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Outta Here | RIP Harry Kalas

I love baseball.

The fates have been especially cruel to my favorite game this week.

Last Thursday, 22-year-old Nick Adenhart died far too young. And earlier today, the game lost two of its most memorable personalities: Mark “The Bird” Fidrych, whose on-the-mound antics earned him much repute, and Harry Kalas, the 39-year veteran of the Philadelphis Philles broadcast booth, whose timeless voice is familiar to so many generations. Click here to listen to his call of the Phils’ World Series victory last year.

The St. Louis Cardinals have always been my favorite baseball team. With the news about Adnehart and Kalas in particular, my mind rushed back to June 2002. On June 18, the Cardinals lost their long-time voice, Jack Buck. Most people know Jack Buck for his call of Kirk Gibson’s dramatic “limp-off” home run in the 1988 World Series: “I don’t believe what I just saw!” For me, listening to 1120 KMOX would never be the same without the fabulous call: “That’s a winner.” That same day, June 18, a 33-year-old righthander named Darryl Kile pitched a gem for the Cardinals, dealing easily with the Anaheim Angels and leading the Redbirds into first place in the NL Central. They’d stay there the rest of the season.

Four short days later, I was at a wedding at the church where I was on staff. During the reception, I had turned on a TV in an office because the Cardinals and Cubs were playing the Fox Game of the Week. I’d run in every now and then to check the status of the game, and was increasingly confused as to why there would be a delay in getting started, with the sun shining bright over Chicago’s Wrigley Field. I’d learn why a few minutes later, when Joe Girardi addressed the Wrigley crowd with a shaky voice. Darryl Kile had been found dead in his hotel room. Jack Buck’s son, Joe, was in the Fox broadcast booth that day at Wrigley.

I’m a pretty emotional guy. I’ve seen Field of Dreams 472 times (hyperbole alert), and I always cry at the “Dad…you wanna have a catch?” scene (no hyperbole there). But I find this interesting: My favorite sports teams (all of which I proudly inherited from my Dad, by the way) have all won a championship within the last decade. In 1998, Tennessee won the college football title. In 2006, the Cardinals won the World Series. And in 2007, the Colts won the Super Bowl. Out of those three titles, only one time was I on the phone with my Dad at the deciding moment with tears running down my face. When we lost Darryl Kile, and Jack Buck, and Josh Hancock in 2007, it felt a whole lot like we lost a very close friend.

Something about baseball just gets in me. There’s just something that sets it apart from all the other sports, all the other games. Today I really feel awful for Tiger fans who watched Mark Fidrych in his too-short career, and for all those Phillie fans who won’t ever hear that incredible voice call a live game again.

I love baseball.