Tony La Russa, New Chicago White Sox Manager, Charged With DUI

Tony La Russa, manager of the Chicago White Sox, was charged with driving under the influence after he allegedly ran his car into a curb back in February, according to ESPN. La Russa left the car smoking on the side of a road in the Phoenix area. This is the second known drunken driving arrest for LaRussa, who pleaded guilty to a misdemeanor DUI in Florida back in 2007.

This comes after the White Sox hired La Russa to be their new manager last week. The last time La Russa was a manager was nine years ago as a member of the St. Louis Cardinals. When ESPN contacted La Russa Monday night, he said, “I have nothing to say,” and hung up the phone. A White Sox spokesman talked to ESPN about La Russa’s DUI charge.

“Because this is an active case,” he said while mentioning the team is aware of the incident, “we cannot comment further at this time.” The incident happened on Feb. 24. LaRussa was standing alongside his SUV when a peace officer responded to a call. La Russa told the officers he had been at dinner with his friends from the Los Angeles Angels. He then told the officer he hit something and a tire blew out. The officer detected a “slight odor of alcoholic beverage” and had La Russa take a field sobriety test.

La Russa was then taken into custody and refused to submit a sample of his blood or urine to test his blood-alcohol level. According to the records obtained by ESPN, the officer got a search warrant to take two tubes of La Russa blood. The case was filed on Oct. 28, one day before La Russa was hired by the White Sox. The records indicated that the 76-year old registered a blood-alcohol-content of .08 or more, and if convicted, he faces up to 10 days in jail.

La Russa is one of the top baseball managers in history as he was inducted into the Baseball Hall of Fame in 2014. He was the manager of the White Sox (1979-1986), Oakland Athletics (1986-1995) and the Cardinals (1996-2011) and won a World Series with the A’s and two with the Cardinals. La Russa is also a four-time winner of the Manager of the Year Award.