In the interests of fairness...

I have to say this about Keith Obherman.

In the mid-90's, I believe one of the last regular season games the Twins played in 95, to be exact, we were playing Cleveland. A future Hall of Famer by the name of Dennis Martinez was pitching against Minnesota. Completely meaningless game, both teams not involved in the post season. But Dennis was a pro, and so was the kid he was pitching against, number 3 in our line-up, playing center field, #34, Kirby Puckett.

Martinez was a skinny Latino who routinely hummed the fastball inside in the mid to upper 90s. One got away and hit Kirby, (a home plate crowder) in the face, shattering his left cheekbone. After being released from the hospital, Kirby, laughing, blew off any hard feelings or controversy, as was Puckett's style.

Obherman commented on it that night on SportsCenter. Made a point of bringing a meaningless game out of a sea of meaningless games and identifying a true baseball hero for doing something every day heroic: not making a big thing out of a legitimate big thing.

In the spring of 96, Kirby woke up at the Lee County Sports Complex where the Twins do their Spring Training blind in his left eye. The story Kirby told till the end, with one exception, was that his retina detached because of glaucoma. While covering his retirement speech Obherman gave a brilliant five minute summary of Kirby's career and why the man should be a first ballot Hall of Famer.

A few years later, as Dennis Martinez is receiving retirement awards, Kirby and Dennis meet at a charity event, where Dennis is throwing a game of catch with some Make a Wish Foundation kids. Kirby makes some jokes, one of which is, "Dennis, if you had this much control when we played I'd STILL be playing right now!" This comment caused Dennis to stop because he was laughing so hard, and the picture of them hugging is priceless. Obherman was on it that night... The smoking gun. It WAS Martinez's pitch that ended Puckett's career, not glaucoma. And again, a five minute speech praising Puckett for the hero he was, and absolving Martinez for doing his job. He cited Puckett for being what was BEST about not just baseball, but SPORTS, in that competitive people didn't need to be complete asses off the field, or on them, for that matter.

Dan Patrick interviewed Bob Costas and Keith Obherman after Kirby passed away on his radio show. Costas (who's son has like four middle names, one of them Kirby) spoke at length about the qualities of Kirby. Keith spoke for about a minute, in the end simply saying "He was my favorite player."

I don't have a lot of personal heroes, but Kirby Puckett was one of them. And as far as Keith Obherman fell after his SportsCenter days into the quagmire of liberal opinion broadcasting, his time on top of the mountain I will always remember because from its peak he correctly cited the heroic virtues of my favorite baseball player.

It's late and I'm tired, so if I misspelled Obherman throughout this post... Sue me.