Paul Splittorff RIP

That's a neat story, Freddie. And from you telling it, it's wonderful that it has stuck with you all this time. How neat. RIP, Paul.

 

Royals fans in the '70s and '80s were blessed by being able to root for some of the classiest men ever to play the game. Two of them, Splittorff and Dan Quisenberry, were taken from us far too soon. RIP.

 

Though my rooting interests lie elsewhere, I grew up in the midwest during their glory days in the late 70s/early 80s. They were indeed a classy group, though Splitt & Quisenberry were polar opposites in terms of their personalities - and not in a bad way. Still remember Quisenberry talking about being depressed after a bad outing and trying to drown himself in the shower.

Ewing Kaufman's organization knew how to build a team to appeal to a midwest fan base. They didn't really go for the flashy guys. Just good solid to great players. In a sense, the Twins are following that model.

 

It's kind of interesting to follow the youth movement model cycle: Royals to Braves to Twins to Rays back to Royals

 

That is exceedingly cool. Thanks for sharing. And RIP Splitt.

I read the transcript of Bob Dutton's chat on the KC Star web site, and the team is going to honor him with sleeve patches with the word "SPLITT" on them.

 

Uh yeah, got pretty dusty in here during that read. Thank you for sharing.

 

That is a great story. Any kid who lost a father can easily relate.

 

I remember him being a very cerebral pitcher, a guy who beat you as much with his brain as he did with his arm.

 

Goldberg, Lefebvre, White, Davis........hearing them talk about Splitt.......yeah.......little dusty in here indeed.

 

Train of life making all too frequent stops
Splittorff's death conjures memories of so many who have passed

By Tom Singer | MLB.com Columnist | 05/25/11 2:51 PM ET
The Train of Souls pulled into another stop on Wednesday morning: Blue Springs, Mo. Time for another passenger, another companion on a life's travels, to get off.

Go in peace, Paul Splittorff. Always got a thrill out of your work on the mound -- bespectacled, professorial-looking pitcher cutting up macho lineups to shreds. Enjoyed the press-room chats even more.

We all have The Train. It chugs along with all the people who impact, enrich and define our lives. When it begins hugging the rails, it picks up passengers. Later, they begin to disembark.
Strange how the longer you ride it, the more frequent the stops become. But, lately, The Train has become a local. Too many stops. So the journey becomes more solitary. There are more open seats on The Train, which is a good thing because the longer it winds through life, the more one seems to need to sit.

No, it's not a good thing. It would be far better if The Train continued standing-room-only, endlessly. But we all know that is not how it works.

They all have had to depart, turning their seats over to new generations. And so The Train chugs along, still welcoming passengers who enhance the journey with their personalities, their conscience and, sure, their skills. Curtis Granderson, David Ortiz, Joe Maddon, Manny Acta, Ryan Howard, Ryan Braun, Mike Scioscia. Many others.

Too often, though, The Train brakes to a stop. Someone has to leave. The cars fall silent as we wave out the windows, mouthing a weak farewell, yet words that still say it all:

"Thanks for sharing the ride, for making it better."

http://mlb.mlb.com/news/article.jsp?ymd=20110525&content_id=19560974&vkey=perspectives&fext=.jsp&c_id=mlb

 

Made me shed a tear. Splitorff pitched in the first major league game I ever attended in person in the early 1970s. I remember thinking it was sort of cool that a guy could pitch wearing glasses. Sad to see him go.

 

Growing up in KC in the late 70's/early 80's was a magical time for a young baseball fan. I was...young (only 6 in 1980 during the World Series run) but can even remember back as far as the 1977 ALCS. Hated the damn Yankees and Splitt was the Yankee Killer.

As a boy, I ran into...
George Brett at KCI Airport (twice) plus I still have a picture, framed, of the two of us when I was 5.
Jamie Quirk at the airport
Rich Gale at a Perkins
Dennis Leonard picking up a pizza for his family
Paul Splittorff at a furniture store
Al Cowens (also passed away too soon) at the grocery store
Amos Otis and Freddie Patek visited our school once, on different occasions.

They were all so gracious to this little kid.

Those guys were fabric, absolute fabric, of our city. Beloved (and, yes, a more innocent time. I still remember Darrell Porter's horrendous coke addiction described by Denny Matthews as "personal problems". Porter did enough coke to kill an elephant.)

Kansas City went through bizarre tragedies, such as the 1977 Flooding that killed 25 and the 1981 Hyatt Regency Skywalk Collapse, killing 114. Yet we always had the Royals to cling to and they, for the most part, made us all proud.

We all lost our own innocence over the Royals in the 1983 drug scandal and, really, it never fully regained. Once Dick Howser passed away, ownership made one final expensive push (Mark Davis) and the team just faded into the abyss that it has been in for decades.

Yet for the stretch I grew up with, in Kansas City for those years, it was incredible to be around.