The Nine

    My all-time favorite athletes

 

 

 

Introduction

     I’ve been a sports fan for as long as I can remember. Professional sports, mostly. Team sports, always. Golf and tennis held no interest for me. But that doesn’t mean I didn’t hold certain individual athletes in higher esteem than others.

     Favorite players.

     Growing up, everybody in my neighborhood had favorite players. Guys you rooted for above everyone else on the field, court, rink, or diamond. You collected their trading cards, hung their posters on your bedroom wall and defended them in all debates. You wore their jerseys. You mimicked the way they swung the bat, passed the ball and shot the puck. They became an extension of you in that they represented the qualities you held dear in terms of competition and, more importantly, the person you thought you were, and hoped to become. When they succeeded, you celebrated with them, feeling somehow empowered by having chosen them. And when they failed, you felt it deeply, as if you yourself had come up short. If they left town, you felt betrayed. And when they retired, you hoped they did so as a member of the team you had always associated them with. That way, they always remained yours.

     My brothers and our friends and I always rooted for Boston teams, but sometimes we’d sprinkle in an out-of-town team as a sort of secondary affiliation. This was almost always brought about by the discovery of a new favorite player. There were some unwritten rules in place when it came to choosing favorite players. Members of the Bruins, Celtics, Patriots and Red Sox were always up for grabs. For example, it was perfectly acceptable for you and your neighbor to both have Carl Yastrzemski as a favorite baseball player. But if you chose Johnny Bench, and chose him before anyone else, you could expect exclusive rights to him—sort of finder’s keepers—and you might even start rooting for the Reds as a result. It could get complicated.

     When I set out to compile this list, I envisioned it as a Top Ten, but then discovered there were only nine athletes whom I could truly count as favorites. After writing them down, I looked at the list, and wondered, “Why these guys?” All but two of them are Hall Of Famers. And all but two were members of at least one championship team in their respective sports. Between them, they’ve scored 1366 goals, accounted for 239 touchdowns, hit 635 homeruns and grabbed 22,793 rebounds. Heck, two of them even got thrown out of a game for fighting...with each other. Their greatness and competitiveness is undisputed. But why them and not nine other athletes? So I started writing; started with number one and worked my way down. Some of what I discovered was expected, some surprising, but each one makes perfect sense to me now.

1 Bobby Orr (Boston Bruins 1966-1976)

Field Of Dreams On Ice

     My earliest sports memories all have to do with hockey; my older brother playing, my father coaching, the rink in our backyard with the plywood end boards, and a bunch of grown men in plaid slacks and sideburns standing around our kitchen early on a winter’s evening, cocktails in hand, getting ready to go out. They were going to The Garden. They were going to the Bruins game.

     My dad was a Bruins season ticket holder; thirteen tickets, all in his name. He was like the popular blackjack dealer at Las Vegas Night whenever the Bruins were at home. Some of the guys on the team were friends of his, customers at his gas station. I remember watching the games on TV38; that familiar theme song—the Ventures’ “Nutty”—signaling that it was Bruins Time. Knowing my dad was there was the next best thing to watching the game with him. When the Bruins were on the road, my brothers and I would join him in front of the console TV in our living room and we’d all cheer together. Looking back, I find it funny that we were so united, all hoping for the same thing. As time went on, we shared less and less common ground. But those Bruins teams of the 70s had special appeal. And one Bruin stood out above the rest. Bobby Orr.

     They knew he was coming since before I was born. Bobby Orr signed with the Bruins in 1962, four years before his NHL debut. He won the Calder Memorial Trophy as rookie of the year in 1966-67, and over the next nine seasons, he won just about everything else. His name and number are pure hockey poetry.

     Orr...Four...Score!

     He is the subject of the most recognizable image in hockey history; mouth open, arms raised, body outstretched in air. The most famous goal ever scored. My brother Jimmy and I shared a bedroom in our basement and the first thing you saw after stepping down into it was that iconic black and white poster (there were color versions, but everybody knew they were fake), tacked into the paneling on the far wall.

     During the early 1970s, I followed Bobby Orr by watching TV, listening to the radio, collecting trading cards, and reading the programs that my father and Jimmy would bring home from the games (they were there, at The Garden, to witness that famous goal on Mother’s Day, May 10, 1970). The TV and radio experiences were made all the more memorable by the indelible voices of Fred Cusik and Johnny Peirson (TV) and Bob Wilson (radio). Their voices are forever in my head, providing the soundtrack to every great Bruins highlight of the era.  I knew all about Bobby Orr’s records and trophies and the two Stanley Cups. But nothing would compare with seeing Number 4 play in person at The Garden, a privilege I experienced several times during the 1974-75 season.

     My father knew many of the ushers and fellow patrons in the various sections where his seats were located throughout the arena. I thought it was cool that my dad was so well known in the building where the Bruins played. We’d arrive early so he could meet with some of his friends by the beer stand behind the stadium section while Jimmy and I watched the players warm up. Very few hockey players wore helmets in those days so it was easy to identify who was who without knowing all the uniform numbers. But Bobby Orr would’ve stood out to even the most uninformed hockey fan. The way he skated, the way the puck seemed to follow him around the rink and the way he made it crack when he shot it from the point. You just knew.

     And that was only during warm ups.

     It’s true the TV cameras followed the puck, and Orr had the puck a lot, but there was an electricity at The Garden during that time that could only be felt at the rink. Orr, starting out behind the Boston net, accelerating up ice, finding open space where there seems to be none. The crowd begins to hum and buzz with anticipation as he crosses center ice, then the blue line. We rise as one as Orr enters the opponent’s zone. A shot on net, a microsecond of silence, a collective holding of breath followed by a feathery flutter at the back of the net as the red light switches on. And then the eruption of glee; everybody, arms raised, smiling and screaming; my dad, my brother and I, all shouting and cheering together. My family was never big on outward celebration, but we celebrated Bobby Orr and those Bruins teams with unrestrained enthusiasm.

