Albert Belle was a very good baseball player who spent the majority of his time with the Cleveland Indians. For those of you not old enough to remember, Albert Belle wasn’t a choir boy.
Him giving Lebron advice about being professional is like Jack the Ripper holding a women self defense class.
Here are a few of Belle’s transgressions:
- In 1986, he went after a heckler in the stands who was shouting racist insults at him
- In 1991, he threw a baseball into the stands, where it struck a fan who had taunted him by yelling, “Keg party at my house, Joey,” a reference both to Belle’s prior nickname and his stints in alcohol rehabilitation.
- He was suspended in 1994 for using a corked bat and received further disdain for sending teammate Jason Grimsley through the building’s ceiling panel to break into the locked umpire dressing room to retrieve Belle’s corked bat and substitute it with another teammate’s bat.
- He also chased down rowdy trick-or-treating vandals who were celebrating Halloween by throwing eggs at his home; Belle ended up hitting one of the vandals with his car.
- In February 2006, Belle was arrested on suspicion of stalking a woman who was identified in court as a former licensed escort.
- On July 27, 2006, Belle plead guilty to one count of stalking and he was sentenced on August 24 to 90 days in jail and five years supervised probation. Belle had attached a GPS tracking device onto her car and obtained her phone records.
Albert Belle aka Mr. Professional.
Here is his advice for Lebron:
“My advice to LeBron is to take the high road and act professional,” said Belle. “I hope the fans do the same. I don’t want them to embarrass themselves on TV. I’d like to see everybody hug and kiss before the game and then the fans can boo the heck out of LeBron during the game.”
While the source of the advice is a shaky, it is sound. The thing we don’t want to see are fans getting liquored up and doing something stupid.
The wouldn’t be good for the NBA, Lebron or the city of Cleveland.
