All Jose Guillen needed to know about breaking knees he learned from Frank Robinson

(Jose Guillen, being restrained from giving Mike Scioscia a hug, during the great Frank Robinson v. Mike Scioscia Incident of  June 2005. AP Photo.)

Sort of lost in the shuffle with the news of John Lannan's vacation to Harrisburg yesterday (for us, anyway) was the return of old friend Jose Guillen to  D.C. Guillen, of course, was one of the original 2005 Nationals, whose career in Washington limped along for a few months in 2006 until finally ending with surgery on his right elbow in July 2006.

We always loved Jose because, well, you never knew what he was going to do next -- always volatile, always seemed ready to explode in a murderous rage at a moment's notice. And he always made opening the sports page the morning after a game worth your time, because every morning you were guaranteed a fantastic quote from Guillen, be it complaining about the fences at RFK Stadium or calling Mike Scioscia a piece of garbage.

Guillen reminisced about his time in D.C. in a piece on Nationals.com yesterday, and talked about his relationship with Frank Robinson. He didn't disappoint -- the story is chock full of great quotes. Like this one, describing how Old Frank told him to break a guy's knees, the old school way.

"He said, 'I don't ever want to see you jog into a base. Go hard. If the second baseman stays in there, break both of his knees. That's the way you should be playing the game -- old school. You don't want to see a shortstop standing there,'"
(Jose Guillen, quoting Frank Robinson, via Nationals.com, 6/21/2010)

So, a belated "Welcome back!", Jose. Thanks for the memories. And thanks for not trying to break any fans knees during your time in D.C., especially Nationals fans:

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Comments

[James]

Remember there is still a game in progress tonight and a full game tomorrow. That means plenty of time for Guillen to blow his top if provoked a little bit.

[The Nationals Enquirer]

Commenter Keith on Facebook reminded us of the time Jose Guillen's girlfriend was robbed after cashing one of his $12,000 paychecks at a check cashing place on H street in NE. Here's a link to the story in the Post: May 5, 2006.