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Where were you when the hope of the Cubs died?
SUN-TIMES COLUMNIST ^ | July 9, 2003 | BY MARK BROWN

Posted on 07/11/2003 9:54:00 AM PDT by restornu

The rest grow old, but not Kenny Hubbs. His Cubs teammates--Banks, Santo and Brock among them--have long since seen their hair fall out or turn gray. The man he replaced at second base, Don Zimmer, seems downright ancient.

But Kenny Hubbs is frozen in time.

In the picture in our minds, he is forever young--a lean, unspoiled 22-year-old, the Rookie of the Year.

Maybe it is a picture from a baseball card we remember.

Maybe it is a picture that went with the tragic 1964 newspaper headline--the one that brought news of the airplane crash that meant the promising second baseman would never get the chance to fulfill his potential.

If you're old enough, maybe it is a picture not of a man but a place, the place you were when you first got word that he was dead, a strange but true phenomenon for a two-year major leaguer. (Ask around.)

For a baseball team whose modern history revolves around the concept of woulda, coulda, shoulda, there can be no better icon than Kenny Hubbs.

He would have taken the Cubs to the World Series, some say. He could have made it to the Hall of Fame, they'll tell you.

On Wednesday, he'll come as close as he'll ever get.

As part of the buildup for next week's All-Star Game here, Hubbs' family is donating to the Hall of Fame the glove he used as a rookie in 1962 to set two major league fielding records, along with the game ball from the day he set one of them--consecutive errorless games by a second baseman.

Ted Spencer, chief curator for the National Baseball Hall of Fame and Museum, said he will immediately display Hubbs' items along with artifacts from more famous baseball notables at the All-Star FanFest, which opens Friday at McCormick Place. Then he'll take Hubbs' memorabilia back to Cooperstown to join the museum's collection, more "footprints in time," as Spencer refers to the keepsakes from record-setting performances.

Keith Hubbs, Ken's older brother, met me at McCormick Place on Tuesday to show me the ball and glove and talk about his brother. If there's one thing you don't have to ask Keith Hubbs twice, it's to talk about Ken, who would have turned 62 this December.

"It's nice to have just a little bit of him in the Hall of Fame," said Keith, 65, a successful businessman and star athlete in his own right who moved to Wrigleyville with his wife six months ago on a Mormon mission.

Keith showed me pictures of when Ken was a high school All-America in both football and basketball ("his best sport," Keith says) in California, and told me how he'd been class president and a top student. He told me about the personal qualities that always set Ken apart: quiet, modest, focused, driven.

He showed me the Sports Illustrated article from a decade ago titled "What Might Have Been," in which the writer took a flight of fancy relating how Hubbs led the Cubs to five world championships (with the help of Brock, who was never traded for Ernie Broglio in this altered state of reality). Keith told me Billy Williams assured him they would have at least won in 1969.

Keith showed me a letter he'd received in 1964 from Holly Schindler, 12, of Flossmoor, donating 50 cents to the then-newly created Ken Hubbs Foundation. (It's still going strong.)

"I am a loyal Cub fan and Ken Hubbs was my hero," Holly wrote. "I knew all statistics of him, height, weight, etc., even the color of his eyes. I have even converted a Sox fan to a Cub fan. I was grieved to hear of the young athlete's death, and I feel terribly sorry for the Hubbs family. This is part of my allowance, and I feel better by donating."

If you're not old enough to remember Hubbs, Holly's letter may give you a sense of how his death was received.

It was a knife through the heart of Cubs fans, but the story of the untimely death of the young athlete with the wholesome, clean-cut image went beyond Cubdom.

"Ken Hubbs had the affection and respect of all Chicago," said the telegram from Mayor Richard J. Daley that was read at the funeral. "There isn't a man in Chicago who wouldn't have been proud to have him as a son."

Keith Hubbs said he only recently found the ball, which was kept in a small pouch with two small black-and-white photos of Santo making the presentation.

His mother then found the glove in a long-neglected equipment bag, just where Hubbs had packed it for the trip to spring training that never came. He died when a small plane he was piloting crashed in a snowstorm near Provo, Utah.

It never occurred to them to sell the stuff.

The Hubbs glove is notable mostly for its simplicity--a small Chuck Cottier autograph model made by Spalding. Hubbs used it while going 78 consecutive games and 418 chances without an error, which helped him become the first rookie to win a Gold Glove award.

G. David Tenenbaum, a Chicago law librarian who is researching a book on Hubbs, said several former players, including Banks, have told him Hubbs would have been a Hall of Famer if he'd lived.

That may seem a stretch, given that Hubbs batted only .247 in just over two full seasons.

But as every Cubs fan learns the hard way, you never know what might have been.


TOPICS: Miscellaneous; Sports
KEYWORDS: faq

1 posted on 07/11/2003 9:54:00 AM PDT by restornu
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To: restornu
Wow, this brings back memories. I was not quite 11 years old, living on the north side of the city, when Kenny Hubbs died. Kenny was one of my favorite players, and I remember being very sad when I heard the news.

Soon thereafter, though, the next second baseman, Glenn Beckert, became one of my favorites. And when I was a teenager, my goal in life was to succeed Beckert as second baseman of the Cubs.

Didn't happen, btw. :-)

2 posted on 07/11/2003 11:51:41 AM PDT by Charles Henrickson (Lifelong Cubs fan now living in St. Louis)
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To: All

DANG FREEPERS KEPT ME FROM BECOMING THE WORLD'S GREEN KING!


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3 posted on 07/11/2003 11:53:43 AM PDT by Support Free Republic (Your support keeps Free Republic going strong!)
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To: restornu
Though I grew up a Cardinal fan, I remember being shocked at the death of this promising young ballplayer Mr. Hubbs. I saw him play the year before his untimely death at the old Busch Stadium. He had potential even then. I too believe that the Cubs may have won in 1969 if Ken Hubbs had lived. By the way, I was 13 then, when the tragedy happened.
4 posted on 08/24/2003 9:10:02 PM PDT by molitor (Go GOP 2004)
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