     For a sports fan, there’s nothing quite like having the best player in a given sport playing in your city. I’m talking about the absolute, no doubt, no argument, Best, and not just for a game or season, but for several years. In my lifetime, there have been only three instances where the best player in a particular sport was clear for all to see. In basketball you had Bill Russell in the 1960s and Michael Jordan in the 1990s (even with the mid-decade baseball sabbatical), and in hockey you had Bobby Orr of the late-60s through mid-70s. That’s it (Okay, maybe Wayne Gretzky in the 1980s, but that’s it). 

                        Warning: this will be the first of many instances in this series of essays where I will veer slightly, or not-so-slightly, off course, to support and/or justify my many claims and theories, and to attempt to show that I’m not just saying things to piss off people who might not agree with me. I do this also because I find working with, and formatting, footnotes, maddening.

     Basketball is the easiest sport in which to identify the best player because you have so few players on the court and everybody has offensive and defensive responsibilities. Football is the opposite with eleven men on offense, and eleven on defense (In the 1940s, Sammy Baugh led the NFL in passing, punting and interceptions, but I’m talking about my lifetime, and no 2-way player has been so great in the last 49 years) so football is out. In baseball and hockey you’ve got pitchers and goalies having roles so unique from everyone else’s that it’s nearly impossible to pick the best player (I’ve often wondered who’s idea it was to award wins and losses to pitchers and goalies in sports where games are won and lost by teams). Babe Ruth, a legendary pitcher and hitter, is probably baseball’s only candidate, ever (90+ years ago). Anyway, I was too young to witness Bill Russell, and Michael Jordan of the 1990s played in Chicago. So I had Bobby Orr, and despite the goalie caveat above, he was the best player in the NHL.

     Orr won 2 Art Ross Trophies as league scoring champ along with 8 Norris Trophies as top defenseman. He led the NHL in plus/minus six times, and was plus-597 for his career (second only to Larry Robinson). He won 3 Hart Trophies as regular season MVP, and 2 Conn Smythe Trophies as playoff MVP, scoring the Stanley Cup clinching goal in each of those Conn Smythe-winning seasons. He was a first-team NHL all-star eight straight seasons, and...well, you get the idea; he set a lot of records, won a lot of awards and scored a lot of big goals. But perhaps more than any on-ice accomplishment, it is the words of those who played with, and against, Bobby Orr, that tells us how great he really was:

“Orr not only was the top defenseman in the game but he was considered the best player ever to put on a pair of skates. There was nothing insulting about being rated number two to such a super superstar” 

-Brad Park, 4-time runner-up to Orr for Norris Trophy.

“I know what he does to a team because I experienced it when we played together in the Canada Cup.  We were like a bunch of kids on a pond waiting for someone to come along and organize us.  When he walked in the room, we knew we would be all right.”

-Denis Potvin, teammate, 1976 Canada Cup

“He was the best player in every game; he was the best player in the tournament.”

- Bobby Clarke, teammate, 1976 Canada Cup

“I don't know that there has ever been anybody that so completely dominated a team sport."

- Ken Dryden, Montreal Canadiens Hall Of Fame goaltender

     Bobby Orr gave Boston Bruins fans a reason to be proud. It was simple: We have him, and you don’t. Even though I was a just a kid, as a fan of Bobby Orr, I puffed out my chest and walked a little taller on my way through those Garden turnstiles.

     Okay, back to 1974-75. I must have seen seven or eight games during that season. Orr won the league scoring title along with his 8^th-straight Norris Trophy. He also broke his own record for goals by a defenseman with 46. Those were all great accomplishments, but, like Orr, I’m sure, I was looking forward to the playoffs, and to being there in-person.

     But it didn’t happen.

     My family was at a hotel in Disney World when we heard the short news clip. The Bruins had lost to the Chicago Black Hawks, 2 games to 1, in the first round of the Stanley Cup playoffs. The season was over. There would be no games to look forward to when we got home. I was stunned; an unhappy ten year-old in the Magic Kingdom. Imagine if I’d known that I would never see Bobby Orr play again?

     The following season, Orr would play in only ten games for the Bruins. Bracketed by two separate knee surgeries, he would score 18 points in those ten games, continuing his career pace of over a point-per-game. But the surgeries had been piling up for years (he would have twelve during his playing career) and his knees would not respond the way they used to. With his contract expiring at the end of the season, the trade rumors began to swirl. I hated hearing speculation that Bobby Orr might leave Boston.

     And then it happened.

     On June 8, 1976, Bobby Orr signed a free agent contract with the Chicago Black Hawks, the team that broke my heart when I was at Disney World the year before. It was my worst day as a sports fan. The circumstances that led to Orr leaving would not be known for several years. I blamed the team, not the player. I continued to support the Bruins, but didn’t entirely trust them. Most of the great players from the Bruins teams I grew up rooting for were gone either by trade, retirement, or by defection to the WHA. But I never thought Bobby Orr would be playing for another team in another city.

     When the truth came out about Orr’s agent, Alan Eagleson, and his duplicitous dealings, all was forgiven. Without going into too much detail, Eagleson withheld information from Orr that would’ve kept Bobby in Boston. Eagleson is now a convicted felon. He stole so much from so many. He stole from Bobby Orr, and he stole Bobby Orr from us.

     Bobby Orr is the greatest hockey player I’ve ever seen. He’s the greatest player my dad’s ever seen. Over all the years, even when we couldn’t agree on anything else, it’s the one thing we were both sure of. No tension. No debate. And that’s why I am so protective of Orr’s legacy. I know from reading his autobiography that personal achievements meant little to him, but I got annoyed in 1986 when Paul Coffey scored his 47^th goal, wanted a recount in 2000 when Chris Pronger was voted winner of the Hart Trophy as MVP (the only defenseman other than Orr to be so honored), and was relieved in 2012 when Nicklas Lidström retired with only 7 Norris Trophies.

     Whenever one of Bobby Orr’s records fall, it’s like a chisel chipping away at my childhood. When I defend him, I’m defending so much more than a hockey player. I’m defending a belief. A belief that some athlete-fan relationships are transcendent. So many of my fondest childhood memories revolve around Bobby Orr and the Boston Bruins. It really was a wonderful time to be a kid in Boston, especially if you loved hockey.

