Baseball Passings 2016

[Guest Mets Willets Point]

Hall of Famer Monte Irvin, 96. Played with Newark Eagles (1938–42, 46–48), New York Giants (1949–55) and Chicago Cubs (1956). Scouted for the Mets in 1967-1968.

Was the oldest living Negro League Player, not sure who that passes on to now.

[Frayed Knot]

Mets – Willets Point wrote: Was the oldest living Negro League Player, not sure who that passes on to now.

Pretty soon the answer to that question is going to be 'No one'
The Negro National League last played in 1948 with a total of just six teams. Even a 22 y/o who played in that final season would be turning 90 this year.

[Guest Mets Willets Point]

Frayed Knot wrote: Mets – Willets Point wrote: Was the oldest living Negro League Player, not sure who that passes on to now. Pretty soon the answer to that question is going to be 'No one' The Negro National League last played in 1948 with a total of just six teams. Even a 22 y/o who played in that final season would be turning 90 this year.

The Negro American League competed until 1951 and barnstormed until 1960 so there may be a few youngsters in their 80s left.

[G-Fafif]

Irvin scouted for the Mets in the late 1960s before taking a job making Bowie Kuhn look less inept. He was also one of the dignitaries who turned a shovel of dirt at the groundbreaking for Flushing Meadow Municipal Stadium on October 28, 1961. He may have been the last survivor of that ceremony. My first memory of Monte is him in his Giants uniform, smiling out from the two-page Old Timers Day spread in the 1972 Mets yearbook.

[Edgy MD]

That, along with going to work for Rheingold, makes him about as Metly as a guy can be without being a Met.

[Centerfield]

It makes me sad that we will soon live in a world where there are no more living Negro League players. What an incredible institution. We need to keep hearing about it first-hand.

[Edgy MD]

Read a book — or write one! — in honor of David Voigt, fiercely scholarly historian of baseball, and past president of SABR. Author of this definitive three-volume history.

[fimg=250]http://ecx.images-amazon.com/images/I/516GlneCXjL._SX331_BO1,204,203,200_.jpg[/fimg] [fimg=250]http://ecx.images-amazon.com/images/I/51JPxqhjmjL._SY344_BO1,204,203,200_.jpg[/fimg] [fimg=250]http://ecx.images-amazon.com/images/I/51lqJQTPcXL._SX331_BO1,204,203,200_.jpg[/fimg]

[Edgy MD]

Longtime catcher, legendary sportscaster, and (I believe) the guy with the grace to say absolutely nothing as Vin Scully wordpainted the magical 1986 Game Six comeback.

Joe Garagiola, ladies and gentlemen, saying goodbye at the ripe age of 90.

[fimg=225]http://cache2.asset-cache.net/gc/138358588-pictured-nbc-sports-announcers-joe-garagiola-gettyimages.jpg?v=1&c=IWSAsset&k=2&d=Z0zsWpN2ukUDXYqF4boPJfVlHExuxpeY%2FR2Hd0en75NzfjLgblXgLHHWETxhRtGG[/fimg]

[G-Fafif]

The world is down to 22 living New York Baseball Giants.

[Frayed Knot]

17 year vet and 209 game winner (Balt, Cincy, Braves, Cubs) Milt Pappas - 76

Notable for, among other things, losing a perfect game on a borderline 3-2 call that didn't go his way with 2 outs in the 9th. And he wasn't shy about saying how unhappy he was with HP ump Bruce Froemming.
The other oddity in his life came after his playing career was over when his wife simply disappeared one day after going out shopping. Amid rumors of abduction and ritual murder by a local cult in suburban Chicago, no trace of her or her car were found until almost exactly five years later when a pond was drained for construction purposes just a few blocks from their house revealed the family car with her remains in it. The death was ruled an accidental drowning caused by her apparently mistaking a driveway to the pond for a road into her neighborhood.

[Guest cooby classic]

Edgy MD wrote: Longtime catcher, legendary sportscaster, and (I believe) the guy with the grace to say absolutely nothing as Vin Scully wordpainted the magical 1986 Game Six comeback. Joe Garagiola, ladies and gentlemen, saying goodbye at the ripe age of 90. [fimg=225]http://cache2.asset-cache.net/gc/138358588-pictured-nbc-sports-announcers-joe-garagiola-gettyimages.jpg?v=1&c=IWSAsset&k=2&d=Z0zsWpN2ukUDXYqF4boPJfVlHExuxpeY%2FR2Hd0en75NzfjLgblXgLHHWETxhRtGG[/fimg]

Aw I missed this. No offense to Milt Pappas

[Edgy MD]

Sean Murphy, Oakland farmhand passes unexpectedly at 27

Cause of death hasn't been released but he was under suspension for drug of abuse reasons.

