Quote:
Originally Posted by RMc
And even then, Bird wasn't just one of the best pitchers in baseball, he was a cultural phenomenon, on the cover of the Rolling Stone, a legit superstar. And the main reason a 11-year-old kid in suburban Detroit (me) became a baseball fan in the first place.
We will not see his like again.
|
Same with this also 11-year-old kid, though on the other side of the state (southwest Michigan). I was probably destined to be a life-long baseball fan anyway (certainly runs in the family) but Fidrych in 1976, at such a vital stage of my development as a human, certainly solidified it. Would I be as passionate a fan without the Bird as my childhood hero? Maybe. But I tend to think probably not quite as much, and with less unadulterated joy.