Seems like a good time to revisit something I wrote 7 years ago.
I still feel the same way. Murcer should have a plaque in Monument Park. Sadly, with every year that passes, I think the chances get more and more remote.
Thursday, May 20, 2021
So, Bobby Murcer would have been 75 today
Seems like a good time to revisit something I wrote 7 years ago.
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That was truly moving Bern. I read the whole piece and then the comments. (2014 an we had trolls even back then.)
Read his wiki too.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bobby_Murcer
Beautifully written, Bern, and it stands the test of time.
The honors any team bestows should have a certain emotional element. Murcer was a fine player on what was usually a mediocre team. He should have been the AL MVP in 1971. But more than that, he was a beloved Yankee.
And apparently a thoroughly nice guy. A friend of mine who was a baseball writer told me how, when he was suffering from cancer, Murcer took a bunch of time to talk with him and advise him.
I'd put him in the park for that alone.
You can not even intimate that you love the Yanks and be in your 60s and not have loved Bobby.
Perhaps the viliest thing ever done by the Boss was dispatching him to Candlestick Park.
That was the day the music died
The Archangel
Way to say something that needed to be said and, apparently needs to be said again.
The park like any good attraction that memorializes, should touch, move, and inspire.
I think that adding Bobby Murcer would accomplish all three.
Doug K.
He was never the next Mantle but he was the first and only Murcer. Shoulda been a lifelong Yankee. YES ran his Yankeeography yesterday and I caught some of it. It surprised me how sad and heartbroken I was just from seeing him talking about his career on camera.
The man left a mark.
Yep, he should've been a lifelong Yankee. And he was taken away from us too soon. A very nice guy and a winner in my book. And yes, he should have his plaque in Monument Park.
The Hammer of God
Except, of course, that the Murcer-Bonds deal started the sequence of events that led to the team's 1970s World Series.
Where Bobby really got screwed over?
Game 3, 1981 World Series. Bob Lemon, beginning his sad managerial meltdown in that Series, sends Murcer up to pinch-hit in the top of the 8th. The Yanks are trailing, 5-4, but they have 2 on with nobody out against an uncharacteristically wild and hittable Fernando Valenzuela, who had already surrendered 9 hits and 7 walks.
Lemon tells Murcer: "Bunt for a hit."
BUNT FOR A HIT??? WTF?
Thoroughly confused, Murcer, who didn't bunt much, popped up his bunt to Cey, who promptly doubled Larry Milbourne off at first.
DP. Yanks lose, 5-4, drop the next 3 in a row and the Series.
I would've loved to see Bobby hit away and put one in the bleachers. If he had, the Yanks would've gone up 3-0 in games, and almost certainly won it all.
Sad, sad, sad.
If I remember correctly, Murcer was once asked who should've gotten the MVP award for the Dodgers in that series, and he said "Lemon."
If I remember correctly, Murcer was once asked who should've gotten the MVP award for the Dodgers in that series, and he said "Lemon."
Beautiful essay.
I was reminded of something in that essay I have tried hard to forget. The selling off of the Old Stadium, splinter by splinter, teaspoons of dirt. They should have given it away to, for brevity's sake, in a drawing of names of season ticket holders going as far back as possible. Instead, those greedy, sleazy, slobs had to grovel for every penny. Something died in me when I first read about it. It was bad enough that taxpayers leveraged their money, but Ownership demeaned itself in a way Dickens could never have dreamt of. I like to believe that George was too addled to have known about it, Frost had to have been behind it. Right? Rant over.
Thank you for posting the link to the previous Bobby Murcer article you wrote. It was well written and insightful. I wanted to add to the hopeful momentum of the crusade.
When my two sons were probably 10 and 12 yo we made what was an annual pilgramage from then WY and later SD) to KC to see a 3-game series with the NYY. Being a life long (60 yrs & counting, now) NYY fan, and growing up of course a Mickey Mantle fan (during his twilight years), Bobby was my generational hero. At the time he was announcing games(Rizzuto/WPIX?). The boys and I were on the west side of the park, pretty much unfettered by crowds, and had shown up early in an era where players entered by bus or limo unencumbered by security fences or under stadium garages (also to capacity crowds). We were waiting for BP/Infield to start and the gates to open when Bobby came bounding up the steps. I immediately recognized him (as I was always enamored that he was wearing penny loafers without socks...LOL). I explained to the boys who he was and urged them to courteously ask for his autograph as Mr. Murcer and mind their yes sirs and no sirs. He stopped, with that Murcer smile, and his first question was "do you boys even know who I am?" After their awe delayed answer he not only signed for them but spent several minutes talking to them as I stood in the background. After the answer, the Murcer smile continued to gain brilliance and my sons had a memory they remember to this day (my adult son called, I could tell fighting back tears, the day Bobby passed away). Such a humble, gentle spirit, devoted to baseball...having trekked through the unattainable goal of being Mantle's replacement (and from OKLA so I'm guessing that started early) and maintaining his values through an era of the NYY marching soullessly through the MLB desert, were the takeaways for me and are to this day. By the way, they also got the autograph of a very young, developing ss that day by the name of Derek Jeter. They remember both but I still believe that Bobby Murcer made baseball alive for them and they are still bb fans, NYY fans, and Bobby Murcer fans to this day, now both in their late 30's. I vote "YEA" on a monument for Bobby.
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