The Two Big Issues of the Week

I’m going to comment in order of importance.

Thanks For Not Kirbing Your Enthusiasm, Puckett

What an absolutely horrible and shocking thing it is that happened to Kirby Puckett. Honestly, I don’t really care that after his career, he had some domestic and legal troubles. Well actually I do care, because it always seemed that Puckett was one of those never-gonna-screw-up type guys, and it kind of makes you feel silly when the guys you thought were exceptions wind up proving the rule, but still.

One of my first baseball memories was watching Puckett in the 1987 World Series. He was complete. He even stole bases back then. That’s right. He stole an average of 16+ bases his first four years in the majors. Then he started eating a lot, although he did have one of those token 17-steal seasons late in his career. That was before the "defensive indifference" statistic was introduced. Come to think of it, it's probably WHY the defensive indifference statistic was introduced.

But I really have to give Puckett credit for making sure I stayed into baseball. The first W.S. I remember was ’86 with the Mets and Sox, obviously an exciting 7-game series. The next year, ’87, was an equally thrilling 7-game series between Puckett’s Twins and the Cardinals (the first World Series in history in which the home team won every game). Couple that with Game 1 of the ’88 Series – Gibby’s gimpy, game-winning home run off Denny Eck, and how was I ever going to leave this game? But I was spoiled, and I didn't know it.

Honestly, what I really have to give Puckett credit for is for reaffirming my love for baseball. That happened in 1991. Let me set the scene: After Gibson’s home run in ‘88, we had a couple poopy pants World Series – the A’s killing the Giants in the quake-marred ’89 Series and the Reds sweeping the A’s in 1990.

Then came 1991: the “worst to first” World Series between Minnesota and the Atlanta Braves (the first year of the Braves 14-year division title run). That series had everything. Puckett won game six with an extra-inning, walk-off home run (back when our English language was still in its adolescent stages and they just called it a “game-winning” home run). The Twins won Game 7, also in extra innings, to win the second World Series in history in which the home team won all seven games (the third, if you’re scoring from the Internet, was the Yankees/Diamondbacks series in 2001. This is actually a good bar trivia question).

But seriously, back to Puckett. In that ’91 series, he made one of the most spectacular big-moment catches in baseball history, robbing Ron Gant of a homer in the third inning of Game 6. He hit .318 in his career, although it is true that he really never accumulated the numbers that most Hall of Fame outfielders compiled. But guess what? For some reason, nobody really complained that much when he got into the Hall of Fame on the first try. Some of it probably had to do with him still being an effective player up until the problem that forced him to abruptly end his career before the 1996 season.

But there was just something about Kirby. He seemed to like playing baseball. That’s an odd concept. Most baseball players act like they’re working in an office somewhere installing drivers onto really bad laptop computers.

But not Puckett. He seemed to play with a, “I know all you fans would play this game for free and I would too,” mentality. And I’ve missed that since he retired prematurely 10 years ago because of that unfortunate eye problem. And I’ll miss him every time I think about the Twins, and every time I think about athletes who look a little bit like you and me, and most importantly, when I start wondering why I love baseball so much and why I never lost that love.

I love you baseball, and I loved you Kirby.

- Barry later this week. Let me digest this stuff first, okay?