baseball obituaries 2012

Andy Carey, Yankee third baseman 1952-60:

http://www.pinstripedbible.com/2012/01/11/on-andy-carey-1931-2011/

Marty Springstead, AL ump/supervisor

http://mlb.mlb.com/news/article.jsp?ymd=20120118&content_id=26381166&vkey=news_mlb&c_id=mlb

so, yeah, Gary Carter, as we've come to expect.

http://mlb.sbnation.com/2012/2/16/2803443/gary-carter-dies-obituaries-from-new-york-montreal

Tonight (not a 'shop):

http://assets.sbnation.com/assets/956775/GaryCarterESB.jpg

Don Mincher dies at 73; player on '72 World Series champion Oakland A's

http://www.latimes.com/news/obituaries/la-me-don-mincher-20120306,0,4706014.story

HR leader on the '69 Pilots (25)! I think he had some funny moments in Ball Four.

1966-98 ump Harry Wendelstedt

http://mlb.sbnation.com/2012/3/9/2858082/harry-wendelstedt-mlb-umpire-dies?tw_p=twt

Mel Parnell, Red Sox lefty who thrived at Fenway from '48-53

http://mlb.mlb.com/news/article.jsp?ymd=20120320&content_id=27461524&vkey=news_mlb&c_id=mlb

cincinnati reds hall-of-famer and pinch-hitter extraordinaire jerry lynch (1954-66)

http://www.upi.com/Top_News/US/2012/04/02/Jerry-Lynch-superb-pinch-hitter-dies/UPI-50221333387482

Ray Narleski:

http://www.cleveland.com/ohio-sports-blog/index.ssf/2012/04/ray_narleski.html

I associate him with Don Mossi, by all accounts...not the George Clooney of his day.

Moose Skowron, Yankee/Dodger slugger of the '60s:

http://mlb.sbnation.com/2012/4/27/2981066/bill-moose-skowron-yankees-slugger-dies-at-81

Pedro Borbon. I was there in '73 when he took a chunk out of a Mets cap with his teeth.

http://espn.go.com/mlb/story/_/id/8009018/former-cincinnati-reds-reliever-pedro-borbon-succumbs-cancer-65

My favourite team pre-Jays; it's been a long time, but I remember him as the primary set-up guy (and also, without checking, that there was one year where he won over 10 games and had a very high WP).

Pedro Borbon was the glue of the Big Red Machine pitching staff. Look at how many innings the guy pitched in that stretch.

I would say he was Captain Hook's favorite.

James on Pedro (echoing Morbius's comment--maybe James has the wrong team?):

Bill, I am sure you saw that Pedro Borbon passed away. Many will not remember him, but what an unusual career by today's standards -- 120 relief innings a year, with high hit/low Ks, but low walks and HRs allowed. Was his usage unusual for his time? And, could someone like him be used effectively today (sort of as a 2 inning every-other-day swing set up guy)?
Asked by: deberly

Answered: 6/5/2012
He was a very effective pitcher who never moved into a key role. The 2-inning stint for relievers was much more common then than now. Looking at pitchers with 1 start or less and 110 innings pitched or more, there were 3 such seasons in the 1930s, 7 in the 1940s, 12 in the 1950s, 56 in the 1960s, and 74 in the 1970s, including 4 by Borbon; then there were only 63 such seasons in the 1980s, 10 in the 1990s, and there have been none since 1999.

Debating whether it is inappropriate to mention this at the time of a man's passing, but one time the Reds got into an on-field fight, I think with the Pirates, and Borbon was accused of biting a player from the other team. The players took to calling him "Dracula", derisively, and this nickname kind of caught on. I think he was held back in the bullpen because Sparky thought he was too flighty, too intense, to be trusted with the closer role.

That season I alluded to above ('73. 11-4) was strange. He gave up over a hit per inning (137 hits in 121 IP), walked 35 (good) and struck out only 60, yet somehow managed a 2.16 ERA.

I don't remember anything where he bit someone. He tangled w/ Buzz Capra in the immediate aftermath of the Rose-Harrelson playoff fight, and wound up clamping a Mets cap on his head. Then chewed on it.

OK, Borbon DID bite a couple guys, I'd forgotten.

