Major League baseball suffered another black eye when former major league pitcher Ricky “Wild Thing” Vaughn admitted using steroids throughout his 7-year major league career.

Vaughn was seen as a remarkable success story when he finished third in American League Rookie of the Year voting following the 1989 season. Vaughn helped lead a surprising Indians team to the postseason after spending the past 18 months in a California prison after being convicted of stealing a car.

Vaughn, who last pitched in 1996 with the Colorado Rockies says that he used steroids to help with the transition from the California Penal League to the Indians and that he added nearly six miles per hour to his fastball.

“I was enhancing my performance a little bit,” Vaughn recently told Sports Illustrated.

“Wild Thing” and the rest of the Indians took America by storm in 1989. The team, which was constructed mostly of older players and unproven rookies, started out slow but finished the season by winning 47 of their final 62 games and tying the New York Yankees for the AL East crown and beat New York in a one-game playoff. (more…)