Mike Piazza, the longtime Dodgers catcher and fan favorite who most recently played for the Oakland Athletics, has been living in Miami Beach during the off-season for quite some time. Now, he has left the Golden State behind.
Piazza and his wife, the former Alicia Rickter -- a 1995 Playboy Playmate -- have bought their second property in the Miami Beach area. The home, purchased for $10 million, had been listed at $12.5 million.
Mediterranean in style, the house was built in 2001 and sits on 100 feet of waterfront. There are eight bedrooms and nine bathrooms in its 9,600-plus square feet. Other features are a two-story living room with a marble fireplace and a cypress-wood-beamed ceiling, an elevator, a pool, fountains and a three-car garage.
The kitchen is state of the art -- perhaps because the seller is Sophia Marcovitz, ex-wife of Marshall Marcovitz, the founder of the Chefs Catalog.
Besides their two homes in the Miami area, the Piazzas have an apartment in New York.
Piazza, 39, is a free agent. After starting his career as the 1,390th player chosen in baseball's 1988 amateur draft, Piazza went on to become one of the top major league catchers of all time. He was chosen for a dozen All-Star games and holds the record for most home runs by a catcher.
Piazza appears in the documentary "Champions of Faith," which profiles Christian baseball players.
Scarlett Brooks and Elena Bluntzer of the Bluntzer Group represented the Piazzas; Jill Eber and Jill Hertzberg represented Marcovitz.
An upwardly mobile home
Apparently there's no celebrity-proofing against the slowdown in the housing market.
Jaime Pressly, who won an Emmy last year for her role as Joy in the NBC comedy series "My Name Is Earl," has finished remodeling and has listed her Tarzana home at just under $1.3 million. It was listed in December 2006 at close to $1.4 million but was then taken off the market.
Now that the 30-year-old has found her niche as a comic actress, she and her boyfriend, Eric Cubiche, a DJ, want larger quarters and plan to move up.
Pressly oversaw a complete remodeling of the 3,000-square-foot house, which sits behind gates and is set back from the street. The house has three en-suite bedrooms including a master suite with a sitting area, two walk-in closets and a bathroom with a spa tub and steam shower.
The home also has wood and iron entrance doors, ebony hardwood and Spanish tile floors, bamboo window shades and three fireplaces.
