Kirby Puckett Jersey Day - revisiting his career

[Saxophone Joe]

I am super excited for tomorrow's game! Those jerseys look sweet. Anyone else going?

I'm also glad the current team will be playing meaningful baseball too. Every game matters right now...

I mentioned in another thread, but my wife is named after Kirby and was born in January 1985, just after his rookie year. I always maintain she's probably the first person or pet named after Kirby. 

Anyway, going to this game has me thinking about how special a player Kirby was and how sad the final decade of life was. I mean, the guy got a hit off Greg Maddux in March 1996 and woke up the next day and couldn't see out of one eye. Tragic. I'm 43, so really only recall the back half of his career. But he was my idol. I love telling people he has the highest average of any right-handed hitter post-World War II. 

I don't care about the off-field issues. I mean, of course I do - I don't condone abuse in any fashion, there are no excuses, but the guy wasn't a monster. And it's clear taking baseball out of his life set his life in a different direction. When the cameras were off, retiring completely devastated him, clearly. But it was a miracle he even made it to the big leagues, given where he came from, let alone the Hall of Fame. There's a really fascinating biography or documentary waiting to be made that would peel back the layers of who Kirby really was. Who knows? People are complicated and Kirby died before he had a chance to fully redeem himself. There's a lot to unpack with his life. We can never get inside another person's head, you know? And I'm assuming all the people who now trash Kirby as a terrible person never listened to Miles Davis or Elvis Presley, read Ernest Hemingway, watched a Marlon Brando film, enjoyed a Mike Tyson fight or voted for anyone who was less than moral, etc. You get the point. Kirby has a complex legacy to grapple with, no doubt. 

So Kirby had his flaws, obviously. But as a ballplayer (and that's why I'm here - to talk baseball)? Man, pound for pound, there was no one better. He brought it, every day, and sure brought Twins Territory a whole lot of joy over 12 years. I'm looking forward to celebrating him (and a Twins win!) tomorrow. 

PS - a few months back, I read Joe Posnaski's massive Baseball 100 book of the game's top 100 players. Kirby wasn't included. I wrote Joe an email telling him he made a mistake, and he actually apologized for not including him and said he might add Kirby in an updated edition.