The Man Returns Home - Bunselpower32's Blog

Bunselpower32's Blog

The Man Returns Home

Posted on January 21, 2013 at 01:37 AM.

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If you made it this far into my OS arena, it should have become obvious that I am a St. Louis Cardinals fan; if not, I'm not doing my job very well. I love Cardinal Nation, I love it that I recently got to move to this city from my home, and let me tell you, there is nothing like baseball season in St. Louis. Seeing the entire city come together to huddle around the radio to listen to John Rooney and Mike Shannon in October on KMOX is incredible. I love the history, the pride, the legends, the characters, and I especially love the way that the city drops everything for the Cardinals without any further explanation needed.

This love that the city has for their team was manifested in their reaction as they heard, one by one, that the greatest hitter of all time had passed away. Shock, reminiscence, surprise, even. I myself heard an announcer on the local sports station listing all of his achievements after I got in the car to go home from work. The list was so long that I got home before it was finished. I raced upstairs to my apartment to see if my role model had indeed died as I feared he had. 92 is very old, much older than he or anyone else probably expected. Everyone knew it was coming, but you wouldn't know it if you were to look at their reactions. Because what had just died wasn't just a great player; it was a legend, it was a piece of Cardinal history, and if you live in a town like St. Louis, that is a piece of you.

Stan started out as a pitcher for the Cardinals, and was a pretty good one. He sustained an injury to his shoulder that forced him to stop pitching, which turned into the luckiest injury there has ever been. Stan went on to have an amazing career highlighted by 3630 hits, and a stellar .331 batting average.

I could list all of his stats, but you can find that easily enough. I could tell you about the first time I saw him play, but that doesn't exist, because I never had the privilege of seeing him play the game I love. No, what I want to do is to do my best to pay homage to my idol by reading between the stat lines, a few accomplishments that seldom are discussed.

Stan was consistency, and that was highlighted by his 1815 hits both at St. Louis and on the road. He never struck out more than 50 times in a season, ending a 22 year career with 696 strikeouts. He had 29 more doubles than he had strikeouts. To put that in perspective, Mark Reynolds only needed the seasons of 2008, 2009, 2010, and through mid May of 2011 to accumulate this many strikouts. Stan was a mix of power, contact, and speed that was never before and never will be seen again. He is the only player in MLB history to be in the top 50 of every batting category. In my opinion, he was the greatest all around hitter to ever play the game, taking all of his stats into account. It was said about Stan that the best way to get him out was to, "Pitch him four wide ones and try to pick him off first."

But Stan didn't care about accolades. He was always humbled by the chance to play the game. And that leads into what I believe to be Stan Musial's greatest on field achievement - never being ejected from a game. He always viewed baseball as a gift, and never treated it or the fans with contempt or presumption.

He loved St. Louis, and knew it was the fans that were what allowed him to play that game he loved professionally. He never turned down an autograph; he never walked by little kids holding out baseballs and gloves and bats for him to sign. He would never be to busy to talk to a fan. His accessibility was something that was unique about such a huge star, both then and now.

He didn't marry a supermodel, but he had one wife until last May when she passed who I know he wouldn't have traded for 100 supermodels. He didn't bet on a game, but he had a lot of people betting on him. He never ate a bunch of hot dogs and drank a bunch of beer before games, but the people watching him and listening to him sure did. He never sharpened his spikes, because he didn't need force to be respected. He just lived his life, played his game, and never expected anything from anyone.

I battled with putting the paragraph in about his stats, and I finally decided to do so, since after all, he was a baseball player. But the fact that I can have all of this information just flowing out about Stan and none of it related to his stats shows what kind of a player, citizen, and man he really was. He was the essence of humility, and I can't wait to meet him. It's no wonder that the town of St. Louis act as though we have all lost a family member; we have.