APPRECIATION Kaline takes his bow; the legend will live forever
When there is so much death around, one man’s passing can go unnoticed. This one will not. Even with the shroud of coronavirus taking us down in shocking numbers, no one in Michigan was numb to the news that arrived with a gasp Monday afternoon: Al Kaline is gone.
Mr. Tiger takes his bow. At a time of year when baseball should be puffing its lungs, Al Kaline gave his last breath . He passed away at his home in Bloomfield Hills at 85 because of complications from various medical ailments, according to friends.
“I just talked to him over the weekend,” his former Tigers teammate and dear friend Jim Price said, fighting tears after hearing the news. “It was difficult. He didn’t sound right. I said, ‘Al, call me. I’m worried about you.’ He said he would. But of course, he couldn’t.”
He choked up. “I’m heartbroken.”
Aren’t we all? At a time when we lacked any sadness to spare, suddenly we were gushing. Al Kaline, who we all seemed to know, who was always around, who spent six decades of his life affiliated with the Detroit Tigers, is gone.
But his legend lives. Kaline hasn’t played a baseball game since 1974, but he is still one of the first Tigers players who come to mind when you say “great ones.” He hasn’t been on the air for nearly 20 years, yet his voice — like that of Ernie
Harwell — still rings in the ears of Tigers fans everywhere.
He was a legend, yes. But in accomplishment only. Inside his No. 6 uniform, inside his sport coat and open collar, inside a television booth, or a banquet hall, or a charity event, Al Kaline never played a legend. He was simply a good, kind man.
Consumed by the pandemic that is rattling the globe, we were sideswiped by the news, and left scrambling to put his life into some perspective. Here is a try: This was a beaming star who didn’t let the glow get in his eyes, a Baltimore kid born into poverty, the son of a broom maker, who reportedly signed his first contract at age 18 while dressed in his prom outfit. A man who won a batting title at age 20, who made 18 AllStar teams, who played until he was 39, who inspired the 1968 Tigers to that classic World Series title, who collected more than 3,000 hits, who still holds the franchise record for home runs (399) and who once threw out three baserunners in three straight innings — from right field!
This is a man who got hitting tips from Ted Williams, who smacked a hit off Satchel Paige, who once went into an autoparts business with Gordie Howe, and who made the Hall of Fame on the first ballot.
But this is also a man who asked, upon signing his first contract, if he could still play in an amateur game a few days later because he had promised the guys he would do so. A man who once refused a pay raise when he didn’t think he’d earned it. A man who, as a pro ballplayer, worked an offseason in a sporting goods store, who was shy and reverent around older, accomplished players, who was selfconscious about his grammar when broadcasting games, and who never announced himself to a room and often would go unnoticed, until some observer with his mouth dropping open would gush, “Hey, isn’t that Al Kaline?”
It was. He would offer that bright smile, and a handshake, maybe an old story. And another fan would forever be in awe.
As a boy, Kaline had a bone in his left foot removed, and he had to learn to run on the side of his foot. During the 1968 season, he broke his arm and actually suggested to manager Mayo Smith that he sit out the World Series because other players had earned it more.
No way that was going to happen. Instead, Smith made the nowfamous move of juggling the lineup, moving Mickey Stanley to shortstop to get Kaline into right field. The Tigers rebounded from a 31 deficit to win the championship.
The perfect player has left us now. But it’s not the bat and glove that will define his legacy. After all, it’s been years since we saw him play baseball. But so many are telling the tale of him shaking their hands, or sharing a story, or encouraging their kids, or laughing at a memory.
In this spring without baseball, in this season of global sickness, another death might be easy to dismiss with a depressed shrug and an “Isn’t that a shame?” But it’s not Al Kaline’s dying that makes us sigh. It’s the life he led, and the fact that we may never see its likes again.
Mr. Tiger takes his bow. Summer feels a long way off.