PORT ST. LUCIE – Too often in the world of sports the word hero is thrown about loosely. Understand this about the Mets’ new bench coach, Don Baylor. He is a hero in many ways. More than anything, he would be embarrassed to be paid such homage.
Baylor was the perfect teammate, the guy you could always count on. He’ll never blow his own horn, he’ll never be the center of attention, but he’ll always be there when you need him.
As Baylor begins his fight against bone marrow cancer, there will be many people praying for him because he has touched so many lives as a ballplayer and a man.
You may not know this, but it was Baylor who integrated the schools in Austin, Tex., as a seventh-grader. He also was the first African-American baseball player at Austin High. One man who stood by him in those difficult days was Frank Seale, who became his baseball coach his junior year.
Even though it was clear Baylor had the talent and the work ethic to be a star, he didn’t play as a sophomore under the previous coach. “I just couldn’t believe he wasn’t playing,” Seale told me yesterday from his home in Texas. “No one worked harder than Don in that 100-degree heat of Texas,” Seale said.
The first thing Seale did was make Baylor his captain. The two men – one black, one white – have remained close friends ever since.
Many years later, when Baylor was manager of the Rockies and the club celebrated the 50th anniversary of Jackie Robinson integrating the majors, Baylor proudly escorted Rachel Robinson onto the field for the ceremony. His special guest that day was Frank Seale.
“Racial things never were a part of the team because of Frank,” Baylor told Tracy Ringolsby, one of the most respected baseball writers in the country.
“Don Baylor has always been a winner because of his character,” Seale, 65, said. “I talked to him Wednesday night and he told me he didn’t want this to become a distraction for the team. That’s Don, the team always comes first. He said the Wilpons have been so great to him as if he’d been in the Mets organization his entire life.”
Baylor, who was hit by a major league record 267 pitches during his 19-year career, said of his fight against the multiple myeloma: “I know what I have to do . . . Normally in this game, standing and facing a Nolan Ryan is your toughest challenge.”
As a player, Baylor, who was MVP in 1979 with the Angels, made it a habit to visit hospitals and sick children. The cruelty of cystic fibrosis became a cause for Baylor. One day while talking to a child who was stricken with the disease, the child mentioned the foreboding words “cystic fibrosis.” It sounded a bit like “65 roses.” Baylor soon established “The 65 Roses Club,” a charitable organization which assists the Cystic Fibrosis Foundation.
“Don has helped raise millions and millions of dollars for that organization,” Seale said. “The good Lord is not going to forget that . . . If anybody can beat this cancer, Don can beat it. He has the character and the will to beat this.”
That’s the feeling throughout the Mets clubhouse. “You know Don Baylor’s attitude,” Mo Vaughn said. “He’s been fighting all his life, so he’ll fight this.”
With all his strength.
ANOTHER TOUGH FIGHT
Mets coach Don Baylor is suffering from a form of bone marrow cancer known as multiple myeloma. Occasionally, myeloma can be first found as a single tumor in a single bone, but most of the time it will go on to spread to the marrow of other bones.
Multiple myeloma is formed by malignant plasma cells. Although plasma cells are an important part of the immune system, when they grow out of control, they can produce a tumor. The tumors can grow in several sites, particularly in the soft middle parts of bone called the bone marrow. When these tumors grow in multiple sites, they are referred to as multiple myeloma.
Source: American Cancer Society