     Like many sports franchises with a rich tradition, the Bruins love to honor their past. Whenever Bobby Orr is called upon for a ceremonial puck drop, you can bet I’ll be watching with a tight chest and eyes a little blurry with nostalgia (that’s a tough-guy way of admitting that I may be crying). Every time Orr walks from the shadows of that tunnel into the bright lights of the arena, it’s like he’s one of the ghosts from Field Of Dreams coming out of the cornfield. I can’t explain it any more than I can explain my reaction to the end of that movie. All I know is that it feels the same; something to do with the complicated narrative between fathers and sons that twists grown men into emotional pretzels.

     Recently, I talked with my dad, who still watches every Bruins game on TV, about why he gave up all of his Bruins season tickets back in the late 1970s.

     “Was it because Orr left?” I asked.

     He paused, as if looking into the past, “Nobody wanted to go anymore.”

     I took that as a “Yes.”

     Gordie Howe once said of Bobby Orr, "Losing Bobby was the greatest blow the National Hockey League has ever suffered"

     We’re lucky here in Boston, though, because we never really lost him.

     Bobby Orr. He’s a part of my past. He reminds me of all that once was good. And he’s the greatest sports hero of my lifetime.

2 Guy Lafleur (Montreal Canadiens 1971-1985)

A Canadien In The House Of Orr

     I know, I know, just give me a chance to explain.

     The first time I saw Guy Lafleur play was in March of 1975 against the Bruins at the Garden. My older brother had introduced me to Lafleur through a game we used to play using my hockey cards. We’d spread the cards out on the living room carpet and take turns drafting all-star teams. There were no winners or losers; the fun was in the drafting. Not knowing many of the players, I’d just take as many Bruins as I could before the guessing would start. But I noticed Jimmy kept selecting the blonde-haired right-winger for the Montreal Canadiens with his first pick. When I asked him why, he explained that Guy Lafleur was the best player available (obviously, I didn’t have Bobby Orr’s card at the time). So I knew, going into the Garden on that Saturday afternoon, to keep an eye on number 10 in red.

     During warm ups, my attention, as usual, was trained mostly on Bobby Orr, Phil Esposito, Johnny Bucyk and the rest of the hometown Bruins. But I couldn’t help being distracted by what was going on at the other end of the arena. There was just something about the Montreal Canadiens and those iconic bleu, blanc et rouge uniforms (in those days, the visiting team wore their dark sweaters [and yes, they called them “sweaters”]). As much as I loved the Black and Gold, those Montreal uniforms were the most magnificent I’d ever seen.

     The following season, the Canadiens would go on the most dominant 4-year run in NHL history, and the core members of that team were on Garden ice that day; there was Ken Dryden in net, Guy Lapointe and Larry Robinson on defense, Jacques Lemaire and Yvan Cournoyer up front. And then there was number 10, Guy Lafleur.

     While Bobby Orr was the master at starting and stopping, accelerating and changing direction, Lafleur seemed to glide in straight, exquisite lines, his blonde hair flying back as if he were driving a convertible with the top down. He was utterly mesmerizing. That day, I decided that, while I worshipped Bobby Orr, I wanted to be Guy Lafleur.

     It must be mentioned here—and probably should have been mentioned earlier—that I have never been, and never will be, a Montreal Canadiens fan. The final score that day was 2-2. Orr and Lafleur each scored a goal, but I was not happy with a tie. I wanted the Bruins to win. I didn’t know it then, but I was witnessing Bobby Orr’s last great season, and Guy Lafleur’s first. Lafleur would be no friend to the Bruins, creating a complex challenge for me as a fan.

     And so began this strange paradox of rooting for a player on a team I respected, but ultimately despised. Of course, my father didn’t get it. How can you cheer for a guy who plays for your team’s fiercest rival? He had this rule that said, Whenever there’s a game that does not involve the Bruins, you’re supposed to support the team closest to your own city, geographically. Still, I never saw him root for a team from Canada, even if the Canadian team was playing the LA Kings, or the Flames, who were in Atlanta at the time. I guess his loyalties began in the Northeast and branched out over the rest of the Continental United States, but never crossed the border. I never rooted for a team from Canada either, but starting that season, whenever the Bruins played the Canadiens, I hoped for a Guy Lafleur hat trick and a 4-3 Boston win (It was even more complicated for my best friend, Mike, who was a Bruins fan with Ken Dryden as his favorite player. Try rooting for your team to win while hoping the other team’s goalie doesn’t give up any goals).

     Lafleur and the Canadiens made it very difficult for me and every other Bruins fan during those early Post-Orr-Era seasons. They had absolutely no weaknesses. They had the best goalie in Dryden, the best forward in Lafleur and the best trio of defensemen in Lapointe, Robinson and Serge Savard. The Bruins would lose to the Canadiens in the Stanley Cup Finals in 1977 and 1978. The worst loss, however, came in the seventh game of the 1979 semifinals when Lafleur scored the famous—or infamous—too-many-men-on-the-ice goal late in the third period to send the game into overtime and an eventual Montreal win (Still the hardest, most accurate in-game shot I’ve ever seen. Look it up on YouTube, the puck gets by Gilles Gilbert so quickly it literally knocks him off balance...I’m not happy about it, just admiring it). Looking back, it’s still hard to believe how close the Bruins came to beating them. The hurt from that loss stung for weeks, and I can still remember some of the kids at school giving me looks that said, What are you upset about? He’s your favorite player.

     There were issues in the neighborhood as well. In street hockey, while choosing sides, everyone was always quick to claim that he was Bobby Orr ( yes, even after he was gone to Chicago) or Phil Esposito. Sometimes, arguments ensued. But no one protested when I started saying that I was Guy Lafleur. In fact, as one of the younger players, the normal beatings only intensified. “Oh, you’re Guy Lafleur? Well, how’s about a nice two-hander to the shins?” Lafleur was not popular in my neighborhood.

