Ford C. Frick award winner Tim McCarver waves to fans and admirers as his truck inches down Main Street in Chooperstown during the Hall of Fame parade in 2012. McCarver’s truck stopped leaving Doubleday to pick up a hitch hiker.

February 21, 2023

By Bob Elliott

Canadian Baseball Network

“Do I really, really have to do it?”

“Yes.”

Pretend that the first question sounded like a Grade 2 student moaning about a homework assignment. It was asked by me in 2012 at the Otesaga Hotel in Cooperstown.

The serious answer coming from Bradford Horn of the National Hall of Fame sounded like a veteran Grade 2 teacher. Stern.

It was a Thursday afternoon. We had gone to an empty ball room at the Otesaga and I gave the speech I was to give Saturday afternoon to an audience of one. Horn, the right-hand man of Hall of Fame’s CEO Jeff Idelson, was impressed ... from the look on his face. He didn’t leave the room. And then he said:

“One other thing Tim McCarver and you have to do a press conference Saturday morning?” Horn said.

“Do I really, really have to do it?”

I pleaded that my stories wandered all over the place. Explained how I mumbled. How I often went off on too many tangents. My dear friend Mark Whicker often interrupts me to say “ah, hold on a second -- you have too many windows open on your lap top.” Plus, I was not exactly photogenic. Horn assured me I’d be fine.

Yeah right.

McCarver, who passed last Thursday, won the Ford C. Frick award and I won the BBWAA Excellence award ... after three second place finishes. Hence the need for the press conference.

We went a school, were given our hand held mikes. McCarver was as smooth as the other side of the pillow. Like when he worked games for ABC, CBS & FOX, the New York Mets, New York Yankees, San Francisco Giants and St. Louis Cardinals.

The answer to my first three questions directed my way were 1. “Yep,” 2. “Maybe.” 3. “I’ll feel better around 5 p.m. (once the speech was over).”

The late great Martin Noble of MLB.com raised his hand. Earlier he had told me “I am happy you are being honoured but the best part is there are two good guys being honoured.” Martin was a big McCarver fan. As were all the Mets scribes. Ditto for the Phillies and the Cardinals writers ... and so on ...

Noble asked, “I have never seen anything like this ... well when Rick Hummel won ... the city of St. Louis was really excited, but you have a whole country excited. Why is that?”

After a pause I answered, “Ahhhh, you mean besides the fact we’re both so good looking?”

“Seriously we had the Olympics in Vancouver, we won more golds than any other country in the world and Canadians went nuts. We are as patriotic as you guys ... we’re just shy on bravado. I’m the first Canadian to be honoured by the writers ... Canadians would get excited about any Canadian being honoured ... no matter the sport or the award.”

McCarver jumped in and told about being traded to the Montreal Expos and the passion of the fans during the 1972 Summit Series vs. the Russians.

There was passion for the Canucks facing the Russians ... and then there was panic, but more on that later.

* * *

After the meeting with ESPN and the Hall of Fame organizers on Friday, I asked if I could go first. McCarver made his living talking. The only work I’d get from a broadcaster would be emptying the trash bin.

“No problem,” McCarver told me. “You’ll be fine.”

Just as Johnny Bench had told me Friday. Bench actually settled down the herd of butterflies roaming my stomach.And was the reason I was able to get throught the day. (Flashing ahead to the post-season, Phil Rogers from Chicago was driving and I said something dumb. He slapped me on the shoulder and said “welcome back.” Welcome back? “Yeah, we all thought aliens inhabitated your body that weekend in Cooperstown.”)

I’d met Tim McCarver a few times over the years before we climbed into the van and headed to the press conference. My speech was OK. No tears. Zero tangents. I did skip one page where I spoke about my son, McCarver’s was a total home run as my daughter and sister said. There were 4,500 fans there ... but the worry for me was the 45 Hall of Famers seated behind me.

Then, came the hard part getting into the Ford F150s truck for the parade. Organizers had to wait for McCarver, who was talking to broadcast partner Joe Buck. I was politely refusing to give a fan an autograph. He wanted me to sign on the Bob Elliott page inside the Baseball Encyclopedia he held.

“Sorry sir that’s not me, I can’t pretend to be a major leaguer,” I explained. That Bob Elliott won the National League MVP with the Boston Braves and a third baseman didn’t win it again until Mike Schmidt of the Philadelphia Phillies won in 1980. Hall of Famer Carlton Fisk teased me for not signing. The fan wasn’t the first to make the mistake. Introducing myself to Boston Red Sox manager Joe Morgan in his office at Fenway he cut me off and said “Hey ... didn’t you release me one year in Kansas City.”

There was a bench in the middle of the truck. I suggested to McCarver that he sit at the back because after his 21-year major-league career -- 12 seasons with the Cardinals, nine with the Phillies, two with Red Sox and one with the Expos -- plus 23 World Series plus 20 all-star games in the broadcast booth, earning three Emmy Awards.

“Timmy there are going to be Cardinal and Phillies fans on both sides of the street, you should sit at the back, you can see both sides,” I suggested. But the instructions were we each had to sit on the side above our names -- posted on the truck.

