Actor and writer Charlie Day made an appearance on The Tonight Show Starring Jimmy Fallon on Monday night to promote the season premiere of his show, It's Always Sunny in Philadelphia, and in the process elaborated on a long-standing urban legend.
According to the legend, Hall of Fame third baseman Wade Boggs once drank 64 beers on a cross-country flight from Boston to Los Angeles. Boggs has denied the actual figure in the past but apparently confessed to Day as they were shooting the episode, which aired Wednesday night on FXX.
"He was famous for baseball. He was also famous for the amount of beer he would drink," Day told Fallon.
"I've heard these stories," Fallon replied.
"Supposedly, when they would have these cross-country flights, he would drink, on average, 40 to 50, some say 70 beers," Day added.
"Like on a New York to LA type of thing?" Fallon asked. "So it's like a six-hour flight."
"Yeah. There was, like, a layover somewhere in North Dakota. I don't know," Day said.
"70 beers?" Fallon questioned again.
"Our characters are trying to break the record in the episode," Day said.
"And you actually got Wade Boggs to appear in the episode?" asked Fallon.
Boggs appears to Day's character during the show in a hallucination, saying there's "nothing more fun than winning" and encouraging him to keep drinking.
"Yeah, he was great," Day said. "We reached out to him and thought, 'Is he going to be OK with this?' When we called him, he was just like 'Yeah, I'll do it.' "
Then came the clarification, or elaboration, on the urban legend.
"He told me that the actual number ... He pulled me aside and said, 'Charlie, really it was 107.' So how is that even possible?" Day said.
"Six hours to drink 107 beers?" Fallon asked. "I don't even know that they'd have that many on the plane."
"Not six hours," Day said. "So he would come to the airport about 12 deep, and then he'd be on the plane and just firing them back. Then have the layover and then they'd get there. Then they'd go out that night, you know, and then he'd hit third with two doubles."
Johnny Hockey
Cleveland Browns quarterback Johnny Manziel is often referred to as "Johnny Football."
Get ready to hear Calgary Flames rookie Johnny Gaudreau referred to as "Johnny Hockey."
According to the U.S. Patent and Trademark Office's records, Gaudreau applied to trademark the nickname in September. It claims the name's first use in August 2014.
"We were concerned that people were going to abuse the Johnny Hockey name, coming out with Johnny Hockey shirts and stuff, and we wanted to make sure that did not occur," Lewis Gross, Gaudreau's agent, told TSN.
Like Manziel, Gaudreau won the award for the best college player in his sport. Unlike Manziel, Gaudreau has seen success as a professional, scoring 13 goals with 19 assists in 42 games this season.
Sports quiz
How many All-Star Game appearances did Wade Boggs make?
Answer
With his 12 consecutive appearances, Boggs is third behind Brooks Robinson (15) and George Brett (13) in number of consecutive appearances by a third baseman.
Sports on 01/16/2015