Dave Boswell, Twins ace of the '60s who got KO'd by Billy Martin:

http://www.nytimes.com/2012/06/14/sports/baseball/dave-boswell-pitcher-who-tussled-with-billy-martin-is-dead-at-67.html

Johnny Pesky, at 92

http://mlb.sbnation.com/2012/8/13/3240275/johnny-pesky-dies-red-sox-news

I associate Pesky with an audio clip of that one World Series in the '40s that the Red Sox lost in seven...something where he takes a cut-off throw over his shoulder and fails to get the guy at the plate. (Will now check this--I like to test my fading memory.)

Enos Slaughter's "mad dash"

What exactly happened when Pesky turned around is still a matter of contention. Some claim that Pesky, assuming that Slaughter would not be running home, checked Walker at first base instead of immediately firing home, while others contend that Pesky was so shocked to see Slaughter on his way to score that he had a mental lapse that accounted for the delay. Whatever the reason, the delay and a weak and rushed throw home allowed Slaughter to score just as Red Sox catcher Roy Partee caught it up the line from home plate.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Slaughter's_Mad_Dash

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=t7IgTE593oA

Yeah, it was even mentioned in your link. I'd forgotten it was Enos Slaughter, though. Bad man.

Posnanski rejects the idea that Pesky had any chance to throw out Slaughter:

http://joeposnanski.blogspot.ca/2012/08/pesky.html#more

Champ Summers. Great name.

http://www.highheatstats.com/2012/10/champ-summers-1946-2012/

I always think of him as part of the 84 padres but did not realize that was his only year with the team!

Eddie Yost, sabermetric pioneer:

http://sportsillustrated.cnn.com/2012/baseball/mlb/10/17/eddie-yost-obit.ap/index.html?sct=mlb_t2_a5

Not to be confused with Eddie Joost, who was pretty damn similar.

ach, I have his autograph! Somewhere. 3b coach for the Mets in Hodges/Berra years.

Dave May, 12-year OF traded for Hank Aaron

http://mlb.mlb.com/news/article.jsp?ymd=20121022&content_id=39983990&vkey=news_mlb&c_id=mlb

http://www.listindiario.com.do/el-deporte/2012/11/1/253383/Asesinan-a-expelotero-Pascual-Perez-en-intento-de-atraco-en-Haina

http://cdn01.dailycaller.com/wp-content/uploads/2010/08/athletespascual-perez.jpg

:(

Deadspin obit:

http://updates.deadspin.com/post/34761131446/pascual-perez-is-dead-at-55-killed-for-his-pension

Lee MacPhail, HOF son of a HOfer

http://mlb.sbnation.com/2012/11/9/3623520/lee-macphail-obituary-dead-hall-fame

Many tweets about Marvin Miller. Haven't seen any articles yet.

http://www.nydailynews.com/sports/baseball/ex-players-association-exec-marvin-miller-dead-95-article-1.1208710

So lousy that they never put him in the HOF--he seemed like such an honorable man, and he made piles of money for everybody.

p sure he didn't care about the HOF much.

Saw him deliver banquet speech at SABR Cincinnati convention in '04 (and rode in the elevator with him after). You could spot the plentiful pro-owner red-staters who refused to stand when he was finished.

the Bowie Kuhn anecdotes in his autobiog are rich, btw

I know he said he didn't care about the HOF (partly because he felt resented after being snubbed so many times), but he should have been in, and he should have been alive to see it happen.

A chronicle of Miller and the HOF:

http://mlb.si.com/2012/11/27/marvin-miller-hall-of-fame/?sct=mlb_t11_a3

I'm just speculating, but my guess is that he very much wanted to be in the Hall, but had too much honor to accept an induction that required lots of people lobbying and pleading on his behalf.

Rogelio "Borrego" Alvarez, former first baseman for the Cincinnati Reds and Cuban Winter League star, died Friday evening in Hialeah, Fla., due to complications from kidney failure according to a former teammate who wished to remain anonymous. He was 74.

Alvarez was signed by the Cincinnati Reds in 1956 out of his hometown of Pinar del Rio, Cuba. “I was 17 and a half. That year, we came about eight of us all together to Douglass, Ga. It was a little town, and we went there to train,” he said. Alvarez would soon be faced with the harsh realities of segregation, something he didn’t experience in Cuba. “I didn’t know it was so bad, the colored people couldn’t go no place. The white people stayed in the good hotel, we had to go to the black community and stay in a house, stuff like that. We didn’t understand the bad words, so we didn’t know what they said.”

http://www.examiner.com/article/rogelio-borrego-alvarez-74-cincinnati-reds-first-baseman-and-cuban-star

http://www.firstcoastnews.com/topstories/article/288484/483/Former-Big-Leaguer-from-Jax-Ryan-Freel-Dead-at-36

That is pretty awful news about Ryan Freel.

