<Archive Obituary> Vada Pinson (October 21st 1995)
Bill Schenley
Photo:
http://members.tripod.com/janesbit/images/players/pinson.jpg
FROM: The (Fort Lauderdale, Florida) Sun-Sentinel (October 23, 1995)
~
By Gordon Edes, Staff Writer
Former Cincinnati Reds outfielder Vada Pinson, who later became an
original member of the Marlins' coaching staff and one of the team's
most active participants in community relations, died Saturday night
in an Oakland, Calif., hospital. He was 57.
Pinson, who was the team's first-base coach in 1993 and 1994, had been
in a coma for more than a week after suffering a stroke. A family
member said Saturday that Pinson had recently regained consciousness
and was out of intensive care.
The hospital spokesperson said funeral arrangements were pending.
Pinson is survived by four children: Valerie, Rene, Kimberly and Vada
III.
"There wasn't a classier person as a player or a coach," Marlins
manager Rene Lachemann said. "I don't think there's anyone who
publicly can say a bad word about the way they were treated by Vada
Pinson. He was still young. He loved life."
Pinson, who played for five teams from 1958 to 1975, was one of just
three players to accumulate at least 2,500 hits, 250 home runs and 250
steals over the course of his 18-year career. The other two, Willie
Mays and Joe Morgan, are in the Hall of Fame.
Richie Ashburn, who was inducted into the Hall of Fame this summer and
like Pinson played center field, said he believed Pinson belonged in
Cooperstown, too.
Born in Memphis, Tenn., on Aug. 11, 1938, Pinson moved with his family
to Oakland, Calif., and attended the same high school, McClymonds,
that produced big-league contemporaries Frank Robinson and Curt Flood
and basketball Hall of Famer Bill Russell.
Pinson signed his first professional contract with Cincinnati at age
17 and broke into the major leagues in 1958 with the Reds. He played
11 seasons in Cincinnati, and later played for the Indians, Cardinals,
Angels and Royals before retiring in 1975.
In 1959, his rookie season, Pinson hit .316 with 20 home runs, 84 RBI,
a career-high 47 doubles and 131 runs scored. He also tied a
big-league record by collecting at least 200 hits (205) in his first
season.
In 1961, playing alongside Hall of Famer Frank Robinson, Pinson hit
.343 to help the Reds to the World Series against the New York
Yankees.
Defensively, Pinson was a Gold Glove performer. On the basepaths,
former teammate Robinson said he was one of the most dangerous players
in the game.
Pinson also coached for five clubs, four on the big-league level: the
Marlins, Tigers, Mariners, White Sox and Mets (minor-league hitting
coordinator). Lachemann hired him twice, first with the Seattle
Mariners in 1982.
The Marlins fired Pinson after last season and replaced him with Rusty
Kuntz. Pinson did not have a job in baseball last season but had plans
to seek another opening, perhaps in the new United Baseball League.
"That was one of the hardest things I've ever had to do in baseball,"
Lachemann said of letting Pinson go.
Bonnie Lundquist, the team's former director of community relations,
said that Pinson made more public appearances than any other uniformed
Marlin. He was particularly sensitive to the needs of the black
community, and was a great admirer of Jackie Robinson, who broke
baseball's color line.
"As for Jackie Robinson, thank you very much," Pinson told Ed
Giuliotti of the Sun-Sentinel in an interview two years ago. "He
opened the door for me, and a lot of young players as well. It bothers
me that a lot of young players don't know history, black and white."
---
Photo:
http://www.sportsecyclopedia.com/nl/cincyreds/PinsonCin.jpg
---
Pal Vada's Fight Over; Flood's Will Continue
FROM: The (Fort Lauderdale, Florida) Sun-Sentinel (October 25, 1995)
~
By Gordon Edes, Staff Writer
So far, he has tolerated the chemotherapy; the second cycle began
Monday. But now Curt Flood is to undergo radiation for throat cancer
Thursday morning, and the doctors say he cannot skip the treatment.
So Curt Flood hopes his friend of 50 years, Vada Pinson, will
understand if he is unable to make it to Oakland for Pinson's funeral
that day.
"Vada would say, 'You did what? Get out of here,'" Flood said Tuesday
from his home in Los Angeles, where he looks up from the phone and
every day sees the same picture on the wall: Vada Pinson, Curt Flood
and Lou Brock on a framed cover of the Sporting News.
"I've seen that handsome face for many years," Flood said. "Vada was
neat as a pin. He shined his shoes between innings, almost."
The picture was taken in 1969, when the three were together in the
outfield of the St. Louis Cardinals. Flood and Pinson played Little
League together, went to the same high school a year apart and
excelled on the same fields in the narrow strip of West Oakland that
produced a Who's Who of great athletes: Frank Robinson, Willie
Stargell, Joe Morgan, basketball's Bill Russell.
But 1969 would be the only season Curt Flood and Vada Pinson played
together on the same big-league team. That fateful year
A year later, Flood was out of baseball and went to court to challenge
the reserve clause, which bound a player to a team until that team
traded or released him. Flood went all the way to the Supreme Court
and lost his case, but he set in motion the revolution that brought
free agency and transformed the landscape of American sports.
In 1969, the average salary for a big-league baseball player was $
24,909. Now it's more than $ 1 million.
When Flood went to court, he forever cut his ties with Major League
Baseball. But his friendship with Pinson endured, and as commissioner
of the fledgling United Baseball League, Flood had spoken often to
Pinson in recent months, with plans for Pinson, who was fired as the
Marlins' first-base coach last fall, to play a big role with the new
league's franchise in New Orleans.
That's what they had talked about, the last time they spoke, a couple
of weeks before Pinson died.
"I still have a message from Vada on my answering machine," Flood
said. "Vada Pinson was lying on the floor of his home in Oakland for
three days before somebody found him. Perhaps in those first few
minutes or hours, if only someone had known he was there, they might
have saved his life.
"We don't leave messages. We don't answer messages. Damn." Two of the
best
Pinson and Flood were two of the most splendid outfielders of their
generation. Pinson was 57 when he died Saturday night. Now Flood, 58,
is facing a struggle at least as daunting, and just as lonely, as the
one he waged a generation ago. That one was for a cause. This one is
for his life.
"I am pleased that God made my skin black," Flood once said, "but I
wish he had made it thicker."
No one has ever suggested the Lord came up short when he gave Flood
his heart.
"The doctors say they caught it in time," Flood said of the cancer.
"The prognosis is good. They say it's 90 to 95 percent curable. I
haven't been sick. I haven't lost my hair ... or my testiness.
"Yes, it's scary. It's something God puts on your shoulders: 'Here,
handle this.''' Last winter, when Flood was inducted into the Bay Area
Hall of Fame, his presenter was Vada Pinson, who drove all the way
from South Florida. The scheduled inductee this winter: Pinson. Of
course, you know who Pinson asked to present him.
"I'm going to ask them to honor his last wish," Flood said Tuesday.
"My lasting image of Vada: I always remember Vada Pinson's smile. It
was always present. If not on his face, it was in his voice."
---
1964 Topps (#80) baseball card:
http://www.vintagecardtraders.org/virtual/64topps/64topps-080.jpg
Curt Flood's 1971 Topps (#) baseball card:
http://www.vintagecardtraders.com/virtual/pseudo/71t_curt_flood.jpg