Theodore Samuel Williams 1918-2002

An immortal made the journey from one world to another yesterday morning.


To those of us who were fortunate enough to view him in the flesh, he was truly the stuff legends were made of. He had not been well for a few years, and we all knew that this time was near. For those of us who looked up to him, we did our best to wish this day away into the cornfield, well knowing that no matter how hard we wished, it was not to be.


Words are hard to come by at this moment. It's intensely personal.


As a young boy, I saw him play. The memory of my first time at Fenway Park is indelibly intertwined with my memories of him.


So many memories flash through my mind, colliding in a stream-of-consciousness fashion.


The rush of the greener than green and brighter than bright as you make your way up the runway and glimpse the field for the first time in your life is simply overwhelming……


The first time taking it all in: the sounds….the smell….the feel in the air. It's not something easily forgotten, even with the passing of almost fifty years…….


When the Sox take the field, there he is, with that special number 9 on his back, loping with that gangly jog out of the dugout, on his way out to his station in left field………


Listening to the ancient AM radio, alone in my darkened bedroom, waiting for "The Kid" to pull another one out…………..


Looking forward to reading the sports pages the morning after; hungry for the experts' opinions……..


The pain in this then young boy's heart as the "knights of the keyboard" set him high on the pedestal of perfection, only to most cruelly cut him down, all for the sake of selling newspapers………


Rushing to finish my paper route, so that I could get home in time to listen to the end of the game………..


Sitting at my fly-tying vise, making that "special" salmon streamer just for him, while daydreaming of being able to fish the Miramichee along side him.


That cold, rainy afternoon, listening to Curt Gowdy announce his last home run, and then, matter-of-factly add "in his last at bat in a Red Sox uniform". The stunning finality of that statement, when I realized Gowdy knew something none of the rest of us knew. Breaking out into tears as I processed what that really meant……….


Being in the stands at the 1999 All-Star game as all the players huddled around him on the field, each of them knowing the "specialness" of the moment, and just wanting to be able to brush close to his greatness……..


Setting my self-consciousness aside, and letting the tears roll down my cheeks at that sight. After all, "there is no crying is baseball"…… right?


In a world of overblown hype and hyperbole, he was the genuine article….A real American Hero.


A part of my youth now passes into the shadows along with him.


I mourn for him, you and me.


The world is an emptier place without him.

Teddy ballgame... The slpendid splinter... 521 career home runs... .344 lifetime batting average... homerun in his last big league at bat... lost 5 full seasons to military service... war hero... He was the guy John Wayne played in all those movies... brash... tough... unyeilding... The greatest hitter that ever lived!!!


You have to wonder who's sitting down up there today so number 9 can take his spot in the starting line-up.


I never got to see him play; it was certainly my loss. I grew up loving baseball, and listening to the stories about the greats. There were none greater than Ted Williams, may God rest his soul.


Fitz


P.S. Who is the greatest living ballplayer today?

P.S. Who is the greatest living ballplayer today?


Alex Rodiriguez should become the best player of all-time. It is amazing that he still hasn't reached his 27th birthday. The prime years of most baseball players are between their 27-31 years. With improved conditioning tecniques, many players are having their best years in their late 30's.


It's not fair to call ARod the greatest yet since his career hasn't even reached it's half-way point. But, I think he'l get there.

...

Beautifully written, Myrtle. What is it about baseball that's so special to those of us who fell in love with it as boys? Even knowing somet things we'd rather not know about Babe Ruth and Mickey Mantle and Joe Dimaggio and Ted Williams doesn't take that feeling away when we think of them as baseball players.


I got to see Williams play once, in 1960, at Yankee Stadium. I can still remember the look of awe on my father's face when he came to bat the first time. I remember how big Williams seemed compared to the other players and a big, wide stance.


Maybe someone else will know this (John Cole?), but I think that a sacrifice fly, in 1941, counted as an at bat and that, under's today's scoring rules, Williams's batting average that year would have been around .415.