[Edgy MD]

Pause a moment and honor the life of W.P. Kinsella, Canadian-American novelist who married magic realism to baseball as if they were born to be together. Let's hope there's a cornfield out there somewhere with a place for him.


cRfVu9ay1VU

[Frayed Knot]

Edgy MD wrote: ... who married magic realism to baseball as if they were born to be together.

You mean they weren't?

[Lefty Specialist]

The book is a lot quirkier than the movie was, but a fine read.

[Guest Mets Guy in Michigan]

I loved how he weaved reality in with the fantasy. Everything in the movie about Doc Graham was true, except for the year of his death. They were reading his actual obit -- with the references to the blue hats for Alecia and buying glasses for kids.

Although Graham did go back and play in the minors for a while before starting his medical practice.

I read another of his baseball books -- the Iowa Baseball Confederacy -- but didn't it as much.

Edited September 17, 2016 by Guest

[Edgy MD]

The Iowa Baseball Confederacy was hot stuff. Magic realism and the 1908 Cubs and Native Americans and US cultural history and existentialism and all that. Elements of some his short stories were adapted into it as well.

[Benjamin Grimm]

I loved Shoeless Joe. Iowa Baseball Confederacy was okay. And then there was another book, Box Socials that I didn't like at all.

[Guest John Cougar Lunchbucket]

Russ Nixon, 81. Had a 12 year playing career and former manager of the Reds and Braves.

He was the last Braves manager before Bobby Cox.

[Edgy MD]

Ralph Branca, beloved Brooklyn righthander, figure on the wrong side of one of history's most celebrated homers, and Bobby Valentine's father-in-law, passes at the age of 90.

[tweet]

[/tweet]

[Centerfield]

Sharron Zachry, wife of Pat Zachry. Tragic.

http://www.wacotrib.com/news/traffic/former-midway-principal-zachry-killed-in-i--crash/article_e0015445-b97f-5f48-813c-5af4b0c83a6c.html

[Edgy MD]

Man, that's terrible.

Great that they went back to Waco and lived out their lives where they went to high school.

[Guest John Cougar Lunchbucket]

The entire Wifey Watch community sends its condolences. IIRC, Sharon was a regular at Player Family Day (PFD on your schedule).

[Guest cooby]

[Edgy MD]

The Mets 1979 yearbook records Pat and Sharon Zachry's 1978 appearance at Player Family Day. Pictured taking her turn at bat to the immediate left of the Zachrys is Mary Valentine, daughter of the late Ralph Branca.

[fimg=550:2q2ij7js]https://metsinpeace.files.wordpress.com/2016/11/sharon-zachry.jpg[/fimg:2q2ij7js]

[MFS62]

Ralph Branca, beloved Brooklyn righthander, figure on the wrong side of one of history's most celebrated homers, and Bobby Valentine's father-in-law, passes at the age of 90. [tweet]https://twitter.com/BobbyValentine/status/801418065204412416[/tweet]

A key part of the history of baseball in New York. He was one of MY Brooklyn Dodgers.
RIP.

Later

[MFS62]

I checked back to the beginning of this thread and it seems we missed the passing of Luis Arroyo.
For those of you too young to remember, he was the primary closer for the MFYs in the early 60's and was credited with multi-inning saves in many of Whitey Ford's starts.
In fact, one writer joked that if Ford was making $90,000 he should give $20,000 to Arroyo.

http://www.baseball-reference.com/players/a/arroylu01.shtml

RIP, Little Luis

Later

[G-Fafif]

RIP, the old Cardinal Phil Gagliano, just shy of 75.

Gagliano played in 1967 World Series against Boston and the 1968 World Series against the Detroit Tigers. During his 12-year career, he also played for the Chicago Cubs, Boston Red Sox and for a Cincinnati Reds’ team that included Johnny Bench, Tony Perez and Pete Rose. Gagliano hit .324, mostly as a pinch-hitter, in 1971 with the Red Sox and .290 with the Reds, in the same capacity, in 1973. His last season was with the Reds in 1974. His career and that of high school teammate and former major league all-star catcher Tim McCarver mirrored one another. McCarver, like Gagliano, attended Christian Brothers and signed with the Cardinals in 1959 and played for the Cardinals in the 1960s. “He and I were, at one time, tethered at the hip,” McCarver said. “We went to Christian Brothers together, we played on the same (American) Legion team under Phil’s uncle, Tony (Gagliano). “He and his wife were close enough to my family that they were the godfather and godmother of my youngest daughter. To say I thought highly of Phil is understated. He was just a wonderful man, in every way.”