[VAChief]

Originally Posted by gblowfish

http://tinyurl.com/6d7393w

I watched this special on HBO last night, bio about Curt Flood, his time coming up to the St. Louis Cards, his error in the 1968 World Series, his subsequent trials with the reserve clause, very interesting stuff. He was a very complex guy with a lot of twists and turns.

When I was little, my first team wasn't the Royals, it was the Cards. I started following baseball for real in 1967. The first year I really paid attention, my team (The Cards) won the World Series vs Boston, and the next year they lost vs. Detroit. I just took for granted that my team would be in the world series all the time! Then in 1969 we got the Royals in KC, and I became a die hard Royals fan.

I can still remember lots of guys who were on the 1967-68 era Cardinals. I had all their baseball cards:

OF: Tolan, Brock, Flood
INF: Shannon, Maxville, Javier and Cepeda
C: McCarver
Best Pitcher: Gibson.

That was a Hell of a team.

They had video highlights of Curt Flood in the 1964 World Series when he was a rookie. He reminded me a lot of Willie McGee (not as ugly). Very graceful in the outfield, reliable, had one season (I think it was 1966?) where he made ZERO errors in the outfield. That's why the misplay in the 1968 series was so shocking.

He was a heavy drinker and boozer. His career was shot once he left St. Louis.

Do you St. Louis Cards fans have a take on Flood? Do you love him, hate him, don't care about him any more? He's a truly historic baseball figure.

I never got to see him play in person, but it was that 67 and 68 team that I began to really follow baseball. My family for generations had been Cards fans and it was just a given that they became my favorite team as well.

Flood was a great outfielder in the old school way, didn't just rely on athleticism but was very sound fundamentally. At the time it appeared to me he just didn't want to leave the Cards. It was just a given that the owner's had the right to do anything they wanted with players. In hindsight it is obvious they were all short sighted pricks. Had they seen the future we might not have the heavily weighted player system we have now.

He certainly had his demons, but you can't help but feel for him. Hearing his mother's story was pretty revealing and helped me to understand some of his feelings later on in his life.