Away we went from Doubleday Field -- out onto Chestnut and then right onto Main Street. Am not sure how many people were lining the route, which was only 3/10s of a mile, but on Main Street it looked like they were six or seven deep.

“Timmy, Timmy over here,” I said a number of times.

McCarver would turn and wave. Then turn back to the south side of the street.

“Timmy you’re needed here,” I told him.

Eventually, I felt his paw on my shoulder “Bobby, Bobby, your fans are trying to get your attention.”

I looked and there was Guy White jumping up and down screaming a nickname from my days as a bat boy, along with his wife Carol. White had played first base for my father from juvenile to senior and was a fave.

We arrived at the doors of the Hall and dismounted. Tom Verducci was there, set to do TV interviews. He shook my hand.

Near the staircase stood Geoff Sheridan (Kitchener, Ont.) entrance to the hall when McCarver came near he yelled out "Congratulations Tim." This was not a Cardinals or a Phillies fan, but a Detroit Tigers fan.

“Tim looked, then made a point of coming over and thanked me and shaking my hand,” said Sheridan, son of World War II hero John (Sam) Sheridan). “It was just one of many awesome memories from that weekend.”

Once inside McCarver shook my hand and said, “Bobby I couldn’t believe how many times I had to point out your admirers to you.” Truthfully McCarver won the “turnarounds about 12-to-1.”

* * *

Verducci, North America’s best pure ball scribe, reported that while McCarver was working the 1984 National League Championship Series between the San Diego Padres over Chicago Cubs for ABC, he was interviewed for the vacant Expos managerial job. Montreal president John McHale and Expos GM Murray Cook met with McCarver to 90 minutes.

This was after Jim Fanning retired and before president John McHale about the Montreal manager’s job. The Expos fired Bill Virdon and Jim Fanning took over as interim for the final 30 games. Buck Rodgers was the eventual choice.

Many people claim broadcaster Brent Musberger was behind the plate for McCarver’s first pro game in 1959 for the class-D Keokuk Cardinals. Not true. Charles Morrison of Brighton, NY, told the Rochester Democrat & Chronicle in 1989 that he was behind the plate. Morrison, a WW II vet, said he remembers seeing the 17-year-old McCarver, bags in hand, earlier in the day checking into the clubhouse.

Morrison said McCarver had a habit of bobbing up and down, so the ump hooked a thumb in the back of his belt to hold him down.

Musberger did umpire in the Class D Midwest League, but said in 1958 he knew he would need another line of work after blowing a home run call as the second base umpire with Juan Marichal of Michigan City on the mound. He claimed he needed a police escort to get out of the park.

* * *

McCarver had a sense of humour. A former Toronto TV executive tells how McCarver was working a national game from Toronto with Jay Randolph, who was supposed to interview Oakland A’s owner Charlie Finley by phone during the fourth inning.

Randolph asks three questions and each answer from Charlie consists of one word: “yes,” “maybe,” and no.” Before the fourth question McCarver jumped in and asked: “Mr. Finley you realize that you are not paying for this phone call.”

He once tweaked the Los Angeles Dodgers on air talking about how in his opinion the Dodgers never lowered their mound after 1969 on a Monday Night telecast on ABC. NL president Chub Feeney called to complain to Al Michaels and McCarver. Now, Feeney had a reputation for being notoriously cheap and explained how umpires check the mound after each game. Michaels asked Feeney if the call was collect.

* * *

At the 2004 World Series St. Louis Cardinals right fielder Larry Walker (Maple Ridge, BC) went 4-for-5 with a double, a home run and two RBIs in his first World Series game Saturday, going. So before Game 2 we got to thinking about great Canadian World Series performances. We walked by the booth at Fenway and McCarver was filling out his lineup.

We asked him about reliever Ron Taylor (Toronto, Ont.), who pitched in two games of the 1964 World Series as St. Louis beat the New York Yankees in seven games. Taylor, then the Blue Jays’ team physician, was a fierce competitor. It was never more evident than in Game 4 in 1964. The Yankees led the series 2-1 and scored three times in the first inning.

Cards starter Ray Sadecki faced four hitters and retired one man -- Phil Linz erased when McCarver threw out him attempting to steal third. Roger Craig worked the next 4 2/3 innings, allowing two runs, and when Cardinals third baseman Ken (Kenton Lloyd) Boyer hit a grand slam off lefty Al Downing in the fifth, manager Johnny Keane gave the ball to Taylor.

“Walking in from the bullpen you see the immense crowd, the auxiliary scoreboard, the TV cameras, and I walked by Boyer at third and he said, ‘Keep the ball down, Ronnie,’” Taylor said. He did. Pitching to McCarver, Taylor piut four zeros on the board, allowing zero hits and walking one.

In front of 66,312 at old, old Yankee Stadium, Taylor made it as easy as pitching at Talbot Park in Leaside. Except he was facing Elston Howard, Tom Tresh, Joe Pepitone, Clete Boyer, Johnny Blanchard, Phil Linz, Bobby Richardson, Roger Maris and Mickey Mantle, who earned the walk. The 4-3 win evened the series 2-2.

