Sandy Koufax left at the top of his game. Elegantly easing into private retirement, he refused the dazzle of perpetual celebrity. He may not have been as reclusive as Howard Hughes, but perhaps just as famous.
My father-in-law, the local UPS man for a small secluded California central coastal town, drove the boxy brown truck up a steep hill one day in 1976. “Package for Mr. Koufax,” he announced.
“Yeah, that’s me.” And the Hall-of-Famer put aside the lawnmower and signed for the package. “Would you like some water?” he asked. “You look hot.”
No, they didn’t become fast friends, just friendly; a typical patron-UPS friendliness bearing good-natured remarks, jokes, and a lot of “how’s it going today?”
As a kid in Southern California I listened to every one of his four no-hitters. He beat the Yankees twice in the 1963 World Series-the freaking New York Yankees! Sixty feet, six inches separated him from Mickey Mantle.
So it was that one day I hit the jackpot. On my birthday I was presented with a white, red-threaded beauty. Written in black ink with a distinct left-handed slant were the words: To Mark: Happy Birthday, July 8, 1976. Another gem from Mr. Koufax., courtesy of my father-in-law.
The baseball came to me as part of a friendly gesture, not as a fee. That is what makes it special. This was before the onset of impersonal lines snaking around some rented hall where an array of bored greats scribble their names for a price, never bothering to look up at a kid; before it was an industry. I’m just old enough to remember when baseball was less corporate, before ESPN loaded us down with what passes for news, but is at times indistinguishable from gossip.
When I look at my autographed baseball I don’t see the game’s sometimes discouraging moments. The autographed ball sits atop my desk, safely tucked into a glass case. I don’t touch it; I don’t have to. I look at it and see Sandy high on the mound, reaching back, arching, the gripped ball at the end of the full wind-up almost grazing the back of the mound; then he strides and uncoils….
Is this too romantic? But that’s how baseball is most real; that’s how it is first apprehended when young. That’s why kids bring gloves to the game. And that is what my Sandy Koufax autographed baseball brings to mind.