"When I gave up that hit, I had no idea it was his 3,000th. None. I’m thinking, "What’s going on around here? This is a stinking double." The crowd is standing and cheering. The umpire’s handing Clemente the ball at second base and I’m standing there with my arms crossed glowering at him like, "Give me the baseball. We’re trying to play a game here." Anyway, somebody took a picture from the dugout of me with the umpire handing the ball to Clemente in the background. A couple of days later, that photo was sent to me in the clubhouse. It came from one of the clubhouse kids, but I’m assuming Clemente sent it. When you’re going through the competition, trying to win a ballgame is all that matters in the world. Clemente’s death just brings the importance of other things to the forefront very quickly. He was a great player, and what from I knew of him he was a dynamite individual. Baseball and the world lost that day."
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Baptists from the United StatesPresidential Medal of Freedom recipientsUnited States MarinesPeople from San Juan
Original Language: English
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Sources
Jon Matlack, as quoted in That Was Part of Baseball Then, pp. 133-134
https://en.wikiquote.org/wiki/Roberto_Clemente
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Roberto Clemente
baseball player
1934 – 1972 · United States
Roberto Enrique Clemente Walker (August 18, 1934 – December 31, 1972) was a Puerto Rican Major League baseball player from 1955 through 1972, exclusively with the Pittsburgh Pirates. A posthumous inductee to the National Baseball Hall of Fame (following his fatal plane crash on December 31, 1972, en route to deliver aid to earthquake victims in Nicaragua), Clemente became both the first Latin American and the first C
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