A bulldog on the mound, a hot dog on other stages

Bert Blyleven, one of baseball's merriest pranksters, will be inducted into the Hall of Fame on Sunday. For the Hall of Famers who gather for the annual induction ceremony in Cooperstown, N.Y., it means they will have to invest in fire-retardant dress shoes for the rest of their lives.

The master of the hot foot -- in which shoelaces are lit on fire -- is joining the fraternity.

"No hot foots the first year," Blyleven promised. "I'm a rookie to be seen and not heard. After the first year, though, watch out."

Blyleven is known for having one of the game's best curveballs. He's also known for his pursuit of clubhouse levity. Wherever he went in baseball -- Twins, Rangers, Pirates, Indians, Angels -- he was looking for a laugh and didn't care at whose expense it came. He once gave former Twins manager Tom Kelly a hot foot -- during a game.

"He was goofy," longtime Twins bullpen coach Rick Stelmaszek said.

It wasn't just lighting shoes on fire. Many of Blyleven's pranks can't be recounted in a family newspaper. As for the ones that can, he cut off the toe ends of dress socks. He stole dress shoes and froze them. He nailed teammates with shaving cream pies. And there were stink bombs.

"I did that on a plane once with Cleveland," Blyleven said. "I never did that again. The smell never left the plane. A lot of people were mad at me."

"I see this pig's head," Blyleven said. "I always called [teammate] Jim Rooker 'Pighead.' I asked how much it was, and it was like a couple hundred bucks.

"I bought the pig's head, brought it to the ballpark, put it in his locker, put his uniform underneath it, put a cigarette in its mouth. He was in uniform."

During the annual preseason freeway series between the Dodgers and Angels, Blyleven once smacked Dodgers manager Tommy Lasorda in the face with a shaving cream pie while Lasorda was doing a pregame interview. Lasorda vowed revenge.

The next day, Lasorda stole a pair of jeans out of Blyleven's locker. In the middle of the fifth inning, Blyleven looked across the diamond and saw the jeans on fire in front of the Dodgers dugout. But Blyleven was a step ahead -- he had taken his clothes out of his locker and replaced them with those of a teammate.

Blyleven believes his zest for pranks came from his father, Joe, who raised a large family in Southern California.

There's no evidence Joe mooned his children -- an act that remains a part of Blyleven's repertoire.

To this day, the Twins don't inform Blyleven when the annual team photo will be taken because he shows up and moons everyone during the shoot.

"I have scouts who let me know," Blyleven said.

The element of surprise is not always a good thing.

"I love it," said Twins outfielder Michael Cuddyer, "but I feel bad when they raffle off a chance for a kid to be in the picture and he's probably scarred and the parents are scarred."

"I mooned the team picture," Blyleven said. "Two weeks later, a game is going on in Anaheim. [Manager] Doug Rader says, 'Bert, come here. Someone wants to see you.' It's Jackie Autry, [owner] Gene's wife.

"She pulls out this team picture. It's the moon shot. Gene is sitting there in front and, all of sudden, to the left of him is this big cheek.