Every July, baseball’s legends gather in Cooperstown, N.Y., for Hall of Fame induction weekend. One of the annual events is a tournament at the Leatherstocking Golf Club, part of which separates the Otesaga Resort Hotel from Otsego Lake.
It was during one of these tournaments that Paul Molitor, a few years after he had been inducted in 2004, was in the same grouping as the great Yogi Berra. On one hole, Molitor’s long birdie attempt fell about 10 feet short of the cup. Berra provided his instant analysis for Molitor.
“If you would have hit it harder, you would have missed it shorter,” Berra said.
Even in retirement, the Yogi-isms flowed.
Memories like these await Joe Mauer, the newest legend of the game. He’s the first player born in the 1980s to be inducted into the Hall of Fame, part of a class that includes Adrián Beltré, Todd Helton and Jim Leyland. Mauer will battle emotions as his plaque is unveiled and as he delivers his induction speech. He then will begin a new chapter of his life. The great Sandy Koufax is in his 52nd year of being a Hall of Famer. So, yes, it can be another long life.
Mauer will make new friends, hear new stories and leave with more memories every summer he travels to the quaint town that overflows with baseball fans once a year. Here are some examples.
This will be my fourth trip to Cooperstown. The first was in 2014 as president of the Baseball Writers Association of America, tasked with introducing Roger Angell, who was being honored for his baseball writing career. That allowed me to stay at the Otesaga with the rest of the Hall of Famers. I was on the same floor as Goose Gossage, Frank Thomas, Jerry Reinsdorf and others.
I ran into Thomas and his family at the elevator the morning of the ceremony. “Did you time your speech,” I asked. “Yup, 12 minutes exactly,” he said. I asked if he factored in time for tears, to which his wife and family laughed. “I’m not going to cry,” he said.
