Gooden Arrested After Fight

New York Mets pitcher Dwight Gooden was arrested after a scuffle with officers, a police spokesman said Sunday.

Gooden, 22, and two officers were treated for minor injuries at a hospital and released, Tampa Police Lt. T.L. Cotter said. However, Met spokesman Jay Horwitz said Gooden suffered bruises on the head and left arm, “and last night, he thought his left hand was broken.”

Gooden was charged with disorderly conduct, resisting arrest with violence and battery on a police officer, Cotter said.

“It was all pushing, shoving and kicking--that type of thing,” Cotter said. “There were no weapons involved.”

Horwitz said he spoke with Gooden on Sunday, and the right-hander told him that he had been handcuffed and ankle-cuffed during the incident.

“I don’t know what I did,” Horwitz quoted Gooden as saying. “They never told me what they stopped me for. I’m really in the dark about it.”

Also arrested were Gary Sheffield, 18, a nephew of Gooden; Vance Lovelace, 23, a former teammate of Gooden’s at Hillsborough High School, and a 17 year old, all of Tampa. The three were charged with battery on a police officer and resisting arrest with violence.

All except the 17 year old were booked into the Hillsborough County Jail and released on their own recognizance. The teen-ager was handed over to state juvenile officers, Cotter said.

The incident began just before 11 p.m. Saturday when an officer spotted a Mercedes-Benz and a red Corvette weaving toward each other in north Tampa, Cotter said. The officer pulled over the two cars.

As Gooden got out of the Mercedes he was driving, the Corvette, allegedly driven by Sheffield, sped away, but then returned, Cotter said. A second police car pulled up to aid the officer, then a third private vehicle pulled alongside, Cotter said.

When the other cars pulled up, Gooden allegedly began scuffling with the first officer, and the occupants of the other vehicles jumped in, Cotter said.

The four men eventually were subdued and Gooden and two officers were taken to a hospital, treated and released. One policeman suffered a mild concussion, said Cotter, who would not identify the officers involved.

The spokesman said that to his knowledge the arrested men had not been tested for alcohol and drugs.

“I can’t speculate what was originally on the officer’s mind who stopped them,” Cotter said. “But with the violent reaction that the officers received, they couldn’t really give them a sobriety test.”

He said the charges would be reviewed by the state attorney’s office.

Cotter said he did not know who was driving the third car or if there were any other passengers in any of the three cars.

Horwitz said the men were returning home from Saturday night’s Florida at South Florida basketball game.

“But we don’t have all the details,” Horwitz added. “We’re in the process of trying to find out all the facts.”

Gooden won the National League’s Cy Young Award in 1985 after posting a 24-4 record with a 1.53 earned-run average and 268 strikeouts, and this year helped the Mets toward the world championship with a 17-6 record and a 2.84 ERA. But he fared poorly in the World Series against the Boston Red Sox, being knocked out in Games 2 and 5.

His record in three years with the Mets is 58-19, with 744 strikeouts in 744 innings.

Gooden missed the ticker-tape parade for the Mets after their World Series victory in October, then denied rumors he might be involved in drugs. He asked for a drug-testing clause in his contract for 1987.

Sheffield and Lovelace also are professional baseball players.