my friends, is how one goes out in a blaze of glory.
OF: Ron LeFLORE
	Although I can not find any definitive proof that LeFlore danced with the lady in white, the dude did have sex with a hooker at the age of 12 and soon after was using heroin. To think that he never even once threw some imported dust up his nose seems a little obtuse. Plus, he is the only guy on the list who actually began his career in prison, where he was scouted and signed by Billy Martin and the Tigers in 1973. Anyway, even if he never snorted, LeFlore makes this list anyway for his impressive off the field career of vices (but if I were a betting man, I'd say he did coke, too).
OF: DARRYL STRAWBERRY
	The charter member of the All Cocaine Team, Darryl Strawberry was one of the most talented baseball players in the history of the game. And he threw it all away to get high. And man, oh man, did he ever get high. But, honestly you would too if you had people chanting "DAR-REL, DAR-REL" every god damn day at you. After the troubles of his younger days, Strawberry had a successful recovery and comeback with the New York Yankees. Since his retirement in 2000, however, Strawberry has been arrested 7 times. Charges have ranged from cocaine possession, to soliciting a prostitute, to blacking out while driving. Let's just say that if partying is a crime (and it is), Strawberry is guilty (ditto).
OF: TIM "ROCK" RAINES
	Urban legend states that Raines got the nickname "Rock" because he used to keep a vial of crack cocaine in his back pocket. That is also the reason why he would only dive head first… because he did not want to break the VIAL OF CRACK IN HIS BACK POCKET.
The DH & PINCH RUNNER:
DH: pedro guerrero
	Ol' Pedey was a prolific slugger back in the '80's. He was also legally retarded (IQ of 70) and had more than a passing interest in coke. In 2000, Guerrero was acquitted of federal drug charges because his attorneys argued that he was so dumb it was impossible for him to understand the drug deal he was involved in with a friend. A few years later, Miami police would be called to the home of one O.J. Simpson after The Juice found his girlfriend going to town with Pedey and a bag of snow.
PR: LONNIE SMITH
	I'm not going to lie… Cocaine makes you faster than you would normally be. Would Lonnie have stolen 370 bases in his career if marijuana was his drug of choice and not ghost powder? No, he would have been too busy playing Intellivision, drinking New York Seltzer, eating Pringles and listening to The Steve Miller Band.
The STAFF:
SP: DWIGHT GOODEN
	You know how Roger Clemens is still making $20mil a year? Well Gooden was better than him when they both came up in the mid-80's. Only instead of now holding ESPN hostage yearly by a bunch of "will I or won't I retire" nonsense like Clemens does, Gooden is rotting in jail, being tormented by his demons, staring at the top of his bunk wondering where it all went wrong and what his life could have been. This, if you ask me, is still better than being a steroid-using prick like Clemens. Anyway, cocaine not only ruined his entire life, but made his rookie card virtually worthless, which is something for which many 25-35 year olds will never forgive him.
SP: Denny Mclain
	McLain was one of the best pitchers of the late ‘60's before getting wrapped up in web of gambling and drug trafficking. After spending some time in prison, the two-time American League Cy Young and one-time Most Valuable Player award winner would eventually would go on to bigger and better things: working at a Detroit area 7-11. Ah, drugs… you never know what will happen next!
RP: STEVE HOWE
	Howe went from being the 1980 NL Rookie of the Year to being suspended for the entire 1984 season, which was the first of an amazing seven suspensions from Major League Baseball. Considering that Howe played in Los Angeles in the early 80's, at a time when bands like "W.A.S.P." and "Ratt" were popular, I really don't blame him for destroying his career with cocaine. I would have had a hell of a time staying sober when all of the dudes in town were wearing spandex and lipstick, too.

What could possibly go wrong here?

Honorable Mention: Vida Blue, Willie Wilson, LaMarr Hoyt

Since most of these players have been out of baseball for twenty years now, it may appear that the common ballplayer's love affair with the coke has come to an end. But let's keep in mind here that popular drugs work in cycles. Just sixty some odd years ago Adolph Hitler was abusing methamphetamines like they were going out of style (face it, the man had some vices). After fading from the drug scene post-WWII, meth is now as popular as ever, as well as being the leading cash crop of Kentucky and Missouri. Cocaine will be back… and hopefully soon because coke-heads are hilarious!

So who will be the next baseball player to get arrested for possessing 12 pounds of snow and having sex with an eight year old boy in a small, mountainous village deep inside of Ecuador? No one can say for certain, but the smart money is on Jonathan Papelbon.