Pride of Baltimore…
and the rest of Maryland too! Congratulations to the wonderful Cal Ripken Jr. for being elected into the Baseball Hall of Fame. His dedication to the sport and the fans should be a lesson to pro athletes everywhere. Way to go Cal! (And of course a big congratulations to Tony Gwynn as well!)
(photo courtesy of www.allposters.com)
January 15th, 2007 at 4:59 pm
I attended Johns Hopkins in the mid-80s when Cal was the young phenom. I still have a ball he sliced foul into the cheap seats at Memorial Stadium. ($3 student admission. BYO White Castle sliders). By ‘86 Cal’s consecutive game streak was remarkable enough that people were already wondering whether Gehrig’s record was reachable. My roommate, a true baseball fanatic, would more-or-less snort whenever the topic would come up; not in the modern game, and it certainly not by a shortstop.
Both Cal and Tony Gwyn are two of those rare sports figures who truly could be role models. Good guys who played hard, played fair, and played for their teams first, themselves second. A good year this year.