Some of his gems -

"Baseball is the president tossing out the first ball of the season. And a scrubby schoolboy playing catch with his dad on a Mississippi farm. …

"There's a man in Mobile who remembers that Honus Wagner hit a triple in Pittsburgh 46 years ago — that's baseball. And so is the scout reporting that a 16-year-old sandlot pitcher in Cheyenne is the coming Walter Johnson.

"In baseball, democracy shines its clearest. The only race that matters is the race to the bag. The creed is the rule book. And color, merely something to distinguish one team's uniform from another's.

"Baseball? Just a game — as simple as a ball and bat. And yet, as complex as the American spirit it symbolizes."