AROUND THE BASES

Baseball has received a lot of black eyes lately, mainly because of the steroid issue, so perhaps it is only fair to step aside for a few minutes to remember that baseball also has presented to the world plenty of remarkable individuals. This columnist has argued before that youngsters should look to people other than athletic superstars as role models – that there is nothing inherently heroic about playing baseball, and even less so now that the players pick up such hefty checks for what they do. Yet baseball diamonds have witnessed a lot of individuals over the years who do deserve our admiration. Let’s remember a few of them.

Right at the top stands Jackie Robinson, whose courage continues to inspire Americans. When Robinson took the field for the Dodgers in 1947, breaking the major league color barrier, he was not just an individual player but the representative of a race. He was playing for all African-American men, women, and children; yet he was also playing for the better angels of everyone, regardless of color.

Robinson’s courage was remarkable, and he exhibited it in various ways. There were the death threats, and anyone possessing even a nodding familiarity with American history – the Ku Klux Klan, the lynchings, the murdered civil rights workers – should understand that those were not idle threats. He risked his life every time he stepped on a baseball field, and his family likewise was at risk.

And then there were the racial taunts from other players, moderated only slightly by those players like Pee Wee Reese, the Dodger captain and shortstop, who publicly befriended Robinson. Such courage of another sort it took for him not to fight back, to lash out at the bigots. He taught us that sometimes being silent and persevering, keeping one’s eye on the long-term goal rather than short-term gratification, may be the most heroic act of all. As Carl Erskine, a pitcher and teammate of Robinson’s, wrote in his recently published book “What I Learned from Jackie Robinson,” this pioneer of racial justice “forced Americans to look into the mirror and inside their own soul.”

Hank Aaron found his path toward baseball immortality opened by Robinson, but when Aaron neared Babe Ruth’s career home run record, the bigots returned with death warnings, hate mail, and kidnapping threats against his children. Throughout it all, Aaron behaved with the quiet dignity that characterized his entire career. Aaron led by example, ego never clouding his greatness, his career and life untouched by scandal.

Lou Gehrig, the Iron Horse, taught Americans how to live, how to work, and how to die. One of the greatest sluggers of all time, Gehrig was a gentleman who went about his business with a work ethic seldom seen in any profession. He played 2,130 consecutive games and did not take himself out of a contest until he was dying of amyotrophic lateral sclerosis (ALS), ever since known as Lou Gehrig’s Disease. When 61,000 admirers turned out at Yankee Statium to honor the dying great on July 4, 1939, he gave the most famous baseball speech in history, declaring, despite his illness, that he considered himself the “luckiest man on the face of the earth.” Unable to continue playing ball, he signed on with the New York Police Commission and worked with youngsters until shortly before he died, on June 2, 1941, still in his thirties.

Ted Williams was not always a pleasant person. He could be short with sportswriters and arrogant with anyone he did not like. His family life was generally dysfunctional. But when his country called, he twice put aside his baseball goals and went to war. He pulled no strings to stay out, used no one’s influence to continue bashing home runs at Fenway. In his second go-around, Williams flew thirty-eight missions during the Korean War, once crash-landing with his plane on fire.

Mickey Mantle, dying of liver disease during the summer of 1995, taught his fans something very important indeed-how to repent. Mantle openly acknowledged betraying his ability through extensive partying and urged young people not to drink. A liver transplant failed to help him, but so many fans respected the way he closed his life that organ donations increased sharply.

So let us remember that in the flawed world of major league baseball, many individuals, far more than the few mentioned here, truly merit our admiration and gratitude.

Edward J. Rielly is a Westbrook resident, English professor at Saint Joseph’s College, and widely published author with two books on baseball and American culture.