Ryan Freel was a definite fan favorite when he played in Cincy. He pretty much played with reckless abandon.

fuck...dude was a solid player. you have to wonder if the number of concussions he had were part of this, similar to what's happened w/a number of ex-nflers.

I thought about those concussions myself.

Brad Corbett, Steinbush wannabe

http://www.nytimes.com/2012/12/27/sports/brad-corbett-who-owned-texas-rangers-dies-at-75.html

wow... Freel. more than a little surprised.

Not Musial or Weaver, but I just read that Fred Talbot died the week before last:

http://spectator.org/blog/2013/01/16/fred-talbot-rip

If you've read Ball Four, you'll remember him.

Well, deaths always come in threes.

Earl Williams, 1971 NL ROY w/ the Braves

http://www.nj.com/sports/index.ssf/2013/01/former_braves_catcher_earl_wil.html

There were so many good young catchers breaking in at that time: the 1970-72 window was like what the early '90s were to young first baseman. Besides Williams--who never got any better--you had Bench (rookie year '68), Fisk ('72), Munson ('70), Ted Simmons ('70), Fosse ('70), and Sanguillen ('69).

Throw in Gene Tenace, too, who basically split his time with 1B.

Edith Houghton, first female MLB scout

http://www.inquisitr.com/518269/edith-houghton-dies-mlbs-first-female-scout-passes-at-100/

Virgil Trucks

http://www.nytimes.com/2013/03/27/sports/baseball/virgil-trucks-dies-at-95-had-2-no-hitters-in-1952.html

Had no idea he was still alive. His 1952 season is one of the best quirky statistical seasons ever, no doubt. He was also one of the best "hall of very good" guys of his era, it's interesting to think about what kind of career he could have had if he'd played for better teams and hadn't missed so much time due to injuries and the war.

When I was really young, a couple of my uncles gave me a baseball with a bunch of fake signatures from former Tigers. I thought the NAME Virgil Trucks was fake. A couple years later, when I cared about autographs, I met Trucks and got the real deal.

Just looked up his page on Baseball Reference. His nickname was "Fire"--clunky. Virgil "Monster" Trucks would have been much better.

i don't think there were monster trucks in the '50s

shoulda been "Flatbed"

GRAVEDIGGER

Too soon, Andy.

Bob Turley, 1958 Cy Young winner with Yankees

http://www.pinstripedbible.com/2013/3/30/4166036/new-york-yankees-baltimore-orioles-pitcher-bob-turley-passes-away-obituary

Rick Camp, Braves pitcher (and ex-con) who hit one of the unlikeliest homers ever in the wee hours of July 5, 1985:

http://www.baseballnation.com/hot-corner/2013/4/25/4266260/rick-camp-braves-death-home-run

http://mlb.mlb.com/video/play.jsp?content_id=13062877

(btw yes that is John Sterling doing Atlanta games)

Epy Guerrero:

http://www.thestar.com/sports/bluejays/2013/05/23/legendary_blue_jays_scout_epy_guerrero_dies.html

Hard to overstate his importance to the Jays through the '80s and early '90s. A few of the players he scouted: George Bell, Tony Fernandez, Carlos Delgado, Juan Guzman, Damaso Garcia.

Frank Castillo:

http://www.torontosun.com/2013/07/29/former-toronto-blue-jays-pitcher-frank-castillo-drowns-in-arizona-lake

I remember him, but not that well. Pitched one year in Toronto, and was quite good--trying to figure out why the Jays released him.

Geez, a second one--George Scott:

http://sportsillustrated.cnn.com/mlb/news/20130729/george-boomer-scott-dead-red-sox-brewers.ap/?sct=mlb_t2_a5

Big hitter when I started watching baseball; to be really quaint about it, the RBI guy with mystique. Tony Perez. Bob Watson. Boomer. When the Red Sox brought him back in '77, I remember the team went home run-crazy for a while.

