Cops: Ex-Met Lenny Dykstra Threatened To Blow Uber Driver's Head Off, Claimed He Was Kidnapped

NEW YORK (CBS Sports) -- When New Jersey police arrested former MLB outfielder Lenny Dykstra in May and charged him with making terroristic threats during an Uber ride, they weren't exaggerating. Or at least that's what police reports obtained by My Central Jersey and shared by USA Today seem to suggest.

The 55-year-old Dykstra was arrested outside the Linden, N.J., police station around 3:30 a.m. on May 23 after, as Nick Muscavage reported, "officers were alerted to a vehicle that sped into the attached parking garage" -- an Uber vehicle whose driver apparently exited the car "screaming for help." Now, the police reports indicate just why that driver may have been screaming.

Dykstra, per the reports, requested an Uber ride from Linden, N.J., to nearby Clark Township. But when he entered the vehicle that picked him up, he allegedly demanded to be driven to Staten Island in New York City. After the driver told Dykstra he needed to change his desired location on his phone, the retired MLB All-Star allegedly "placed a black pill bag with an object (the driver) believed to be a gun to his head" and rattled off the following threats:

"I'll (expletive) shoot you ... Take me to Staten Island or I'll blow your (expletive) head off."

Upon being arrested, as USA Today noted, Dykstra told police the Uber driver had kidnapped him. No stranger to legal troubles since retiring in 1996, the former New York Mets and Philadelphia Phillies standout was charged with third-degree terroristic threats and third-degree charges for possession of cocaine and MDMA. The author of 2016's "House of Nails: A Memoir of Life on the Edge," he previously served 15 months in prison after pleading to three 2012 contests of grand theft auto.