Deadspin: Lenny Dykstra

Lenny Dykstra's Mansion Is Up For Grabs

Rick Chandler — Tue, 01 Jul 2008 10:00:45 EDT

In the market for a new place? Lenny Dykstra is selling his $25 million home (marked down from $27.5 million due to various chewing tobacco stains on the furniture and carpets). Presumably he's getting rid of the palatial estate on the Sherwood Country Club in LA because it's too big for he and his family, and NOT because of financial reversals. Let's make that clear.

"It's a compound; it's not a house," said Dykstra, the former All-Star outfielder. "I can go for a couple of days and not see any other family members. I found out I had a tennis court I didn't know I had. And I had to buy it completely furnished. I couldn't afford to buy furniture to fill this place. Are you kidding me?"

Forgive me if I speculate that this is a guy who could be confused by his surroundings in a two-bedroom apartment. Anyway, the house — formerly owned by Wayne Gretzky — is 12,713 square feet, with eight bedrooms, seven bathrooms and a screening room. Tennis court may be figment of Dykstra's imagination. Here's the Sotheby's listing.

Nails Has An Investment For You: His House [LA Daily News]

Lenny Dykstra, Still Pretending To Understand Stocks

Will Leitch — Fri, 13 Jun 2008 12:35:31 EDT

By now, despite what The New Yorker and Bernard Goldberg would like you to think, we generally understand that everybody knows Lenny Dykstra is not actually some kind of financial genius. Apparently not, though: a Forbes magazine investigation has revealed that Dykstra doesn't even make his own stock tips.

Looks like Dykstra is just taking his old mentor's picks.

[Market strategist Richard] Suttmeier says that after he did a television appearance several years ago he received a call from Dykstra. "He wanted to learn how to read a [stock] chart," Suttmeier says. "I taught him."

... FORBES compared Dykstra's buy recommendations as they appeared on TheStreet.com from Apr. 1 through May 1 with those in Suttmeier's weekly Sector Report during the same month and before. Among Dykstra's 17 buys, 11 had appeared days earlier in Suttmeier's newsletter.

We're not sure why the Lenny Dykstra Is An Unlikely Financial Genius ridiculousness started in the first
place, but can we all admit the jig is up now? Please? You've all seen him talk, right?

Lenny Dykstra Busted By Forbes [Blogging Stocks]

Seriously, Who Ever Thought A Magazine For Athletes Would Work?

Leitch — Fri, 09 May 2008 11:40:03 EDT

We, like just about everybody else who has actually seen the man speak in the last five years, remain awfully skeptical of this supposed financial brilliance of Lenny Dykstra. If you need any more proof, just remember: He's still struggling with his magazine for athletes, "The Players Club." ("Keep the dream alive," or something.) And, uh, those don't work.

Someone else has even tried. "Overtime," the first magazine to try this — and it's still hanging around, actulaly — and has sputtered, being hundreds of thousands of dollars in debt and months behind on its last issue.

It's bewildering that anyone would think of investing money in a magazine for athletes. Sure, athletes have money ... but do they really read a lot of magazines? When we think of athletes and their leisure time, we certainly think of reading.

As Dykstra and Doubledown Wage War, Overtime Watches From the Sidelines [Folio]

Amazingly, The Lenny Dykstra Success Story Has Hit A Snag

Leitch — Fri, 02 May 2008 11:40:17 EDT

So, you know Lenny Dykstra is supposed to be some kind of financial genius even though, uh, he kind of looks like he'd have a difficult time tying his shoes? Bewildering, right? Well, his magazine for the rich athlete, The Players Club, put out its first issue but has struggled with its second, to the point that Dykstra's partner has sued him. And why? Well, Dykstra.

It appears Dykstra might not necessarily be all the way there, sometimes.

Over a relatively short period of time, Dykstra proved himself to be a mercurial, difficult client whose many idiosyncrasies and demanding personality imposed substantial costs on the planned publications and created excessive burdens for Doubledown," reads the suit. "At the same time, Dykstra began shirking his financial obligations to Doubledown beginning in late 2007 and continuing into 2008, repeatedly driving up expenses and increasing the overall costs of the publications at a time when he, on information and belief, lacked the cash to pay for such expenses."

Those expenses included a $400,000 launch party and the hiring of a Time magazine art director Arthur Hochstein. Dykstra also argued in favor of launching the title as a monthly rather than at a more inexpensive bimonthly frequency.

But we thought he was a financial genius! Also, apparently Dykstra presented at the Ellies last night, which are like the Oscars for magazines. (And, just to blow your mind, Buzz Bissinger was nominated for a story about Barbaro. He did not win.) From several accounts, Dykstra was ... a little out of it. This is not going to end well.