FWIW, Bill James ranked the following as the greatest living players (through the 1999 season):


1) Willie Mays

2) Ted Williams

3) Stan Musial

4) Henry Aaron

5) Joe Morgan

6) Barry Bonds

7) Mike Schmidt

/images/glasses.gif Frank Robinson

9) Rickey Henderson

10)George Brett

Andy -


Do you know if the preceding list was based on stats compiled, or ability? We all know that Williams' numbers would be that much better if he hadn't dedicated his best years to our nation. I'm obviously too young to know, but I gotta think, based on what I've read, that Williams was the greatest ever based on talent.


Josh

I just read that on the MLB site; Williams had 6 sacrifice flies that year, so it would have raised his average .411. It is amazing; it's hard to imagine anyone doing that again.


Fitz

Andy,


Mere words are never enough to do justice to the grace and symmetry of the game.


Thank you so much for your kind words.


That is correct. I don't remember exact year that sac fly was changed from out to no at-bat, but I believe it was late 40's/early 50's.


FYI: Baseball is my true love. Still actively involved to this day. Have played it, coached it and taught it for many years now.

Myrtle,


That was a very touching tribute to a great player and a great man. I fell in love with baseball when I was 7 years old. I grew up in Kansas City, and the early 70's was the time when the Royals started to flower. My Grandfather and I used to sit on the back porch on warm summer nights and listen to Denny Mathews call the games. George Brett, Frank White, Amos Otis, Hal Mcrae and a host of others were the heros of my childhood. One of my fondest memories was wrestling for a George Brett foul ball under an old woman's chair when I was a teenager.


The Royals have sense declined in stature, and I rarely make it to the stadium anymore, but I do often think back to those nights 30 years ago and smile. I became a statistics junkie as I learned about the game, so I still occasionally spout stats at the drop of a hat. It was this study of the game that made me appreciate the greats like Teddy ballgame.


Fitz

**What is it about baseball that's so special to those of us who fell in love with it as boys?**


From Red Smith on Baseball, p. 183:


"The only reason baseball is our national sport, instead of cricket or soccer, is that practically all American males play baseball or its equivalents--stickball on the city streets, softball on the school yards--when they are young. When they grow up they go watch the games, not so much to enjoy the thrill of appreciation that anybody must feel seeing a Phil Rizzuto scoop up a grounder and get rid of the ball in one fluid motion, but more because the spectacle restores our youth, warms them with nostalgic memories of the fun they had as kids".


My childhood home featured a smallish backyard with a 3 foot hedge on the back boundary. Beyond that hedge was 3 ballfields, where I played my little league games from age 6 to 16. Across the street there were 6 girls softball fields, where my sisters (under Dad's tutelage) played all their games. The grown men had 2 fields of their own, complete with lights. Those of us lucky enough to be little league all stars got to shine there once a summer. I can't agree with Red more.


KJS

Fitz,


Those KC teams used to kick the crap out of the Red Sox during that period!


They were a great team.


Funny thing, A good friend of mine (and my sons' hitting instructor) went to the baseball Academy in KC. Do U remember that?


He got beaten out by Frank White to become KC's starting 2nd baseman.


Go to a game....the magic is still there if you look for it.

barry bonds is not only the best player right now he was overall a better player than williams. and williams is not the greatest hitter ruth is.


Pat

no one may do that again but there are many other reasons. ted would not have hit 400 today i dont think. he never had to travel to the west coast, never had to face sophisticated relief pitching, never had to face defensive players with the much better defensive equipment that exists now. great hitter for sure one of the greatest ever. no one will hit .411 but it is not because they are not talented enough nowadays.


Pat

Unfortunately, it's only available in anthologies (or I'd provide a link), but, if any of you haven't read it in its entirety, John Updike's "Hub Fans Bid Kid Adieu" is a must. I'm sure many of you know the oft-quoted lines from Updike's piece--"lyric little bandbox of a ballpark," "it was in the books while it was in the air," and "Gods don't answer letters" (when the fans yelled for Williams to come back out after his final homerun. These few quotes cannot do the writing justice, however.