     This is starting to sound like I’m building a case against idolizing Guy Lafleur. But I loved watching him play. The French fans called him Le Dėmon Blond (The Blonde Demon), a far more appealing moniker than the English-speaking fans' "The Flower". He was an amazing offensive player, so fluid and smooth, and he looked great, too, flying down the right wing, a flash of red and blue, firing pucks into the net. As much as Bobby Orr dominated the first half of the 1970s, Guy Lafleur owned the second half, scoring 50 goals and 100 points in six straight seasons.

     I carried on with this illicit sports affair for several seasons, right up until Lafleur’s retirement in 1985. Then, three seasons later, he came back. I’ve always frowned upon professional athletes un-retiring themselves (Mario Lemieux is the exception since his first retirement was due to serious health issues). Michael Jordan did it twice (under very different circumstances), Gordie Howe did it several times and Brett Favre turned it into an annual made-for-television ESPN event. The worst part about Lafleur’s comeback, however, is that he didn’t return as a Canadien, but as a New York Ranger, and then he re-retired as a Quebec Nordique.

     I guess I just like things neat and clean and easy to categorize. Bobby Orr as a Bruin. Guy Lafleur as a Canadien. As an analytical person, I appreciate and value decisiveness in others. Unfortunately, life and sports can be complicated. People change their minds and move around all the time (Perhaps one day I'll write about my top nine relationships with women). Impermanence can be disappointing and frustrating for someone like me. Guy Lafleur is one of my all-time favorite athletes. To me, he will always be a Montreal Canadien, and I will always be a Boston Bruins fan. How’s that for neat and clean and easy to categorize?

3 George Brett (Kansas City Royals 1973-1993)

A Royal Curiosity

     Unlike most of the athletes on this list, George Brett played for one team and one team only. In fact, more than forty years after they picked him in the 2nd round of the 1971 draft, Brett still works for the Kansas City Royals as vice president of baseball operations. I love this about George Brett; the continuity and loyalty. But there is so much more.
     George Brett was a great hitter. This was apparent as early as 1976, when he won his first batting title. But I didn’t take a real interest in him until 1979. That season, he did things with a baseball bat that had not been done in my lifetime (okay, I was only 14, but keep reading...).
     I told myself when I decided to write about my favorite athletes that I would avoid talking about statistics whenever possible (turns out, I will fail, often). All my favorites put up impressive numbers, but statistics can be boring and sometimes misleading and these tributes are about more than statistics. Having said that, I’m going to talk about statistics here because, well, this is baseball, and baseball is about statistics and I don’t believe George Brett’s 1979 season has ever gotten the attention it deserves.
     Brett hit 20 triples in 1979. At the time, I remember thinking, What kind of player hits 20 triples? In all of baseball history, there have been 113 instances in which a major leaguer hit 20 triples in a season. Sounds like a lot, but a quick breakdown shows that 48 of those instances occurred before 1900, and 105 took place prior to 1947 (1947 is THE most substantial demarcation line in baseball history. Dead Ball Era? Steroid Era? Please). So, since the color barrier was broken, 67 years ago, only 8 major leaguers have hit 20 triples and George Brett is one of them, and in 1979, it had not been done in 22 seasons (Willie Mays, 1957). Big deal, right?
     There’s also this...
     Brett’s 1979 season gained him admission into a much more exclusive club than the 20 Triples Club. That season, he became only the 4th major leaguer to hit 20 doubles, 20 triples and 20 homers in a season. At the time, Baseball Digest called the 20-20-20 Club “the most exclusive club in the majors.” Again, Brett was the first to achieve the feat in my lifetime (Mays, ’57) and only Curtis Granderson and Jimmy Rollins (both in 2007) have done it since. Add to those historic numbers, 212 hits, 119 runs scored, 107 RBI and .329 batting average, and Brett’s ’79 season compares favorably to his much-talked-about 1980 MVP season (.390 average, highest since Ted Williams, 118 RBI in 117 games, first to average one-RBI-a-game in 30 seasons).

     Okay, enough stats. I knew it would be dangerous for me to start down the numbers road. The point is, George Brett was doing things that I—and many other baseball fans—had never seen before. And while Fred Lynn (we’ll get to him further down the list) was my favorite baseball player at the time, I couldn’t help being curious about George Brett of the Kansas City Royals.

     Another thing I liked about Brett was the way he always battled those great Yankees teams of the late-70s. Seemed like every year, after the Red Sox got eliminated, the Yankees would then beat Kansas City in the ALCS. It happened in 1976, ‘77 and ‘78. But Brett always played great, batting .375 over those three postseasons, including 3 homeruns against Catfish Hunter in Game Three in 1978. But like the Red Sox, they still lost.

     And then came 1980.

     The Red Sox were floundering in 5^th place in July when they traveled to West-leading Kansas City for a three-game series with the Royals. George Brett had been making headlines as his batting average had risen nearly 50 points since June. But it was a particular at-bat—in which game, I don’t recall—that got me thinking about Brett as a potential successor to Fred Lynn as my favorite player should Lynn be traded or leave town in free agency as many seemed to think he would.

     It was a hard hit ball to the outfield, a single for 99% of Major Leaguers. But Brett did not slow down as he rounded first base; he sped up, and slid into second ahead of the throw. And as he brushed the dirt from his uniform, I thought, That’s the type of player who hits 20 triples.

     The high average was only part of George Brett’s story. All hits count the same when calculating batting average; singles, doubles, triples, homers. All the same. It’s what did not show up on paper that defined Brett. If the question of an extra base came up, he’d answer it with his hustle. Singles became doubles. Doubles became triples. If the fielder took a lazy first step or slightly bad angle, Brett was off and running, forcing opponents into mistakes with the threat of his determination.

     After that, I pretty much rooted for George Brett the way I rooted for Guy Lafleur. Whenever he played Boston, I hoped for a 4-for-4 performance from Brett and a Red Sox victory. The difference was, the Kansas City Royals were never a natural enemy of Boston the way the Montreal Canadiens were, so I rooted for the Royals against every other team, and especially against the Yankees. For me, the Royals represented a second line of attack against an army of oppression. And in the fall of 1980, the Yankees dominance of the Royals came to an end when Brett hit a mammoth, 3-run homer into the third deck at Yankee Stadium off of the great Goose Gossage to complete a 3-game sweep and to clinch Kansas City’s first American League Pennant. They lost the World Series to the Phillies, but won it five years later against the Cardinals (thanks in large part to Don Denkinger), and George Brett remained my favorite baseball player right up until his retirement in 1993.

