FORT MYERS, Fla., Feb. 9 (UPI) -- Former Boston Red Sox pitcher Dennis "Oil Can" Boyd said he often was under the influence of cocaine while pitching.
"Oh yeah, at every ballpark. There wasn't one ballpark that I probably didn't stay up all night, until 4 or 5 in the morning, and the same thing is still in your system," Boyd told WBZ-Radio, Boston.
WBZ-TV, Boston, said Boyd, who played eight of his 10 major league seasons with the Red Sox, told the radio station: "Some of the best games I've ever, ever pitched in the major leagues I stayed up all night; I'd say two-thirds of them. If I had went to bed, I would have won 150 ballgames in the time span that I played. I feel like my career was cut short for a lot of reasons, but I wasn't doing anything that hundreds of ball players weren't doing at the time because that's how I learned it."
Boyd -- who went 78-77 with 799 career strikeouts with the Red Sox, Expos and Rangers -- said he was never asked to take a drug test during his playing days.
Boyd's autobiography, "They Call Me Oil Can," is scheduled for publication in June, and in May he will be filming his role as Satchel Paige in a movie about Jackie Robinson.
