Longtime sports editor dies at 77

STAMFORD — If the celebrated story of Stamford sports was a movie, Bob Kennedy would be the narrator.

As a sports reporter, editor and columnist for The Stamford Advocate, a Hearst Connecticut Media sister newspaper of the Middletown Press, he chronicled the athletic battles of city players and coaches for 40 years.

Now he is remembered for his love of writing, coaching, Stamford and the family to which he was devoted. Kennedy, who had been hospitalized since March, died Sunday at the age of 77.

His wife of 52 years, Bartan Kennedy, posted news of his death Monday on Facebook:

“Bob passed away peacefully last night after a long struggle with Alzheimer’s and Parkinson’s,” Bartan Kennedy said. “Our family is so sad but very glad he is finally at peace. Thank you to all for your love, prayers and support over the years. Bob was a wonderful husband, father, grandfather and friend.

“We had a wonderful life together.”

Players, coaches and fellow writers said the same Monday.

“Bobby was a community treasure,” said Tom Renner, who worked with Kennedy for 20 years and succeeded him as Advocate sports editor. “He was an encyclopedia of Stamford sports. From the 1950s until the 2000s, he saw the best of Stamford sports.”

That included National Football League Hall of Famer Andy Robustelli; Major League Baseball player and manager Bobby Valentine; National Basketball Association referee Bennett Salvatore; Trinity Catholic basketball star Rashamel Jones, who went on to win a national championship with the UConn Huskies; and Amanda Pape, a Trinity basketball player who was one the highest- scoring women in state history, Renner said.

“Bobby knew almost all of them personally,” Renner said. “He was a leader in the community. He embraced that role. You know that saying — if you enjoy your job, you never have to work a day in your life. Nobody epitomized that more than Bobby.”

Kennedy first witnessed Stamford sports successes when he was a boy — in 1951, he watched the city win the Little League World Series in Williamsport, Pa.

He worked on Stamford High School's newspaper,

The Siren, with classmate and future U. S. Sen. Joseph Lieberman. Kennedy was interviewed by the national media when his lifelong friend was named presidential candidate Al Gore’s running mate in 2000. When Lieberman announced he was running for president four years later, Kennedy, along with others from thei Class of 1960, stood beside him on the podium at Stamford High.

Kennedy started his journalism career with The Advocate in December 1964. He was the sole sports reporter on staff at the time and remained so until he left the newspaper for a job in New York in 1970. He returned to The Advocate in 1975 as sports editor, retiring in 2007. He filed stories and columns on Stamford and Fairfield County sports as a special correspondent for a decade after that.

During his career, Kennedy covered New York Yankees great Mickey Mantle, shook hands with boxing legend Muhammad Ali, and traced the career of local hero and friend Bobby Valentine. Kennedy has said Valentine is the greatest athlete he had ever seen on high school baseball and football fields.

Valentine, now executive director of athletics at Sacred Heart University in Fairfield, said Monday that Kennedy was a “disciple of the patriarchs of Stamford sports” — along with John Scalzi, Mickey Lione, Sharkey Laureno and others.

“After World War II, Stamford was lucky to have guys who settled in the community who gave a darn about the youth,” Valentine said. “They gave the character- building facet of coaching at least as much time as they gave the X’s and O’s. Bobby did the same. He was a coach at heart. He knew those old guys in Stamford had the answer to life. It was the cloth Bobby was made of.”

Kennedy said the same when he left The Advocate in 2007. He told Joseph Pisani, then executive editor of The Advocate, that when he played on successful baseball teams as a youngster, “my coaches were local legends. ... These men not only taught the basics of baseball with the best, but taught the lessons of life, how to win, how to lose and how to do both with dignity and respect for your opponent.”

It was his responsibility to pass that on, Kennedy told Pisani. He coached Little League for 10 years, then Senior Babe Ruth in Stamford for more than 30 years, leading teams to regional and World Series championships.