I know what you mean, Myrtle, and I enjoyed your post very much.


A bit off topic for a minute. I just finished teaching a short story course, and for the second to last class I had students read Borowski's "This Way for the Gas, Ladies and Gentlemen," Cynthia Ozick's "The Shawl," and I showed Alain Resnais's documentary Night and Fog. I wanted to end the course on a lighter note, so I chose W.P. Kinsella's story "Shoeless Joe Jackson Comes to Iowa," which, of course, is the basis for the film Field of Dreams. The narrator of the story recalls that he never got to attend a game with his father, and talks about his father's final days in the hospital. They listen to a White Sox game on the radio, his father tells him (again) the Black Sox story, and he insists that his son see a game in person:


"You must go," Dad said. "I've been in all sixteen major league parks. I want you to do it too. The summers belong to somebody else now, have for a long time."


"Hell, you know what I mean," he said, shaking his head. I did indeed.


During that last class, we talked about baseball--what else? One woman, in her fifties, had grown up in Chicago as a White Sox fan. She married a man from New York who built a regulation pitcher's mound in their back yard. When their son was born, she dressed in a Yankees uniform for the birth announcement; they named the boy Mickey.


I thought of my grandfather, with whom I would spend summer nights listening to Red Sox games, and my father, who spent five months in the hospital this year close to death. I know that baseball connects us in ways people who hate baseball don't understand--or care to understand.


"The summers belong to somebody else now . . ." and the last word belongs to Ted, "I am Ted fucking Williams and I'm the greatest hitter alive."


John

I do remember the baseball academy; Frank White was the star graduate there. I always thought Frank White was a hugely overlooked part of those great Royals teams. He had great range, and he became a good hitter later in his career; he even hit clean up in the '85 World Series. He is also a class individual.


One of the games I remember going to as a kid would have been maybe '77 or '78; the Red Sox beat the Royals 1-0 when Yaz hit a frozen rope into the the Royals bullpen.


I do need to get back out to the park; they have replaced the carpet with real grass, and they have redone the seats in blue instead of orange.


That brings to mind a question; why did the orange baseball never catch on? It was an idea of Charlie Finley in the early/mid seventies. I had one when I was kid, and they were much easier to see.


Fitz

being a giant fan and having seen Mays hit #600 Willy was the greatest. Ted W was not too bad/ by by baby.

"Do you know if the preceding list was based on stats compiled, or ability?"


Both. James says he uses six factors in the ratings:


1) The player's career Win Share total.


2) The player's average Win Shares in his 3 best seasons.


3) The player's average Wins Shares in his 5 best consecutive seasons.


4) The player's career Win Shares per 162 games.


5) An era adjustment based on the player's year of birth.


6) A subjective component, intended to "enable us to deal with factors not accurately reflected in the statistics." He says he makes adjustments for "any player who is clearly a major league player, but who is prevented from playing in the major leagues by forces byond his control."


So the first 4 factors are actual achievments, the 5th an adjustment based on when the player played, and the 6th an adjustment based on, for example, the fact that "Joe DiMaggio was in the United States Army in 1943, 1944, and 1945. . . how in the hell can you evaluate Joe DiMaggio without making an adjustment for that?"


One assumes he makes the same adjustment for Williams, although it is obvious from James's writings that he disliked Williams. In his first Historical Abstract, he rated Musial ahead of Williams. The statistical method he now uses (the "Win Shares" system) forced him to rate Williams higher because that's what the numbers show.

Thomas Boswell, Why Time Begins on Opening Day (1984):


"We live in a time when one of the most common experiences of American travelers is a sense that urban life is acquiring a deadly, homogeneous dreariness. Our sense of place, of region and accent and local tradition, is ground down in the face of identical, toneless expressionless Eyewitness Anchorpersons whose duty is to make Cincinnati or Oakland the identical bland equal of Chicago or New York. From the airport to the shopping mall, from the neon gas-and-gulp thoroughfares to the gaudiest clerestory lobby of the ritziest hundred-dollar-a day hotel in town, the distinctions between one city and another, between one region and another, are disappearing.


