He lived a long life and I hope his passing was as swift and sure as he was in the field. Guys like him knew what he meant to youngsters, back in the day when we thought that ballplayers were ten feet tall.
Luke, I lived about 3 blocks from Sox Park and went to all the games that we could, which was almost all home games after school.. We never had to pay, because the Stadium knew we couldn’t afford it and we loved the grandstand and made a lot of noise..
WE also had an empty lot not far from the park, and on several occasions a few of the White Sox players came to that lot and schooled us and actually played on our teams, against one another..
It became so common that they knew us by name.. OMG, we were, to say the least, thrilled.. :)