     During the Brett Era, the Royals played a different offensive style than the Red Sox, who loaded their lineup with power to take advantage of the Green Monster and short right field fence at Fenway Park. Kansas City played their home games on the Astro Turf of Royals Stadium and designed their lineup accordingly with speed at the top, power in the middle and more speed at the bottom.

     In the mid-70s, Brett spent time in different spots at the top of the lineup before settling into the 3^rd slot, where he would remain for most of his career. He would be joined in the middle of the lineup by several power hitters over the years including first basemen John Mayberry, Willie Mays Aikens and Steve Balboni and outfielder Danny Tartabull, as well as some outstanding all-around hitters in Hal McRae, Darrell Porter and Al Cowens. The speed—and there was plenty of it—was supplied early on by Amos Otis and Freddie Patek, then Willie Wilson (12^th all-time in steals, 21 triples in 1985), UL Washington and John Wathan (Wathan's 36 steals in 1982 still stand as the major league record for a catcher).

     Over the course of his 21-year career, George Brett was the mainstay amongst all of that offensive talent. His potent blend of speed, power, hustle and toughness made him one of baseball’s great all-around players. Early in his career, the Royals style of play proved a perfect fit for Brett’s talents; then, his talent realized, he proved himself the perfect player to build a team around. 

     It’s an overused cliché, but George Brett always played the game the right way. He always played hard, never showed anyone up (okay, he did make an ass of himself during the Pine Tar Incident, nobody’s perfect), always came up big in big moments, and remained loyal to his team—and they to him—for his entire career. There may be no other player in the history of baseball who is so obviously his franchise's greatest player.

     George Brett: Mr. Royal. My favorite baseball player of all-time. 

4 Larry Bird (Boston Celtics 1979-1992)

The Legend

     When Larry Bird first stepped foot on the Garden parquet in October of 1979, Boston, in spite of thirteen NBA titles for the Celtics, was still very much a hockey town. The rankings of the local pro teams at the time went, Red Sox-Bruins-Patriots-Celtics, in that order. The Celtics were awful. The 1976 championship seemed far in the distant past. Then Larry showed up, and The Legend was born.

     Like Bobby Orr several years earlier, Boston knew Bird was coming well before he arrived. Drafted as a junior eligible in the 1978 draft, Bird played his senior season at Indiana State while the Celtics retained his rights. Celtics fans got a taste of what was to come as Bird led the Sycamores to 33 straight victories before losing to Magic Johnson’s Michigan State team in the NCAA final (A friend of mine visited the Indiana State campus in the late-80s. The Hulman Center was empty save for a lone custodian dry-mopping the floor. When asked about Bird, the man had this to say, “Nothing ever happened before Larry was here, and nothing has happened since.” Carrying that team to within one game of an undefeated season was probably where the back problems that would plague Bird late in his NBA career got their foothold).

     It was clear from the very start that Larry Bird was worth the wait. He did everything well. His shooting range stretched from the low block all the way out to the newly adopted 3-point line. He passed like a point guard, rebounded like a center and made all of his free throws. Most importantly, though, was his unwavering desire to win every game no matter what it took. Bird played with utter disdain for anyone not wearing Celtic Green and Boston fans loved him for it. Suddenly, the Celtics were winning again, and uncoordinated white guys were showing up on playgrounds all around Greater Boston, rubbing the bottoms of their Converse sneakers, doing their best (and worst) Larry Bird.

     What I loved most about Bird—even more than all his physical gifts—was that he was never out there looking to make friends. On the court, he was all business, never losing his edge. Bird’s loyalty was to his teammates. He chose his friends carefully. The only opponent he ever befriended was Magic Johnson and that didn’t happen until about their sixth season in the league, and after that, they were friends for life. This was a Boston-type attitude, something we fans could all relate to (Another thing we could all relate to had come to light when Bird revealed that the reason he always looked up during the national anthem at home games was to find inspiration in Bobby Orr’s retired number 4. Larry Bird was a Bobby Orr fan!).

     Something else I loved about Bird—was in awe of, actually—was his ability to “see” the game of basketball. On a recent drive home from work, I heard former Bruins great Rick Middleton on the radio talking about what it was like to play on a line with Wayne Gretzky in the 1984 Canada Cup. “He passes the puck where you should be,” Middleton said, “and if you’re not there, you know you should’ve been.”  I’ve got to believe it was the same for basketball players who played with Larry Bird. But with Bird, it seemed to work both ways; if he was open and you didn’t get him the ball, well, you’d probably hear about it. You had to be better when you played with Larry Bird. He could elevate your game, but he had to trust you. I’m sure that’s why he always said that Dennis Johnson was the best teammate he ever played with. No one worked the blind, top-of-the-key pass to the backdoor cutter like DJ and Larry. Bird was a remarkably intuitive athlete, and a consummate team player.

    Now let’s talk about the mid-80s. I’ll have to ask you to indulge me here. I’m about to veer off course again, but there will be a point to what follows.

     I don’t put much stock in regular season MVP awards. These days we know way too much about the voting process and it’s clear that many of the ballot holders either do not take the privilege seriously, or vote irresponsibly to draw attention to themselves. Who really knows what most valuable means anyway? I like to think of individual NBA greatness in terms of mini-eras, where the seasons begin on opening night and stretch to the last game of the Finals. Like quarterbacks in the NFL, the alpha player on an NBA team gets most of the credit in victory and most of the blame in defeat. My picks weigh heavily towards the best players on the best teams; championships, not MVPs, matter most (but if you cross-reference my list, you’ll find plenty of both).