Drungo Hazewood, '70s Orioles system phenom

http://www.baltimoresun.com/sports/orioles/bs-sp-orioles-drungo-hazewood-0731-20130730%2C0%2C557492.story

btw I'm excited that I will probably be able to make a sidetrip in KC to visit the graves of Satchel Paige and Buck O'Neil (Zack Wheat too, for Brooklyn).

http://stewthornley.net/halloffamegraves.html

Frank Pulli, ump and supervisor 1972-2007

http://www.nytimes.com/2013/08/30/sports/baseball/frank-pulli-longtime-umpire-in-majors-dies-at-78.html?_r=0

He made many better calls than the fucking Reggie leg thing in the '78 WS.

Gates Brown

http://www.freep.com/article/20130927/SPORTS02/309270102/gates-brown-dies-detroit-tigers

RIP Gates

http://www.detroitnews.com/article/20130927/SPORTS0104/309270110/

Andy Pafko, NL outfielder who played for pennant winners in Chicago, Brooklyn, Milwaukee

http://www.sportingnews.com/mlb/story/2013-10-09/andy-pafko-dies-long-time-mlb-player-appeared-in-last-cubs-world-series

Pafko at the wall:

http://perival.com/delillo/pafko.jpeg

21-year ump Wally Bell, 48

http://espn.go.com/mlb/story/_/id/9826711/mlb-umpire-wally-bell-dead-48-apparent-heart-attack

rudy minarcin, pitched in 70 games for the redlegs and red sox in the mid '50s, including a one-hitter against his hometown pirates on june 4, 1955

http://obituaries.triblive.com/listing/231091/Rudolph-A-Minarcin-Rudy

Bill Mazer, a NY sportscasting perennial from 1964 through the '90s

http://www.nytimes.com/2013/10/24/sports/bill-mazer-a-sports-fixture-of-new-york-radio-and-tv-dies-at-92.html

Neyer and Olbermann on the Amazin':

http://www.baseballnation.com/hot-corner/2013/10/24/5025316/bill-mazer-sports-answers-trivia-death-obituary

Johnny Kucks, Yankee pitching star of the '56 World Series

http://www.nydailynews.com/sports/baseball/yankees/yankees-world-series-hero-johnny-kucks-dead-80-article-1.1503847

101-year-old ace parker

- hit a homer in his first major league at-bat for the a's in 1937
- was mvp of the nfl in 1940, throwing 10 td passes, kicking 19 extra points and snagging six interceptions
- durham bulls player-manager from 1949-1952
- duke head baseball coach from 1953-1966

I think Connie Marrero is the only centenarian ex-player now

Michael Weiner

http://espn.go.com/mlb/story/_/id/10015217/mlb-players-union-leader-michael-weiner-dies-51

Somehow I missed the announcement about Tony Clark being groomed as his successor.

Lou Brissie, wounded WW2 vet who recovered to pitch for the Philadelphia A's

http://www.washingtonpost.com/sports/lou-brissie-who-pitched-in-the-majors-after-severe-wounds-in-world-war-ii-dies-at-89/2013/11/27/6e02b4fa-578a-11e3-835d-e7173847c7cc_story.html

Mike Hegan, hit .242 with 53 homers (NYY-A's-Pilots!), broadcast Indians for 23 years

http://espn.go.com/mlb/story/_/id/10194072/long-indians-broadcaster-former-major-leaguer-mike-hegan-dies-71

rip all-time great oriole/all-time great center fielder/2-time WS champion paul blair

all-time defender in CF, yes

No real memory of him in the field, but looking at the numbers, he must have been something. For position players he was 2nd on the '69 Orioles in WAR (just slightly behind Frank Robinson), and he was first on the '70 team that won 108 games and breezed through the postseason. That's pretty amazing. I remember him more on the two Yankee teams that won later in the decade--he even managed to keep a part-time job on the '78 Yankees hitting .176.

http://joeposnanski.com/joeblogs/rip-paul-blair/

all-time defender in CF, yes

― eclectic husbandry (Dr Morbius), Friday, December 27, 2013 9:16 AM (4 hours ago) Bookmark Flag Post Permalink

that's what i meant, yes, though he wasn't always scrap metal with the stick either. key component to several of the best teams of the modern era, couple years as the best all-around CF in baseball.

twitter is claiming that ralph kiner has died

anyone's in particular?

https://twitter.com/MLB/status/431522936600555520

idk if i trust this "MLB"