Most of my sports memories are of Kirby Puckett.
I remember "The Game." Trailing the Atlanta Braves three games to two in the 1991 World Series, the Twins returned to Minnesota teetering on the brink of elimination. But Kirby wouldn't let us fall.
When the game went into extra innings, Kirby was two-for-three with two of the team's three runs batted in and an amazing home-run-saving catch of Ron Gant in the third.
He wasn't done. In his first at bat, in the 11th, he stroked a change-up to left-center for a walk-off home run and capped one of the greatest individual performances in baseball.
I remember watching the game; it was late, but my parents let me stay up. I still get chills when I think of Jack Buck's famous call, "Aaaaand we'll see you tomorrow night!"
At that point, Kirby was a god. When it came out later that he told his teammates, "Jump on my back. I'm driving the bus tonight" before that game, nobody was even remotely surprised.
One day, Kirby woke up thinking he had slept funny on one eye. He hadn't. It was glaucoma, a disease that would rob him of his eyesight and his career. He just couldn't see the pitches anymore, and at the end of the season he announced his retirement.
But the disease only added to his aura. Like a Greek hero, he was a tragic figure, cut down before his time by forces beyond his control. It was 1996, and for the next five years Kirby was the elder statesman of Minnesota sports. We named streets after him; the Twins named him a Vice President in the organization; there were Kirby Puckett fan days, Kirby Puckett fan weeks, Kirby Puckett fan years.
It wasn't just that he was so good; it was that he was so nice. I remember when he bought a lake cabin on the same lake as ours. Every weekend we used to boat by his dock just so that we could wave at him while he fished. He always waved back.
When my Grandma ran into him once at the supermarket (and I literally mean ran into him; everyone else gave him his privacy, but Grandma figured out what aisle he was in, then walked down it, slamming her cart into his to "break the ice") he was polite and charming, talking baseball, weather and various lake cabin inanities, sending her away the happiest woman in the world.
In 2001, when he was elected into the Hall of Fame on the first ballot, we began to see the first of the blemishes on Kirby's image. Rumors surfaced about his long-term mistress and short-term girlfriends. Then came a bombshell.
A woman accused him of grabbing her in a bar in Eden Prairie, pulling her into a bathroom and assaulting her. He was charged with illegal imprisonment and sexual assault.
Frank DeFord wrote an article for Sports Illustrated called "The Rise and Fall of Kirby Puckett," which I still have tucked away in a desk drawer back home. Though he was eventually cleared of all charges, he wasn't our golden boy; he didn't have "Minnesota values" anymore.
I didn't care. I remember when he came to the wake of one of my football coaches my junior year of high school. He looked pathetic.
He had always been chubby, listed in his playing days as 5'8," 210 pounds. He was once described as "a cantaloupe with legs." Now he looked like a brown beach ball in a matching cream suit-and-eye-patch combo. He must have weighed 270.
But when I went to shake his hand, my own was shaking so hard that I had to hold it to steady it. He told me, "I'm truly sorry for your loss," and I instantly forgave him for everything he had ever done.
The final memory: on March 5 of this year, my Mom called me. She had tears in her voice. All she said was, "Kirby's dead," and even though I had heard nothing in the news, I knew immediately what had happened. She told me he had a massive stroke and that all of Minnesota was going crazy. He died in Arizona, in exile from the state that he loved and had loved him back.
I have two Kirby Puckett cards tucked away in my room. They're from 1991 and 1995, respectively and are probably worth little more than the paper that they're printed on. But I'll never throw them away. I need them to remember the best, and nicest, athlete I ever knew.
