Robin Roberts

Hall of Fame workhorse pitcher Robin Roberts of the Philadelphia Phillies died today (Thursday, May 6, 2010) at his home in Temple Terrace, 10 miles northeast of Tampa. He was 83.

Mr. Roberts started three games on the final five days of the 1950 season and was the winning pitcher in a victory over the Brooklyn Dodgers that gave the Phillies their first pennant in 35 years. That year, he became the Phillies’ first 20-game winner since Grover Cleveland Alexander in 1917.

I report on Robin Roberts because I had the rather unique pleasure of meeting and talking with him over a period of months in the mid-1970’s. I had personal experience in meeting a man whom many today have called “a very nice man”.

At the time I was Executive Director of the Philadelphia Civic Center. After the demise of the Philadelphia Blazers in 1973 in the World Hockey Association, the owner of Mrs. Paul’s Kitchens, Ed Piszek, formed a minor league hockey team in the North American Hockey League and they played their games at the Civic Center. Mr. Piszek was a friend of Robin Roberts’ and invited him to be the team’s General Manager. I am not sure but a comment left on the philly.com website today said Robin Roberts was part-owner of the Firebirds. I just do not recall that distinction.

However, he did seem to enjoy his role as the GM of the Firebirds. Once or twice a week, he would call me from the Firebirds second floor offices to see if I was available for a meeting. While I believe I was “available” for all callers, I always was “available” for Robin Roberts.

He usually would ask for some kind of cooperation from “the building” for something the Firebirds wanted to do. I served as his enabler, so to speak, and was honored to do so. His requests always were reasonable.

Our meetings were maybe 30% business and 70% baseball. Once he found out I was an ardent baseball fan, he knew he had a major audience of one with someone seven years younger than he.

I told him that as a young resident of St. Louis, I had been weaned on Stan Musial of the Cardinals. Robin Roberts spoke with great admiration for Stan the Man, whom he faced numerous times.

Mr. Roberts was amusing and blessed with philosophy. He said even then (I think he was 46 or 47 at the time), old-timers with the Phillies all still greeted him the same way: “How’s the arm, Robbie??”

He said he always would reply: “The arm’s fine, thank you.”

He said he enjoyed his position with the Firebirds and enjoyed working with the young hockey players. But I never will forget what he added: “You know, John, I made a big mistake when I retired.”

If you know of his way of talking, and visualize his sitting there in the chair in almost a confidential tone, he told me: “I made a big mistake….because I should have been smart enough to get a bunch of business cards printed. Just my name and phone number, and under that, just one word: CONSULTANT.

“The guys who make all the money these days are consultants. And, y’see, you don’t say what kind of consultant you are. You’re just a consultant. And when they call you up and ask you whether you can consult on something, of course you can do that!”

He laughed.