The more you travel, the harder it is to remember where you are.


Sometimes, if you still have a vestigial appetite for vivid detail, for the human face as it runs through the spectrum of emotions, it might be wise to head for the ballpark. Yes, head for the bratwurst line in Milwaukee or the bellicose brogue of the Boston bleachers, or the trendy satin-to-punk fashions of the box seats in L.A. Whether it be a crusty debate among weathered ushers in the Motor City or a mob of pretzel munchers in the belly of Comiskey Park, the ballpark is still the place to go if you want to see people as they are.


Here we find that we are still a nation of countless shades and shapes, heartening and hearty. Orwell's fears have made little headway at the ballpark. There we still find it easy to remember where we are and why we came."

John,


Thank you so much for adding to this string.


As a long suffering member of "Red Sox Nation", I'm very familiar with Updike's piece. It's in my collection.


He, of course, had the "gift", and I second your urging to all who have not read it to do so.


In your post, you stated..."I know that baseball connects us in ways people who hate baseball don't understand--or care to understand."


How very true.....and so, so sad.


I feel so helpless when I search for the words to attempt to communicate the essence of that statement.


I am not ready to cede my summers...yet.


Today is tommorows' yesterday....and we can never have yesterday back.


Live today to its' fullest.

Andy,


Such a great quote from the baseball book--and I real don't need the adjective "baseball"--with my favorite title.


John

Myrtle,


Those words about the summers belonging to someone else are a dying father's last words to his son. I'm not ready to surrender either.


John

John,


LOL....I got that loud & clear....


My response was just my way of saying that I'm planning on seeing the Sox win a World Series before I give up the ghost.

I know both you and John will be thrilled with me for pointing out that the Red Sox won their last World Series exactly 12 days after the Splendid Splinter was born. . .

You sure know how to hurt a guy!!


(groan/smile)

Andy,


I know that you know that I know that you know that deep inside you really have the soul of a Red Sox fan.


John

Anyone else, I'd be impressed with 4th level thinking; I expect nothing less from you /images/smile.gif


There are times when I think how can I possibly be a Yankee fan, the team of Steinbrenner and Billy Martin. (You'll like Those Damn Yankees by Dean Chadwin.) But I can't help myself. Blame it on Mickey Mantle, my first love.


BTW, I really do think the Red Sox have something good this year. If Manny hits his stride, they could be very, very tough.

I'll let the wizard make my case:


http://www.jewishworldreview.com/cols/sowell101601.asp


http://www.jewishworldreview.com/cols/sowell123101.asp


http://www.jewishworldreview.com/cols/sowell082001.asp


eLROY

John, Andy et al.......


The following link will take you directly to a full reprint of John Updikes' essay in this mornings Sunday Boston Globe sports section.


You might also find some of the other columns there interesting.


All of New England is dressed in their Sunday best mourning garb for "The Kid"......


http://www.boston.com/dailyglobe2/188/sports/_Hub_fans_bid_Kid_Adieu_+.shtml

the only thing stopping the modern day ball player from reaching the lofty heights of his predecessors is the amount of money he earns during the early part of his career. earning vast amounts of money early MAY cause him to "retire" early and thus not put in the years of those who went before him.

I have not read all the post but...extrapolate his numbers if he had not missed the seasons to military service and people would still be chasing him for the home run record. (I think Bob Costa's actually did it once and came up with something like 850 home runs)


Supposedly, you could put a 78 rpm record on a turntable that he had never seen before and he could read the lable...

I remember Ted William's swing...he certainly didn't chop at the ball with a compact punch. I remember Willie Mays in all aspects of his play. I remember Roberto Clemente in right field, especially in Forbes Field's truncated right. They were all so graceful. Who today plays with such grace? I no longer live near a ML ballpark and you can't always see it on TV, who are the graceful players?

Three that are playing today that pop immediately into my mind are:


Andruw Jones....watch him effortlessly track down anything in the park in center field, and make it look so easy.......


