Ken Griffey Jr. Hungs Up His Spikes After 22 Years

It probably should have happened after last season.  It was becoming clear that Ken Griffey Jr. had lost bat speed.  It was time for him to step aside.

I covered him for 10 years and got to  know him about as well as someone outside of his family and teammates could.   We used to insult each other's instituitions of learning, his being Moeller High and mine being Colerain.

I would walk through the clubhouse with my Colerain shirt on and hear him yell accross the room, "Colerain sucks."  At one time I jokingly asked him to step outside.  You should have seen the look of shock on some of the player's faces.  They could not believe that someone dared to speak to him in that manner.

His teammates put him on a pedestal because of his immense talent.  I can't count how many current players, including Mike Leake, that named him as their favorite player as a kid. 

Griffey would do anything for his teammates.  Most nice things that he did were unpublicized.  He wanted it that way.

You can look up his stats if you want but I will not recite them here.  I will remember a fun loving man, who at times was misunderstood by his teammates.  He wanted to be just one of the guys but his immense talent would not allow that.  He has a sarcastic sense of humor that a lot of his peers did not understand.

The first time 5'6" Dan Herrera walked into the Reds clubhouse in June right after the third leg of horse racing's Triple Crown was run, Griffey asked, "Didn't I just see you riding in the Preakness."

Like Marty Brennaman, you were better off coming back at him than to get upset or simply take it.  He loved it when someone would come back with a quip.

One day in Spring Training he walked into the Hal McCoy Press Room complaining about what we wrote about him.  He was half serious but half joking, "Maybe I should sneak around me in a trenchcoat and trench vest,"  I looked up from my computer and said, "That would make you a trench vestite."  McCoy burst out laughing and Griffey was at a loss for words.  He later laughed about how I turned the tables on him.

As much as he claimed to be at war with the media, you could count on him for a quote but you had to finesse it.  You would let him talk about non baseball topics, like his electronic gadgets, his boat, "The Chosen One" or his kids.  Once he addressed what he wanted to talk about he would answer baseball questions.

He claimed disinterest but always knew what was going on about others interests.  He watched Colerain play Elder last year on TV and emailed me about it.  Hal McCoy said that Griffey was the very first to congratulate him on his election to the Hall of Fame.  He also recently called Hal about the loss of his dog.

I sincerely wish him the best.