     Here’s how I see it (I’m guessing the early years would’ve been dominated by George Mikan and Bob Petit, but I’m going to start with 1960):

1960-1969 Bill Russell (Boston Celtics)

1970-1973 Lew Alcindor/Kareem Abdul-Jabbar (Milwaukee Bucks)

1974-1976 Julius Erving (New York Nets - ABA)

1977-1978 Bill Walton (Portland Trailblazers)

1979-1983 Moses Malone (Houston Rockets/Philadelphia 76ers)

1984-1986 Larry Bird (Boston Celtics)

1987-1990 Magic Johnson (Los Angeles Lakers)

1991-1993 Michael Jordan (Chicago Bulls)

1994-1995 Hakeem Alajuwan (Houston Rockets)

1996-1998 Michael Jordan (Chicago Bulls)

1999-2002 Shaquille O’Neal (Los Angeles Lakers)

2003-2007 Tim Duncan (San Antonio Spurs)

2008-2010 Kobe Bryant (Los Angeles Lakers)

2011-Present LeBron James (Miami Heat)

     A few points

• Russell’s reign is indisputable and if you don’t know why you’re probably a stat person and this list will never make sense to you. In the 1960s, Bill Russell was the most dominant athlete in the history of professional team sports. And don’t give me that crap about the level of play being inferior due to fewer teams. Fewer teams meant fewer roster spots and that meant deeper teams with better talent up and down their lineups and you played those deeper teams more often and the ABA had not yet lured away as many great players as it would in the 1970s.
• The 1970s were a bit of a mess with no back-to-back champions and so much talent divided between the NBA and ABA.
• Julius Erving of the ABA belongs here; we’ll discuss him further in a future essay.
• If you’d like to know more about Bill Walton’s and Hakeem Alajuwan’s reigns, just Google “Blazermania” for Walton, and “Michael Jordan minor league baseball” for Alajuwan.
• Moses Malone was an absolute beast and the only player on the list whose reign spanned stints with two teams.

     Still with me? Okay. Nobody beats Russell, and, most likely, nobody ever will. And despite what I wrote above about the 1960s, most basketball fans will tell you that the 1980s were the golden age of the NBA (I don’t disagree. I just think the logic used in arguments against the 60s is severely flawed.) Like Bobby Orr and the Bruins of the 70s, I feel so fortunate to have witnessed Larry Bird and the Celtics of the 80s. Bird was spectacular throughout the decade, but from 1984-1986, he played as well as anyone I’ve ever seen.

     The stats, as always, were impressive, and yes, Bird did win three straight MVPs, but the Larry Bird of 1984-86 was so much more than stats and awards. He was healthy; missing only 6 of 308 games (regular season and playoffs combined), and could be seen nightly diving on the court or into the stands for a loose ball, doing anything to secure an extra possession for his team. And, oh yeah, the Celtics won NBA titles number 15 and 16 during that span (warning! veering off again: in 1986, the NBA celebrated its 40^th anniversary, the Celtics, with 16 titles, had won 40% of the league’s championships up to that point [but only 1 of the next 27 for 3.7% -- Yikes!] – current title standings: Boston 17, Los Angeles 11, Chicago 6, Minneapolis 5, San Antonio 4).

     But perhaps it’s a quote following a February 2, 1985, game against the Utah Jazz that best defines the Larry Bird of the mid-80s (and really, his whole career). Up 90-66 after three quarters, Bird came out of the game with 30 points, 12 rebounds, 10 assists and 9 steals. After The game, Bird was asked if he considered going back in (to get a 10^th steal).

     “What for? I already did enough damage to them.”

     At that point, only Nate Thurmond (Chicago 1974) had recorded an NBA quadrulpe-double (three have done it since: Alvin Robertson, Hakeem Alajuwon, David Robinson). Bird didn’t care. The game was won. If that happened today, there would be timeouts called to discuss how to manipulate garbage time to collect that 10^th steal, and every NBA affiliate would be doing live cut-ins of a 24-point blowout.

     Bird never cared about double-doubles, triple-doubles or double anything. If the game was in hand, and he had 9 rebounds or 9 assists—as he often did—he would gladly take a seat so someone else could get some playing time. It’s because of Larry Bird (and Oscar Robertson, who not only averaged a triple-double for an entire season, but for the first five seasons of his career) that I role my eyes over all the stat worshippers.

     Thank you, Larry Bird, for not going back into that game. There’s a Most Valuable Lesson there.

     Bird continued his amazing play for several more seasons after 1986. His shooting percentages and point totals actually rose in 1987 and 1988, and the Celtics home court dominance continued (79-3 over the 1985-86 and 1986-87 seasons), but in spite of all his efforts, the Celtics would not win another title during the Bird Era and his ailing back would force him into retirement in 1992.

     Larry Bird played basketball with grace and abandonment. His supreme intelligence matched his will to win. He pushed the Celtics to the forefront of the Boston sports scene (Red Sox-Celtics-Bruins-Patriots, at Bird’s peak). I remember those words, at that first championship celebration in 1981, “There’s only one place I’d rather be, French Lick.” Bird will always be Indiana. He came from there. He went back when his days with the Celtics were over. But for thirteen unforgettable seasons, he was Boston, too. The greatest small forward I’ve ever seen.

     The Legend. Larry Bird.

5 Fred Lynn (Boston Red Sox 1974-1980)

Gold Dust, The ’75 Series and The Making of a Baseball Fan

     Up until 1974, the only professional sport I really followed was hockey. Bobby Orr and the Big Bad Bruins were handed down to me like a well-worn pair of skates. Growing up in my house, it was like,  “Here’s where you’ll sleep, this is what you’ll eat and the Boston Bruins are your team.” By ’74, I was starting to follow the Celtics, who were on the verge of another championship, and the Patriots, who were moving towards respectability, and the Dallas Cowboys (more on that later).

     I went to Fenway Park for the first time that summer as a nine year old, a 7-0 loss to the California Angels. Yeah, the grass was really green, the wall was really high, and the uniforms were really bright, but other than it being a night game, and that I got to stay out late with my dad and Jimmy and some friends, it didn’t really take. Maybe it was the blowout score, or the slow pace that did it, but the Red Sox failed to captivate me.