Omar Visquel.....the essence of fluidly at shortstop.


John Olerud still has one of the sweetest swings that I've ever see....he kind of reminds me of "The Kid".......


I'm sure there are others.....Just can't think of them right now.

oh man, I love olerud's swing. I'd add A-Rod, Shawn Green and Bernie Williams. All three of them have some pop in their bats without the muscled up swing that some of today's other stars sport.

n/m

Or being able to earn huge sums by continuing to play may cause players to stick around longer, and to maintain their conditioning so that they can do so (Clemens, Johnson, Maddux, Bonds, Henderson, Raines).

Bill James:


"Hundreds of sources, in discusing Williams greatness as a hitter, will talk about what amazing eyesight he had, how he could see the seams on the ball, could read the label on a spinning phonograph record, etc. Williams explicitly stated in his autobiography, My Turn At Bat, that this was completely false, that his eyesight was good but normal, and that his eyes had little or nothing to do with his hitting ability."

I think it might be fair to call Mays the greatest player and Williams the greatest hitter.


D.

James has Mays rated as a better player, but not a better hitter. Mays was a better outfielder and baserunner, but as a pure hitter, Williams was it. I think that James rates Ruth as the best hitter of all time with Williams second, but he has gone back and forth on that a couple of times. It is close in any case.


Is the new Historical Abstract the greatest or what? Worth the wait. Win Shares has some good stuff in it, but I don't know if I have the energy to try to fully understand the system.

Rickey Henderson, tough as nails, cool as ice, and a crotchety old dog. I'm happy to have grown up in his heyday, and even happier he's now with the Red Sox (I can actually root for him /images/smile.gif ).


A true bat artist, even though he's a little slower and more fragile now.

i don't think any of the players you mentioned earned big money early in their career.

Couldn't agree more about Andruw Jones. He's the best defensive player I've ever seen.

LOL....


As a Sox fan, I GOTTA hate the Bombers or I'll burn in hell forever........BUT...


Bernie Williams does qualify for this category.


Graceful as hell, and a true class act.


By the way, how can anyone truly dislike the Yankees of the past few years?


What a great team, classy guys and wonderful manager!!

Here are some stats to ponder:


Player Avg. On Base% Slg%

Bonds .292 .419 .585

Williams .344 .482 .634


The numbers are not even close. Williams is first all time in on-base percentage, second in slugging, and 7th in batting average. This doesn't even take into account that Williams lost 5 prime years to military service while fighting in two wars, and that Bonds plays in the juiced-ball era and is on steroids (no, it can not be proven unless he takes a test, but the circumstantial evidence is overwhelming). Bonds is a great player, but he would have been a Hall of Famer even if he hadn't gone on steroids and become a great slugger; in my mind he has only tarnished his legacy.


Bonds is a better fielder and base-runner than Williams was, but Williams was such a superior hitter that there is no way you can say Bonds is a better player.

Elroy,


A few years back, a friend mentioned a quote

he attributed to Jose Canseco, something on the lines of ' Babe Ruth couldn't have carried Mark McGwire's jockstrap'. All this proves is that Canseco lacked historical perspective, because, as many fans well know, there's no- one, living or dead, who could have carried the Babe's. He was the greatest player to ever put on a uniform, even if Barry Bonds repeats his 2001 season, which I rather doubt will happen.


perfidious

that is a very superficial analysis. for one thing bonds is not just a "better fielder" he is probably the best left fielder to ever play bar none. williams, OTOH was well below average. bonds also will have 600 steals, and has a good chance to set the all time records for walks and runs scored.


more importantly bonds plays currently in the worst hitters park for left handed powere hitters that maybe ever existed. for left handed hitters the park effect of pac bellpark is somewhere around 65-70 and last year it was 50. this means that bonds numbers must get extra credit for the context in which they are put up.


williams was absolutely a better hitter, but bonds is a much more complete player in almost every respect, and in my mind that makes up for the difference in hitting. it is not like we are comparing him to babe ruth who outhomered every team in the league.


pat

check out the freak:


http://www.baberuth.com/photos/rutb053.html


eLROY

There is no question Bonds is a future Hall of Famer, but when you compare him to the best (or at worst second-best) hitter of all time, I think its pushing it.


