RIP: Mark 'The Bird' Fidrych, 54

What an awful, awful day for baseball.

I just *heard* about Fidrych. I never got to see him in his one year height of fame. But wow. I can definitely appreciate the zany fun he brought to baseball.

RIP.

 

Terrible news.
The SI cover was what I was going to reference. I remember that issue.
The Bird had hismelf a cameo role in the wacky 70s sports scene.
His story was unforgettable to those of us who watched it unfold.
RIP The Bird

 

Nice article in the Times:

http://www.nytimes.com/2009/04/14/sports/baseball/14thebird.html?ref=sports

It's amazing how much Monday Night Baseball meant in a pre-cable world.

 

Yeahhhhh....
and....

are you 12?

 

And the times obit: http://www.nytimes.com/2009/04/14/sports/baseball/14fidrych.html?hpw

 

If you didn't get to see The Bird in his prime, you truly missed out on something.

This was a time when The Big Red Machine was peaking and the Yankees were one season (and a Reggie Jackson acquisition) from beginning their late 70s stride. The Reds had Pete Rose, Tony Perez, Joe Morgan, Dave Concepcion, Johnny Bench, George Foster, Cesar Geronimo, Ken Griffey and some great pitchers like Don Gullett. I could almost name that entire roster off the top of my head.

The Red Sox had Carl Yastrzemski, Freddy Lynn, Jim Rice, Pudge Fisk, Jerry Remy, Butch Hobson and a roster that was fairly deep as well. Sure, both these teams had stars, but they had depth.

The Tigers...well, they had Ron LeFlore, Rusty Staub and Willie Horton. Good players in their time, but not the huge ballpark draws that players like Pete Rose were.

Keep in mind this was an era when other than radio, all we had was the Saturday game of the week and Monday night baseball, and you got the scores (but without the video highlights) on the 11 o'clock news or in the morning paper, or you could hear Mel Allen narrate the week that was on TWIB. NBC and ABC were very picky about which teams played the game of the week.

ABC, IIRC, did a lot of AL baseball, much of it being the Yankees, Orioles and such. Better teams=better ratings. For ABC to send their crew to Detroit to do the Yankees playing a team that ultimately went 74-87, there had to be a good reason. And it certainly wasn't the Tigers. Instead, it was Mark Fidrych, who, for one unforgettable season, was spellbinding and magical. He didn't disappoint that night. If anyone was intimidated that night, it was the Yankees. I haven't seen the game since it originally aired, but I can still hear Howard Cosell raving about him.

Happy trails, Bird.

 

while i was quite young, i can remember people enjoyed watching the bird because he loved playing baseball in an era when the game began to become a business. it didn't matter if you were a tiger fan or not ... you just loved watching the guy love playing baseball.

 

I wrote earlier on this thread but in reading his obit I remembered that he was born exactly one day after I was. That factoid, which I'd forgotten over the years, thrilled me at the time but now it kind of gives me the creeps to see my (could have been) birthday in an obituary.

 

Fidrych was the anti-asshole in a game which now features far too many of them.

Don't weep for many ex-jocks en passant (can't remember the last), but got teary when I heard this news.

 

You can't mention Don Gullett and not say Jack Billingham in the next breath dammit!

 

No love for the 1970s Pittsburgh Pirates?

 

The mid-70s was a great time to be a baseball fan, and the Bird was a huge part of that storyline.. RIP..