Forget an athlete, if you told me any human being was going to live to 200 Rickey would have been my number one choice because I would just assume he wouldn't know to die.
In the truest sense of the word, one-of-a-kind.
Exactly
He was my choice to never die
Somehow my brain stopped with him in his 40’s so how did he get to be 65…..I remember when he came up I was in college and Billy Martin was manager and the A’s were pretty good - they had 5 good starters and Henderson & Armas
when he got traded to the Yankees, they had I think Mattingly & Winfield but couldn’t win- they were like a team put together by 5th graders playing stratomatic during summer vacation.
Cable was new and it’s like I was Charlie in Wonka factory. TBS (Atlanta), PIX (yanks), and ROR? (Mets ) were on all the time - Cubs as well. Rickey became a star he was on all the time not once a week 5 minutes on TWIB
But what made it spectacular was the announcers
We are talking legends on all 4 broadcasts and the Yankees had Rizzuto & White. It was unbelievable and Rizutto was worth watching - and he was kinda crazy like Rickey and was always telling Henderson stuff.
It was so good the next day at work all the guys (we are all recently out of college) would talk about Rizzuto and White and Rickey
With Steinbrenner and that group it was entertaining times
Rickey was so good - and defensively he was outstanding