Bernie Carbo - High on Life

A big game player usually gets high off his performance, but Bernie Carbo was high before he hit the field.

I probably smoked two joints, drank about three or four beers, got to the ballpark, took some [amphetamines], took a pain pill, drank a cup of coffee, chewed some tobacco, had a cigarette, and got up to the plate and hit,’’ Carbo said.

The Sox were four outs from elimination against Cincinnati’s Big Red Machine in Game 6 when Carbo came off the bench to smash a three-run home run into the center-field bleachers, tying the score at 6-6. The blast set up Carlton Fisk’s arm-waving, 12th-inning walk off home run for the ages.

Drugs, alcohol, and temptation were his downfall.

“I played every game high,’’ he said. “I was addicted to anything you could possibly be addicted to. I played the out field sometimes where it looked like the stars were falling from the sky.

“I played baseball 17 years of my life and I don’t think I ever missed a day of being high, other than when I went to Saudi Arabia and Kuwait [for a baseball clinic] in 1989. And the only reason I didn’t do any drugs there was that I was afraid that I would lose my life.’’

Carbo, who said he hasn’t touched alcohol or drugs in 15 years, travels throughout New England every summer preaching at youth camps, 12-step programs, prisons, and churches. He uses the nominal money from his fantasy camp to pay expenses.

The Sox acquired the left handed-hitting Carbo and Rick Wise in October 1973 from the Cardinals for Reggie Smith and Ken Tatum.

“When I first met [Red Sox owner] Mr. Yawkey, he was shining shoes in the clubhouse,’’ said Carbo, “and I went up to him and gave him $20 and told him to get me a cheeseburger and fries.’’

Carbo was one of the most popular Red Sox players. Charismatic and colorful, he was part of the fun-loving “Buffalo Heads’’ with Bill Lee and Ferguson Jenkins.

He had a giant stuffed gorilla named Mighty Joe Young and traveled with him. The two were inseparable. The gorilla sat next to him in the middle seat on planes. Carl Yastrzemski wanted the gorilla placed on the bat rack in the dugout.

“Yaz said we were winning and hitting,’’ said Carbo.

In the 1975 Fall Classic, the Sox were underdogs against the Reds of Johnny Bench, Pete Rose, Joe Morgan, and Tony Perez.

Carbo was on the bench for most of it. His old Cincinnati teammates were sympathetic. Pitcher Clay Carroll inscribed a picture for him: “Good luck in the World Series.’’ But when Carbo blasted a pinch-hit homer off him in Game 3 at Cincinnati, Carbo returned later to find his locker ransacked.

Carbo couldn’t break his addictions.

“I just kept druggin’, druggin’, and druggin’ and contemplating suicide,’’ he said.

Eventually his old Buffalo Head teammates came to the rescue.

“Bill Lee called me and he said, ‘Are you doing OK?’ And I said, ‘I’m tired and I don’t want to live anymore.’ ’’

Jenkins, a Hall of Famer, put him in touch with Sam McDowell, who is a counselor for the Baseball Assistance Team, which provides emergency assistance to baseball players in dire straits.

Carbo entered rehab in Tampa, but had a panic attack.

“I ended up in a Tampa hospital,’’ he said. “Five hundred beds in a hospital and I’m in a room with a Baptist pastor.’

Carbo, who conducts a fantasy camp each year at Hank Aaron Stadium in Mobile, Ala., that combines baseball and gospel, in 1993 founded the Diamond Club Ministry, a Christian evangelical organization. He played for six major league teams in his 12-year career, and he batted .264 with 96 home runs and 358 RBIs in 1,010 games. But he was out of baseball by age 33.

Carbo, who said he hasn’t touched alcohol or drugs in 15 years, travels throughout New England every summer preaching at youth camps, 12-step programs, prisons, and churches. He uses the nominal money from his fantasy camp to pay expenses.

Bernie Carbo, now is getting his highs from helping others.