[新聞] Lidle's tragic death hurt deeply

[Vitus ()]

OAKLAND -- Objective? Detached? Professional?
Baseball? Today?

How?

Why?

Can't do it.

I lost a friend on Wednesday when former A's pitcher Cory Lidle
died in a plane crash in Manhattan. Not an acquaintance.
Not a baseball player whose exploits I covered on a daily
basis for two years.

A friend.

Moments before I typed this sentence from the press box at Game 2
of the American League Championship Series, Milton Bradley of the
A's smoked a first-pitch fastball from Tigers rookie phenom
Justin Verlander into the seats at McAfee Coliseum, sending
a sellout crowd into a frenzy. Were this just about
any other night, the sportswriter in me would be trying to hide
from my colleagues the fan-in-me goosebumps covering my arms.

Tonight?

No goosebumps. Nothing. Numb.

I just lost a friend.

You know, journalists aren't supposed to become friends with
their subjects. It's taboo in our business. Potential conflict
of interest, potential for compromised objectivity, blah, blah, blah.

But if befriending an athlete who would have become a friend
had we crossed paths elsewhere in life makes me a bad journalist,
fine. I'll wear it. I'm a human being first, and when I meet
someone with a similar sense of humor, similar values and a
similar personality, I'm not going to deny myself the pleasure
of their company to simply conform to some cold code of my profession.

Professional athletes aren't supposed to befriend journalists, either.
Another unwritten rule. But for the very reasons outlined above,
some of them break it.

Not many, mind you. Of the hundreds of baseball players I've dealt
with while covering the A's over seven seasons for MLB.com,
I consider no more than five of them friends: Erik Hiljus, Barry Zito,
Tim Hudson, Mark Mulder ... and Cory Lidle.

You might have noticed that all of them are pitchers.
There's a reason for that. I was a pitcher, too. Not a very good one,
of course. I can't tell you my exact ERA at the University of
San Francisco, but it read like something you'd see next to the
daily special at a cheap diner: 6.95. A's general manager Billy Beane
once told me I was probably the only 6-foot-7 left-hander in Division I
history to go undrafted, and he's probably right.

But that I played the game at that level gave me something in
common with the aforementioned five, all of whom have played for
the A's at some point, and most friendships are born out of commonality.

My friendship with Cory certainly was, but the more we got to
know each other, the less we talked about pitching. Baseball,
in different forms, was our profession. And who wants to talk about
work unless you have to?

Cory wasn't a typical pro by any stretch, as evidenced by the classic
nickname bestowed upon him in reference to his love of ice cream,
candy, cookies and fast food. "Snacks" was forever snacking, like
Brad Pitt in "Ocean's Eleven," only Cory was about as Hollywood as
your next-door neighbor, and he had a body to match.


But he had a live right arm, a dirty sinker and a nasty disposition
on the mound, so he was a pro. He was the American League Pitcher
of the Month for the A's in August 2002, helping them put together a
historic 20-game winning streak, and his two seasons in Oakland were
the best of his nine-year career. Complementing the Big Three of Hudson,
Mulder and Zito, he went a combined 21-16 with ERAs of 3.59 and 3.89.

And he was the least pretentious pro I've ever met. Probably the most
honest, too -- even when he knew his honesty might get him in trouble.
Perhaps that's why he bounced around so much, having played for seven
big-league teams.

In Oakland, for instance, he continually clashed with then-pitching
coach Rick Peterson, just as he'd done with coaches in Tampa Bay
before the Devil Rays shipped him out. This year alone, he verbally
sparred with Phillies reliever Arthur Rhodes after being traded
from the Phillies to the Yankees, and before that he became one
of the few active players to be openly critical of Barry Bonds.

More recently, he was hammered by the New York press for saying the
Tigers were more prepared to play in the ALDS.

"Someone asks you a question, you answer it, right?" Cory once told me.
"And if you don't answer it honestly, you're a phony."

He could be bitingly sarcastic, as many ballplayers are, and he was
far from perfect, but he knew that about himself and often made light
of the fact.

It was almost impossible to not like Cory, and look no further than
to Peterson for confirmation of that.

I wrote a book about the Big Three two years ago, and in it, Cory
took quite a few shots at Peterson. Yet there was Peterson,
now the pitching coach of the Mets, struggling to contain his
emotions Wednesday after getting the horrible news.

"There's no words to describe the loss of somebody that you spent
some very special times with," Peterson said from the NLCS, where
he nonetheless came up with some poignant words to describe Cory's
journey from replacement player to Devil Rays castoff to valuable veteran.

"It shows the kind of fortitude and the kind of competitive spirit
that you look for from people that you can count on when you
need them most."

I never needed anything from Cory other than a postgame
quote or two every fifth day when he was in Oakland, but
we used to talk daily. We hung out quite a bit at night during
Spring Training in Arizona, too. And after he was traded,
we kept in touch.

I spoke to him by phone only a couple of weeks ago, in fact.
Called him when the Yankees clinched a spot in the playoffs.
Congratulated him. He thanked me and, as usual, quickly moved
the subject off baseball. He asked about my family, and I asked
about his son, Christopher, and his wife, Melanie.

So shortly after I arrived at McAfee Coliseum, when the news
broke that his plane slammed into an apartment building earlier
in the afternoon, I couldn't think of anything but Christopher and Melanie.

A good woman lost a good man. A 6-year-old boy lost a good father.

And I lost a friend. That's why my bosses pulled me off the
game story here.

Baseball? Now? Please.

I have to get on a plane later tonight, heading for Detroit
and Game 3 of the ALCS. It's my job, and I'm leaving my wife
and two daughters, ages 3 and 2, behind to do it.

I'll be boarding a much bigger bird than the one Cory flew,
and I know this might sound a little strange, but damn,
I wish he could be the pilot.

At the very least, they'd better have snacks.

Rest in peace, Cory. It was a pleasure to know you.

--
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→ Vitus:很感人, Lidle真是性情中人啊, 英年早逝太可憐了
推 kevinsyc:我看到一伴看不下去了...Lidle你為什麼那麼早走...
推 CBJackal:唉 Lidle你就這樣走了 洋基還需要你阿 T_T
推 atb:http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=d12fSFjXjw4
推 CCfss:請問這篇新聞的出處是...？
→ atb:公視今天有剪輯他在各隊時的影片
推 Vitus:CCfss: http://tinyurl.com/fe3zd
推 CCfss:謝 是想知道是誰寫的
推 e314520:作者是Mychael Urban  他是Lidle的好朋友之ㄧ