     Then, the following season, Fred Lynn showed up and changed everything.

     I was still deeply disappointed by the Bruins early exit from the NHL playoffs when Fred Lynn and the Red Sox started making headlines in the spring of 1975. They took over first place in the AL East on June 29^th and never gave it up. That summer, following the Red Sox was a magical ride. Some guy even wrote a song about the team at the end of the season: “Hey! Hey! Red Sox, we’re all here to lend you a hand. Go! Go! Red Sox, the best doggone team in the land...” Corny as hell, but very catchy.

     For me, the most significant thing about that ’75 team was that they were my team. Baseball was not big in our house the way hockey was. No one told me to root for the Red Sox. The team had great leaders in Carl Yastrzemski, Rico Petrocelli and Carlton Fisk, colorful characters in Bill Lee, Louis Tiant and Bernie Carbo, and outstanding defensive stars in Rick Burleson and Dwight Evans. There were nicknames galore: “Yaz” “Dewey” “Pudge” “Spaceman” “El Tianté” and “Rooster”. But at the center of it all were the “Gold Dust Twins”, leftfielder Jim Rice, and the man who would become my favorite player, Fred Lynn.

     I tried to copy Lynn’s batting routine; the way he stroked the length of the bat while taking his practice cuts and the smooth follow through as the barrell glided through the zone. But as a right-handed batter, I looked pretty foolish in my attempts. I don’t think it would’ve mattered if I’d been a lefty, though. Fred Lynn had a one-of-a-kind swing, and like fine penmanship, it was nearly impossible to duplicate.

     His fielding was a thing of beauty as well. I remember people saying that, while in college, at USC, Lynn had been a wide receiver on the Trojans football team until Lynn Swann bumped him from the starting lineup. It’s an interesting piece of trivia, and I mention it because, as time went on, I thought if you were ever at a loss to describe the way Fred Lynn played centerfield, you could just point to the way Lynn Swann played wide receiver. Both were fearless, graceful and a little reckless. If the ball was in the air, they were going to catch it, or break their leg trying. And sometimes during pickup games at Robin Hood Park, I’d take an intentionally circuitous route to a fly ball in hopes of stretching out and making a Freddy Lynn diving catch. If Baseball Tonight had been on the air back then, Lynn would’ve made “Web Jems” at least once a week.

     I loved the ’75 Red Sox the way my brother and his friends loved the ’67 Sox. That’s the way it was back then; when your city’s team has not won a World Series in 57 years, you tend to celebrate the ones that came close (I can’t imagine any runners-up anywhere being as revered as the ’67 and ’75 Red Sox were in Boston). And like Yaz in ’67, my new favorite player was leading the way.

     In 1975, Fred Lynn had the greatest rookie season since Ted Williams. He led the AL in doubles (47), runs (103) and slugging (.566), was runner up for the batting title (.331), had a 3-HR, 10-RBI game in Detroit, and played spectacular defense. There was nothing he couldn’t do.

     Baseball was now big in our house, at least amongst the males, and during that summer of ’75, we, along with every other baseball fan in New England, were swept up in an epidemic of pennant fever. The cynicism was present with the older, more jaded fans, but nothing like it would be in another ten years when an idiotic sports writer would invent a curse and sheep-like fans would latch on to the cliché as if the losing needed some metaphysical excuse (Seriously, ’67 Cardinals - 101 wins, ’75 Reds - 108 wins, ’78 Yankees – 100 wins, ’86 Mets - 108 wins. Some pretty good teams, no?). Going into the 1975 playoffs, I was cautiously optimistic; optimistic because the Sox had made the playoffs; cautious because of whom they’d be facing.

     The 1972-74 Oakland A’s have never gotten their due as one of baseball’s great teams. In the 110-year history of the World Series, only four teams have won three straight championships. The Yankees account for three of those teams (1936-39, 1949-53 and 1998-2000), and then there’s the 1972-74 Oakland A’s. That’s it. Well, the Red Sox swept the 3-time defending champs in the American League Championship Series. And because of that, my cautious optimism was turning into hope as the Red Sox headed into the World Series against Cincinnati’s Big Red Machine.

     The 1975 World Series was memorable even before Game Six (That’s right, Mets fans and Seinfeld creators, Game Six, capitol “G”, capitol “S”, was played on 10-21-75 in Boston, not 10-25-86 in Flushing. Game Six was an amazing game from start to finish, not a monumental Sox gag job. Okay, back on point...). There was Louis Tiant pitching two complete-game victories in games 1 and 4, the Reds dramatic 9^th-inning comeback in game 2, the Ed Armbrister interference controversy in game 3, and Tony Perez hitting 2 homeruns in game 5 in Cincinnati to send the Series back to Boston with the Reds leading 3 games to 2.

     Games 6 and 7 of the Series were originally scheduled for Saturday and Sunday, October 18^th and 19^th, as day games. But in a cruel twist of fate, rain delayed the start of Game 6—which wasn’t yet Game Six—until Tuesday October 21^st. What was so cruel about this delay? A ten year-old with a strict weeknight bedtime of 9 pm would have been able to watch every inning of those originally scheduled games.

     My mom was a bit insane when it came to bedtimes. Creep past your appointed time and she started buzzing around the house, “Come on...you’ve got to get to bed...” I know that sounds like every mother with school-age children, but there was something about her earnestness that made you believe something truly awful would happen to anyone who stayed up later than they were supposed to. So, with the Red Sox up 3-0 in the 3^rd inning of game 6—with all of the runs coming on Fred Lynn’s first-inning homer—my mom started her mantra, Come on, Jeffrey, let’s go... I’m sure I resisted, probably sighed a lot, stomped my feet, too. But there was no negotiating, and I went to sleep feeling pretty good about having seen my hero give the Sox a 3-run cushion.

     The next morning, mom came into my room to wake me up like she always did. “They were ringing the bells in New Hampshire last night,” she said, as she pulled the shade, flooding my room with light. She was cheerful, which was not her usual morning mood. Don’t get me wrong, my mother was never a grumpy morning person, but she was usually just as anxious to get us out of bed and ready for school, as she was to get us into bed the night before.

