Notes on a Requiem Mass

 I’ve disliked Jerry Reinsdorf from the day he engineered the destruction of a classic ballpark so that a publicly-funded outdoor mall could take its place.  Add to that his running out of town the best basketball player of all time along with a coach who could weave silk out of old gym shorts.  I also have this thing about billionaires, a kind of human cockroach with money.  Yes, the eminently rich Reinsdorf was recently elevated to billionaire status.

But the man is also human, as was shown by last week’s death of Minnie Minoso.  Reinsdorf says he fell in love with the ex-Sox great the first time he met him.  Even a rich man could see what this poor man had accomplished both on and off the field, though I wonder how the relationship would have progressed had Reinsdorf followed through on his threat in the late 1980s to move the Sox to Tampa.  Anyway to recognize the goodness of this human being, who had no wealth beyond the adulation of countless Sox fans, may be what gets Jerry Reinsdorf into heaven in the end.

It was fitting that a ballplayer from the 1950s should have his funeral mass at Holy Family Church, which dates to 1857; neither that kind of player nor place is common these days.  And it was a good thing there were pews enough to fit everyone.  Of course, the mighty got to sit up front while the ordinary squeezed in where they could.  I’ll give a break to Frank Thomas because he is extraordinarily big.  For a man who once admitted he didn’t know all that much about Jackie Robinson, Thomas showed he’s learned enough to appreciate the life and contributions of the first black Latin player to reach the majors.

And, soon-to-be 88-year old Billy Pierce can sit wherever he wants.  The lefty great—go and compare his career stats to Whitey Ford—walked unaided to the pulpit to offer his praise for an old teammate.  Perhaps someday the Hall of Fame will find a way to include Minoso and Pierce while one of them is still alive.

At the end of mass before everyone processed out, a young man walked to the altar and played a tape Minnie Minoso had the foresight to make.  “Since I came over here in 1951, you gave me your love and your respect,” offered the voice of a man who could not be dead.  Ever polite, Saturnino Orestes Arrieta Armas Minoso thanked his listeners, then added, “I love you and God bless you.”
He did, for somewhere between 89 and 92 years.