Players’ bond formed on field, built on loyalty
He’ll be 88 next month and remains up on the news, especially the comings and goings of the Red Sox, whose colors he once wore.
Sox fans from the ’50s will need no introduction to Ted Lepcio.
But if you came aboard later, there’s something Ted wants you to know, especially if you saw yesterday’s headlines.
They told of Jimmy Piersall’s death at 87, with emphasis on his battle with a mental illness that would probably be described now as bipolar disorder. Back then, the less genteel diagnosis was that Jimmy had suffered a nervous breakdown.
As he read of his friend’s passing, Lepcio didn’t dispute those stories, but felt compelled to make them more complete, “because this kid deserved to be remembered as the outstanding player he was.”
If he sounded like a protective friend, it’s because that’s what he became after joining the Sox in 1952 as Piersall’s roommate.
“He was as good as any center fielder I ever saw,” Lepcio, an infielder, remembered. “Jimmy took a back seat to no one. But he was wound so tight. We’d go down for breakfast and he’d start barking at a waitress. I’d say, ‘ Damn it, Jim, just order another pancake if that’s what you want.’
“Really, he was a good kid, but, oh, he could be a pain. ... That’s why a lot of the guys in the locker room didn’t warm up to him.
“I remember the time Satchel Paige walked him and Jimmy ran backwards to first. Who knows what he was thinking? Or the time he got into that brawl with Billy Martin. I helped break it up and still have no idea how it started.”
Piersall was eventually admitted for a short stay at a mental health facility.
“When he came back,” Lepcio said, laughing, “sportswriters asked, ‘ Do you see any difference?’ I said, ‘ No, he’s the same pain ... he’s always been.’ ”
But Jimmy did seem to quiet down, and never dodged the stigma of his illness.
Years later, teamed with White Sox broadcaster Harry Caray, he could still kick up a fuss, like the time he implied baseball wives were fortune hunters.
“Harry would often say, ‘You’re crazy, Jimmy,’ ” Chicago columnist Barry Rozner remembers, “and Jimmy would say, ‘Yes, and I have the papers to prove it!’ ”
The stories can even be amusing.
But speaking like the loyal roomie he was, Lepcio just hopes no one forgets, “Jimmy was a hell of a ballplayer, and a real good kid, too.”