“We had two guys go out who weren’t expected to pitch, go the rest of the game and beat them,” said McCarver. “I mean after all they were the Yankees.”

Before Game 7 at Sportsman’s Park in St. Louis, the pitchers played a game -- left-handed hitters, captained by Sadecki, vs. the right-handed hitters, captained by Taylor.

“Sadecki’s team complained we batted out of order and went to Bob Uecker, our official commissioner for an official ruling,” said Taylor, who erased the evidence. “I ate the lineup. We were a loose bunch before Game 7.”

They were loose before Game 1. At Busch Stadium at Dixieland band would play prior to games. When they went for a break Uecker found an unattended tuba. Uecker picked it up, put the tuba into proper marching and playing position. Then, he proceeded to shag balls in left field with the tuba. McCarver loved to tell that story “with the NEW YORK YANKEES watching one of our guys try to balls in a musical instrument.” And the punch line Uecker was sent a bill after the season. Tuba damaga. Too much.

When the Cardinals clinched the NL that year it was a giddy time. The clubhouse attendant kept playing a World War II song -- Pass the Biscuits, Miranda -- since the Cards had not been to the Series since 1946.

In 1977, prior to a summer day game when the Vet turf was baking at about 140 degrees, McCarver thought it was a good time to borrow head groundskeeper Fred McKenna’s winter coat and bundle up on the bench.

McCarver remembers Uecker dancing naked to the music, side-stepping a broken champagne bottle.

“So, naturally we all go to Stan Musial’s restaurant to continue the celebration,” McCarver said in the FOX booth. “We look around and someone says, ‘Where’s Ronnie?’ We couldn’t find him anywhere.”

Two clubhouse attendants were dispatched to the Cardinals’ clubhouse.

“Here was this soon-to-be-a-doctor, this brilliant mind, lying in his locker behind the clothes hanging from above, only his feet sticking out,” McCarver said. Asked whether the story was true, Taylor said: “I was relaxing for Phase II.”

* * *

Ed Wade served as both GM of the Phillies and the Houston Astros. He first met McCarver when Wade was “lowly” intern in 1977 with the Phillies under the legendary Larry (Baron) Shenk.

“Tim really went out of his way to make me comfortable in the clubhouse and on the field, and every time we ran into each other over the years, he always treated me like a good friend,” Wade said. “When our son, Ryan, was born in May of 1983, Tim sent a beautiful outfit for him. In 2021, Roxanne and I ran into he and his daughter in Cooperstown and Roxanne had the opportunity to thank him in person.

“I’m glad many of us had a chance to say hello to him at last year’s reunion. A gritty player. A great historian/broadcaster of the game. A friend to all. God Bless Tim McCarver.”

* * *

On Sept. 2, 1972, the Expos beat the Cincinnati Reds 7-2 at Riverfront Stadium as McCarver batted clean-up and singled in a run. Meanwhile at the Montreal Forum, Canada fell 7-3 to the Russia in an upset of all upsets. This was against a team with a Junior B goalie who grew up to become Vladislav Tretiak, Hall of Fame netminder.

Two days later McCarver was hitless as the Expos and Carl Morton edged the St. Louis Cardinals Hall of Famer Bob Gibson 1-0 in the opener of a doubleheader at Busch Stadium. McCarver was behind the plate in the second game hitting a triple, a single and driving in a two runs as the Expos lost 8-7. Meanwhile, order was restored at Maple Leaf Gardens as Canada won 4-1.

Two days after that the Expos had a day off. Meanwhile, Canada blew a two-goal lead as Russia rallied for a 4-4 tie.

Two days after that McCarver was hitless with two walks in the first game of a doubleheader, a 7-1 loss to the Pittsburgh Pirates. And he was held hitless in the nitecap, a 4-2 defeat in 12 innings. A 21-inning day of squatting for McCarver. Meanwhile, at the Pacific Coliseum in Vancouver Russia won 5-3 to complete the Canadian end of the tour leading 2-1-1.

Two weeks later McCarver was hitless with a walk as the Pirated edged the Expos 4-3 at Three Rivers Stadium. Meanwhile, Russia edged Canada 5-4 at the Luzhniki Palace of Sports in Moscow.

Two days later McCarver was behind the plate at contributing a double and a single in a 2-1 victory against the Pirates. Meanwhile in Moscow, Canada won Game 6, 3-2.

Two days later the Expos lost 6-0 to the Chicago Cubs. Meanwhile at Luzhniki, Canada won 4-3 to make it 3-3-1 going into the final day.

And two days after that on Sept. 30 McCarver was hitless in the opener a 3-0 loss to the Philadelphia Phillies. In the second game he caught, batted second, homered, singled and drove in a pair in an 8-4 win against the Phillies. And in Moscow, Canada scored the final three goals -- with Paul Henderson scoring with 34 seconds remaining. Canada had won the Series.

* * *

Timothy:

I hope you are upstairs riding on the back of a truck with Vin Scully, Ernie Harwell and Tom Cheek getting ready to watch some spring ball.

Elliott: Riding down Main Street with Tim McCarver -- Updated