RIP Yogi Berra

by wj

"It ain't over 'til it's over." And now, alas, it is. :-(

Comments

[russell]

The one and only.

Maybe the last man who remembered that baseball is supposed to be fun.

RIP

[Countme-In]

That hit me kinda hard this morning.

I don't like my Yankees or my Beatles in the past tense.

Only Whitey is left.

Yogi, on life (and if you play baseball, this says it all):

“In baseball, you don’t know nothing.”

On leaving hotel rooms as you found them:

“The towels were so thick there I could hardly close my suitcase.”

Regarding Einstein's Unified Theory of Hinduism:

“It’s deja vu all over again.”

Advice to Internet bloggers:

“Never answer an anonymous letter.”

Channeling Robert Frost:

“When you come to a fork in the road, take it.”

Musing on Death. If only:

“Nobody goes there anymore. It’s too crowded."

His kid:

"You can't compare me to my father. Our similarities are different." - Dale Berra.

Stengel's Seneca to Yogi's Wodehouse:

"They say he's funny. Well, he has a lovely wife and family, a beautiful home, money in the bank, and he plays golf with millionaires. What's funny about that?" - Casey Stengel

[cleek]

Yogi-ism heard on NPR this AM:

Q: where do you want to be buried?
A: surprise me.

[byomtov]

I became a fan of Yogi when I was a kid, and he was in the prime of his baseball career. I never stopped.

In and out of baseball, he was terrific.

[Steve Gibson]

As a software tester and would be scientist, I've always liked, "You can observe a lot by watching."

[Countme-In]

Yogi, calling Whitey Ford on the telephone a few years back after hearing reports that the latter underwent some serious cancer surgery:

"Whitey, are you dead yet?"

[liberal japonicus]

Yogi's NYTimes obit pointed to this article about he and Ron Guidry.

http://www.nytimes.com/2011/02/24/sports/baseball/24yogi.html

It would be nice to be in a country where I could hang out with older folks, and know that when I don't understand them, it's not that my knowledge of the language sucks, it's something else.

[JakeB]

I can't help but remember the Yogiism, "If you don't go to other people's funerals, they won't come to yours."

[Countme-In]

lj, and Jake, that is some great loyal Yankee stuff.

I'd have put this on Russell's and GoTNC' Beatles thread, but that reminds me of how Paul McCartney had George Harrison flown in his last days to the former's down low, anonymous property in California, despite their bullsh*t, completely irrelevant differences, to die unpapparazied and privately, with dignity surrounded by his loved ones.

Just as Paul arranged wife Linda's last moments at their Arizona ranch.

That all of us will have that tight, loyal Beatle and Yankee love available to us in our last moments.

[Countme-In]

Yogi was an anchor baby:

'Yogi was born in 1925 and 1930 U.S. Census records show that Yogi’s father, Pietro, who arrived in the U.S. from northern Italy in 1909, still declared as an alien five years after Yogi was born. So did his mother, Pauline. It didn’t matter to Yogi, of course. The 14th Amendment to the U.S. Constitution guaranteed him citizenship.

Berra died Tuesday, and here’s the Sports Illustrated headline on its obituary: “Remembering the great American life of Yankees Legend Yogi Berra.” Yogi’s certainly was a great American life. Emphasis on “American.” And it was a life made possible by the 14th Amendment.'

from Daily Kos

[wj]

Want to bet that his parents (living on Dago Hill in St Louis) were less than totally proficient in English, and spoke Italian to each other, and to their neighbors. Obviously refusing to assimilate properly. Just like Hispanics today.