Here's a little winter-time baseball memory exercise for Bauxites. Complete the following thought -- and explain your answer. (For me, this will be easy.)
Baseball Memory: I can't explain it -- he didn't play for my hometown team, he wasn't a Hall of Famer, there's no obvious defense, but when I was a kid, one of my favorite players in all of MLB was ...
... (again, for me, this is easy) ... Ralph Garr. Born 61 years ago yesterday, The Roadrunner was an All-Star OF with the Braves before being traded to the White Sox and falling off fairly quickly in his early 30's. I mentioned this briefly in the All-Jason Hall of Names article a while back, but my childhood best friend and I actually formed an Ohio-based Ralph Garr Fan Club waybackwhen he was winning batting titles for the Bravos ... and remember, this was before TBS brought the Braves into national U.S. broadcast focus, before USA Today, before (gasp!) the Internet.
And I can't explain it -- I just barely recall it had something to do with his great big smile on a 1974 or '75 Topps baseball card. And that was enough to make Ralph Garr one of my four or five favorite players ever. How about you and your "can't explain-it" player attachment?