As for the ballpark argument, Bonds has only played a couple of years in Pac Bell. Ted Williams, on the other hand, played his entire career in Fenway, which is a terrible ballpark for lefties. Remember that Williams was a dead-pull hitter, he didn't use The Wall nor the screen above it. I read an article once that projected that if Williams had played his entire career in Detroit instead of Boston, and had not missed 5 years to WWII and Korea, he would have hit well over 1,000 home runs. Whether or not that is true is irrelevant, but the fact remains that he won two triple crowns and missed a third by hundreths of a point (under modern rules in which sac flies do not count as ABs, he would have had 3 triple crowns). He led the league in on base percentage 12 consecutive seasons and slugging 8 consecutive seasons (excepting the years he missed). He is first all-time in OBP, second in slugging, and just barely second behind the Babe in OPS (had he not missed 5 prime years, he surely would be first in OPS).


The Nintendo-like numbers of Bonds, Sosa , et al are a product of many factors, including, I believe, smaller ballparks, diluted pitching, a livelier ball, and steroids. In the history of baseball pre-1990, only 10 players hit 50 home runs in a season. From 1995-2001, there were sixteen (16) 50+ home run seasons, and six (6) 60+ home run seasons (vs. 2 in the history of baseball prior thereto). Bonds' number are great, but you need to consider them in the context of the rest of the league. Williams absolutely dominated his league for virtually his entire career. Bonds, while consistently excellent, did not dominate nearly to the extent Williams did, with the exception of 2001.


By the way, Bonds had 484 steals coming into this season and has averaged 13 steals per season the last 3 years, so he is not going to come close to 600 steals. He is also about 500 runs and 400 walks behind Rickey Henderson, so, given his age, he is not likely to catch Henderson, either.


My point is not to demean Bonds, who is a great player (though I think he is a cheater). My point is that I would rather have the greatest hitter ever (or, at worst, the second-best hitter ever, and only by the slimmest of margins) than a great hitter who was a superior LEFT fielder and base-runner. Anyone can play left field (especially in Fenway park). Bonds' defensive contributions would be much more meaningful if he played a more important position, such as CF, SS or C.

perhaps you've forgotten Ty Cobb. 12 batting titles in 13 years. Lifetime average .366. Never hit for power except for a 2 day stretch when, disgusted with all the Babe Ruth hype, wanted to show reporters and fans that anyone could hit homers. He parked 5 in 2 games.

As a hitter, Williams may have been best. He missed

over 5 years in his prime. If you extrapolate

"average" years for those five, he'd have hit over

700 home runs, had a .350+ career average and

possibly 2000 RBI.


Moreover, he was not a "compiler", a player who

played many years as a very good, but not great

player (think Eddie Murray or Dave Winfield). He

was a superstar until the final two seasons of a

20+ year career. This in an era where conditioning

and surgical techniques were not even close to

what they are now.

The even more intrigueing speculation is....


What if TSW played in Yankee Stadium??


How many 350-385 foot fly ball outs do U think Ted

made in Fenway over the years?


For speculations sake, lets say 10-15 per year (and I think that's minimum)!


Add those to his HR total and calculate the effect on his batting avg. and see what U come up with!!

I don't know if the 10-15 additional home runs is accurate, since I never saw Ted play... but if that is accurate, then he would have hit an additional 200 - 300 home runs. Factor in the 5 years he missed as average years--even though they were prime years--and I can understand why people say he would have hit over 1,000 home runs if he played an uninterrupted career for a team that had a lefty-friendly ballpark, such as the Yankees.


As for his batting average, if you change 15 outs to hits each season... then his career batting average would have been over .370!!!

yup..........and now one can understand why true baseball people call him the greatest HITTER who ever lived......