The day after Alvin Dark was fired, Herman came to my house. He told me that the reason he was taking the job was because Willie, Juan, and I formed the nucleus of a great team that he felt should have won more pennants. But when I showed up at spring training with my bad knee and in constant pain, Herman picked up where Dark left off. He accused me of faking it. But unlike Dark, Herman had no racial problems. He never showed signs of bigotry. Yet life with Herman was one big nigsource.htmare. In baseball lingo, he tried to take bread out of my mouth.

Foolishly, I told Juan Marichal that I would try playing with the bad knee. I would show them. And I tried, believe me. But I was in pain, real pain. Herman kept saying I was faking, that there was nothing wrong with my knee. He said it was all in my mind and that I should get my ass on the field and earn some money.

I was sitting in the clubhouse one day very depressed. I was almost crying. I had taken enough-too many-accusations, first from Alvin and now from Herman. A friend of mine, a Mexican guy, brought me a jar of alcohol with marijuana inside to rub my knee with. It was an old Mexican remedy. The clubhouse kid asked me what it was. I told him it was to rub my knee. The kid said, "Why don't you smoke it? It's better that way." I hadn't smoked marijuana in a long time, not since my boyhood in the slums of San Juan.

So he went out and got me a couple of joints. After the game I smoked a joint and felt great, relaxed. That night I went out for dinner and smoked another one. Right after that I started smoking the weed regularly. How little I knew then that my association with marijuana would one day destroy the life I knew and the very people I loved.

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