Lenny Dykstra Sued By Publishing Partner [Portfolio]

Lenny Dykstra, Cosmopolitan

Leitch — Thu, 10 Nov 2005 10:15:13 EST

We know we make fun of ESPN a lot here, and much of it is justified, of course, but we are nothing if not fair. The big investigative steroid story gracing the cover of ESPN: The Magazine this week is, for lack of a better word, outstanding. Legitimately all-encompassing, it's sober, smart and full of all kinds of great info. It's the type of public service journalism that has been sorely lacking not just at the network, but in sportswriting all together. There. We said it. See? We're reasonable people.

Our personal favorite bit, however, involves everyone's favorite financial advisor Lenny Dykstra, whom the story implicates with considerable steroid abuse.

Scott "prescribed" a cocktail that blended several steroids, oral and injectable, and watched the little man explode. By season's end, he was the first player ever to lead the National League in at-bats, hits, walks and runs. The Phillies reached the World Series and Dykstra finished second to Barry Bonds in the MVP balloting. That winter, the team gave him a four-year, $24.9 million extension. The deal showed just how much money was available to players who could pump up their stats.

But it was the beginning of the end for Nails. Instead of pushing it in the gym during spring training of 1994, he lounged at a waterside spa and continued a long-running extramarital affair with the sister of his business partner's mistress.

A guy with this kind of judgment has to be anybody's first choice for investment advice. That last sentence is like an entire season of "Knots Landing."

Who Knew? [ESPN]
Lenny Dykstra, Your Financial Consultant [Deadspin]

(Big kudos, by the way, for Buster Olney, who, along with Tom Verducci, has been doing amazing stuff on the steroid beat. He's also all over the fake Steve Phillips story too; breaking real news there.)

Lenny Dykstra Likes Them Big Words

Leitch — Tue, 01 Nov 2005 14:55:44 EST

As we've mentioned before, we remain befuddled and terrified by TheStreet.com's hiring of former Phillies/Reds/Mets human chaw as a financial columnist. But every time a new column is posted, we keep thinking they'll admit it's a joke. But so far, nyet.

This week's column continues the following sentence:

"In contradistinction to true sovereign ties, where reigns are inherited and virtually limitless, baseball royalty has to be earned each year.

That's right: Lenny Dykstra using the word "contradistinction." Not a ghost writer there at all, no ....

Dykstra: Winning Formula [TheStreet.com]
Lenny Dykstra, Your Financial Consultant [Deadspin]

When Lenny Dykstra Speaks, People Listen

Leitch — Tue, 27 Sep 2005 11:17:28 EDT

We've told you already how shocked we were to see that human wad of chaw Lenny Dykstra is writing financial opinion pieces for TheStreet.com, but we're still not quite over it. Dykstra's newest "column" has just been posted at TheStreet, and we find several statements extremely disturbing.

• The column begins with a quote from Billy Joel. From "Pressure," even.
• In the next sentence, Dykstra refers to Billy Joel as a "musical genius."
• Dykstra claims to use Listerine mouthwash every day. We dunno; somehow we doubt that.
• He pulls a Larry King! "Look up the word "integrity" in the dictionary and you will see a picture of Pfizer's CEO, Hank McKinnell."
• Lenny uses the word "stifling." Somehow we suspect that was an editor addition; originally, this said "fucking hot, fucker."

We ask again: Can anyone at TheStreet.com explain how this column happened?

The Heat Is On [TheStreet.com]
Lenny Dykstra, Your Financial Consultant [Deadspin]

Lenny Dykstra, Your Financial Consultant

Leitch — Thu, 15 Sep 2005 17:30:19 EDT

OK, this was so ridiculous that we have spent the last hour checking it out, lest we be the target of some elaborate ruse. But it appears to be legit: Former human chaw Lenny Dykstra is writing a weekly investment column for TheStreet.com. No, really. Seriously. Lenny Dykstra — or, more likely, his editor — is responsible for this sentence: "Mine Safety manufactures and supplies a sophisticated and comprehensive line of products used by workers around the world in the fire service, homeland security, construction, oil and gas, chemical and other industries, as well as the military."

The Lenny Dykstra who once challenged a Senator to a fight. The Lenny Dykstra who was accused of gambling on baseball. (Oh, and steroids.) The guy who once "wrote" a book in which every third word was "fuck." He is now a financial columnist? We know he owns some car washes, but we thought that was just for the 17-year-old girls.

And now he writes: "Are you ready to talk about cash flow? How about almost $2 billion in cash flow from operations and free cash flow of $655 million?" Honestly, we're not really sure what to do with ourselves right now. We need to sit down. Anybody at TheStreet.com wanna shed some light on this?

How To Keep This Rally Alive [The Street]
Say It Ain't So [Attytood]
Dykstra Arrested On Misdemeanor Charges [ESPN]