The Palm Beach Post's "60 Seconds With..." segments are back during Marlins Spring Training. Each post is a transcript of a one-minute interview by Marlins beat writer Joe Capozzi with a member of the Marlins organization, and JoeCap's latest "Marlins minute" features president of baseball operations, Larry Beinfest.
Among other juicy tidbits, Larry denied allegations a Marlins Mermaid nearly tossed him overboard while driving a gun-boat in Iraq.
Catcher John Baker wrote in his blog that you almost fell off a boat in Iraq.
No, no, no. What happened was, we're out in the Persian Gulf and it was choppy. We're in like a 20-foot Boston Whaler with a huge gun on the front. One of the (Marlins) Mermaids grabbed the wheel for a second, and it wasn't her fault but I got splashed with a ton a water. There were no body parts hanging over the boat. I just got wet. That was it. I was on the wrong side of the boat, which is the story of my life but we can go into that later.
A recent study shows that 94.89% of all lies begin with the words "no, what happened was." Not that we'd ever accuse Mr. Beinfest of spinning yarn, but that's not exactly how Johnny Bakes remembers the incident. Next time, Coghlan drives.