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I did some digging on the Mets new minor league signee Jon Switzer and... ok, fine, I was looking for information about his wife Dana.
All I could find was (1) stories about him working out with a yoga instructor named Dana, but I'm pretty sure she isn't/wasn't his future wife, and (2) this story from a 9/30/2008 blog entry about paranormal stories in baseball. I'm not sure what the blogger's source is, but the Scott Williamson angle seems to have other accounts elsewhere on the internet.
http://wildaspiecryptid.blogspot.com/20 ... weird.html
<blockquote>St. Petersburg, Florida is the home to the Renaissance Vinoy Hotel. Known since 1923 for its exquisite décor, mighty palm trees, ornamental archways, and regal octagonal tower, the Vinoy stands overlooking Tampa Bay, affording guests on the upper levels a panoramic view of the Gulf Coast. It is considered the architectural crown jewel of the Bay area, and its elegant Southern charm has attracted such rich and famous impresarios as Jimmy Stewart and Marilyn Monroe. Now, the Vinoy is the host hotel for any baseball team visiting the Tampa Bay Devil Rays.
Scott Williamson, 2003 relief pitcher for the Cincinnati Reds, checked in with his team in mid-June of that year. On the night of their arrival, Williamson turned out the lights in his room to get a good night’s rest before the next day’s game. That was when he felt “a tingling sensation over my body, like I was being watched.” Following that uncanny surge in the nervous system, Scott then began to feel enormous pressure on his chest. It became more and more difficult for him to breathe in the clean smell of hotel room air. Fearful, he rolled over in bed. Then he saw him.
“I looked over and saw this guy in a coat from the ‘30s or ‘40s, standing by the curtains,” Williamson said.
The apparition disappeared before his eyes. Williamson then called his wife, an emergency room nurse, and asked what sort of malady could produce the combination of hallucinations and chest pains. No plausible condition could be determined.
Later, a friend of Williamson did a bit of research on the incident. Two things were found: One, chest pains and shortness of breath are sometimes reported by people who claimed to have been in the presence of ghosts. Two, the original owner of the hotel died there in a fire. His name was Benjamin Williamson. Cue spooky music. Indeed the original owner was of the aforementioned name, but no other investigator was ever able to verify any story of a fire.
Fire or no, the Reds checked out of the Vinoy, leaving the hotel to its next unsuspecting victims, the Pittsburgh Pirates. The very night after Williamson’s ordeal, many members of the Pirates staff reported sighting people in the hotel who were dressed out of place and even transparent. While pitching coordinator Frank Velasquez fought with the keycard entry to his room, he noticed a man walk down the hallway in an old fashioned suit with top hat and tails. Figuring he was the concierge, Velasquez turned to ask for assistance…just in time to see the man disappear through a wall. Other Pirates players and personnel reported seeing a similar figure that very night, some saying the man was standing in their rooms.
As one might guess, the reported happenings of these two nights in 2003 were not unique. In 1991 the Vinoy was undergoing renovation. One afternoon the entire work crew quit after finding their paint cans were opened, thrown from the scaffolding, and their contents splattered all over the walls. The workers were in an adjacent room taking a break…and never heard a thing. In 2001, John Frascatore was at batting practice with the Toronto Blue Jays. An assistant ran into the dugout and told John to immediately go to the clubhouse and call his wife at the Vinoy. Fearing any number of horrific medical and violent crime scenarios had befallen his wife and kids, John and his racing heart wasted no time getting to his cell phone.
His wife screamed in a shrill voice that their room was haunted and they were checking out that very instant. Won’t even bother packing. Apparently, the kids were brushing their teeth and the water refused to turn off. Once the faucet knob was strong-armed into place, it stopped. Then they would leave the bathroom and it would again turn on. And that’s when the toilet began to flush on its own. When John spoke to the Vinoy front desk about moving his family to a room in the hotel’s new wing, the staff member yawned and told him, “Yeah, that stuff happens all the time.”
Many other baseball players and support staff have had encounters with the unknown at the Vinoy, but perhaps none are quite as disturbing as the account of pitcher Jon Switzer of the Devil Rays and his wife Dana. Why a Devil Rays pitcher was staying at the visiting team’s hotel is unknown, but on with the story we go.
During the night, Jon and Dana heard a “scratching” behind the headboard of their bed, “like a rat clawing from the other side of the drywall.” In time the noise in the dark subsided and fifteen minutes of quiet passed. Then all hell broke loose.
The scratching returned and this time it was loud enough to shake the bed. The temperature of the room seemed to turn icy, as if the air conditioning was just cranked to “high.” Jon and Dana leaped up and turned on the lamp on their nightstand. What they saw then would disturb them for the rest of their lives.
Above the bed was a 19th Century-era painting. It depicted a young girl in a Victorian dress holding a basket in a garden of flowers. According to Jon, the girl’s expression was one of desperation and her left arm was moving, actually moving and clawing at the glass of the frame as if wanting out. The Switzers left the room and decided to forego the next morning’s continental breakfast, even if it was complimentary.
As of this writing, the Tampa Bay Rays are on top of the American League East and are considered one of the best teams in baseball. Maybe it’s because their opponents can never get a decent night’s sleep.</blockquote>
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