     I had no idea what the Granite State ringing of the bells meant, but things became clearer when I got downstairs. It was all over the news: Carlton Fisk hit a twelfth-inning, game-winning (they weren’t called walk-offs back then) homerun to send the World Series to a seventh game. Apparently, church bells were rung in his hometown of Charlestown, NH, in a late-night celebration. But there was so much more: Carbo’s game-tying, pinch-hit homer, Dewey’s game-saving catch, and Lynn lying motionless for several moments after crashing into the wall attempting to catch Ken Griffey’s triple.

     I was both elated and bitter. There would be a seventh game. But my mom, who knew nothing about sports, sent me to bed in the middle of the greatest game in Red Sox history, and then woke me up the next morning to tell me about it in the most uninformative way. And if that wasn’t enough, when I got to school, my first-grade teacher, Miss McCarthy, announced to the class that my friend, Thomas Flynn, was “maybe a little tired” today since he went to the Red Sox game the night before. I looked over at my pal. He didn’t look tired to me. He was beaming.

     Later that night, my mother shooed me to bed with the Red Sox again leading 3-0 in the third. But unlike the previous night, I could not get to sleep. Maybe it was all that I had missed the night before that had me staring at my ceiling with worry. Till this day, I cannot explain why I didn’t think to have a transistor radio hidden beneath my pillow.

     After nearly two hours of restless fretting, I soft-footed it downstairs, stopping at the landing, just out of sight of any adult passersby. From there, I could hear Curt Gowdy’s voice calling the play-by-play from the living room television. 4-3 Reds. And it was over. I cried on the stairs; the only time a sporting event ever broke me with sadness.

     That was the hardest loss I ever had to endure as a baseball fan. Of course, there were other crushing Red Sox defeats. The one-game playoff against the Yankees in ’78 was tough, but I was a little older then, and I was an adult with adult distractions in ’86 and ‘03, when I just got angry and swore a lot. But as a ten year-old, the calluses of sports fan disappointment had yet to form, and I carried the pain of the 1975 World Series around like a jagged pebble in my shoe during an off-season that never seemed to end. Years later, when asked to comment on the greatness of Game Six, Johnny Bench said, “The fans of Boston still believe the Red Sox won that series 3 games to 4.”  I, for one, have never felt that way.

     I still tease my mom for making me miss Game Six, but perhaps I should thank her for Game Seven. Because I was hiding, I was allowed to mourn in private, out of sight of my father and older brother. That was a seminal moment for me. I could’ve gone back to bed, woke up the next day, and said, “I can’t take this drama. This just isn’t for me.” But it was too late. If the Sox had lost and I hadn’t felt a thing, maybe I would’ve continued with the guitar lessons I was taking at the time, became some kind of artist instead of a sports fan. But I liked the drama and emotion of team sport competition. Win or lose, I wanted to feel it.

     In the weeks that followed the Series, Fred Lynn became the most decorated rookie in the history of baseball after winning a Gold Glove and being named AL Rookie Of The Year and Most Valuable Player (I did care about MVPs back then). He was the first player ever to win both ROY and MVP in the same season (and the only one in my book – Ichiro Suzuki had already played 9 professional seasons in Japan before his “rookie” season in 2001 – but no one reads my book, working title: Ignoring The Facts: Protecting My Hero’s Legacies).

     Over the next several seasons, Lynn continued to be one of baseball’s biggest stars. He made the all-star team every year he was with Red Sox, and in 1979, had a monster season with career highs in runs (116), homeruns (39) and RBI (122), and led the AL in batting (.333), slugging (.637) and on-base pct (.423). The 39 homers were 14 more than he would hit in any other season (imagine the suspicion today?), and I remember hearing that his extra power came from working out on Nautilus machines, so I dropped my free-weights program and joined a nearby gym where I could workout on machines. I did this, not because I was going to hit major league home runs, but because Fred Lynn did it.

     In 1980, talk of Lynn’s expiring contract and the difficulty the Red Sox were going to have resigning him dominated local sports pages. The reality of the free agency era was hitting this 15 year-old hard. Bobby Orr’s departure in 1976 was confusing and complicated and hurt like hell, but for me it was sudden, and all had been made right during Bobby Orr Night in 1979, when his number was retired and fans at the Garden gave him a 10-minute—I think it’s up to 20-minutes, now—standing ovation. But Lynn’s leaving moved about as fast as the second hand at the end of a school day.

     The announcement came in January, 1981: Fred Lynn traded to the California Angels (For me, this was a bit ironic seeing as how the Angels were the team that crushed the Sox during my first trip to Fenway; the night I didn’t become a fan). As mentioned in an earlier essay, by the time of the trade, I had been leaning towards George Brett as my favorite player. But Fred Lynn and the 1975 Red Sox are the reasons I did become a baseball fan, and Lynn’s exit from Boston severed my most enduring tie to that unforgettable era (By that time, Jim Rice had become the most feared hitter in the AL, but he missed the ’75 Series with a broken wrist—damn you, Vern Rhule!—and Yaz had been fading for some time).

     Fred Lynn himself sums up exactly how I felt when he was asked about leaving Boston in a 2013 interview for the website, BostonBaseballHistory.com:

“I hated to leave Boston. ... I have a lot of great memories of the city and the team. I think you have a special attachment to the team you start out with. I’m always going to be a Red Sox.”

     Fred Lynn was never part of a World Series championship team. He is not in the Baseball Hall Of Fame. But he was the player who made me love the game of baseball, the one who drew me in, and the ’75 Sox will always be my favorite team. “I think you have a special attachment to the team you start out with.”  I think so, too.

*One last note about the ’75 Series: Jim Rice was hit by that Vern Rhule pitch on September 21^st in Detroit. At the time, he had 102 runs batted in and 92 runs scored. The Red Sox lost three one-run games in the 1975 World Series. Rice’s primary replacements were Cecil Cooper and Juan Beniquez, who went a combined 2-27 with 2 RBI in the Series. Is it possible that Rice could have been the difference in any of those one-run games?...