The thread on Robin Roberts' death includes many testimonials from folks about the great talks they shared with Mr. Roberts. That got me to wondering which former major-leaguer board members had their best "baseball conversation" with.
It's an easy pick for me:
Johnny Neun.
Mr. Neun, who played in the majors from 1925 to 1931, was a special instructor for two spring trainings when I was in the Brewers organization. The club brought him to camp in Arizona to spend time with the minor-leaguers in 1985 and '86. He was 85 when I first met him. Each morning, before camp started and the coaches would go over the day's itinerary, we'd have a "One minute with Johnny" session during which he'd share a tip or story from his playing days. It used to piss me off to no end that very few players showed him much respect.
In '85 I spent a lunch break with him and pelted him with questions about when he played for the Tigers. He was a teammate of Ty Cobb for two seasons! In the middle of our chat, out of nowhere, I asked him whether he could tell me much about the Federal League (he was a teenager at the time the league was formed). He gave me a look of surprise, probably trying to figure out why a 22-year-old minor-leaguer was asking him such a question.
That stayed with him, because the next year in camp when we saw each other for the first time, he greeted me with a "Hey, Mr. Historian!"
His favorite story was about how he was the first player to pull off an unassisted triple play to end a game. He did it for the Tigers in 1927.
That year was his last in camp, and four years later he died. I still remember how surreal it felt to be able to talk to someone who could give first-hand accounts of playing baseball in the 1920s. He was a great guy, and his passion for the game -- and how to play it the right way -- was an inspiration.