Our announcer, Harry Kalas, keeled over dead at age 73 in the announcers’ booth while preparing to announce todays Phillies’ game against the Nationals.
A man should die while engaged in his calling. That is good.
Not in a hospital room. Not, while twiddling his thumbs in “retirement.”
It made national news.
Kalas was a member of the fraternity of a half-dozen or so great announcers, headed by Vin Scully of Los Angeles.
These men are as well-known as the same-sized set of great ball-players themselves.
This fact is itself a tribute to something great about the American spirit.
The game is more than this or that great player. It is a pastime in the truest sense of the word; a community, a gathering, a ritual. Sports are about winning, but sportsmanship is about much more. We still have at least a dim memory of it from a by-gone era.
