R.I.P. Pascual Perez

In the midst of racism in the news, conspiracy theorist Tila Tequila, the American elections, and the continuing saga of corruption in Québec politics, one subject fell through the cracks: the death (murder) of Pascual Perez, one of my favourite Montréal Expos pitchers.

The former All-Star was found dead at his Dominican Republic home:

Some of the reported details of Perez's death are gruesome, but they also have yet to be confirmed. One report says robbers waited for Perez, a terminally-ill kidney patient with five children, to receive his $2,000 major league pension check before surprising him at his home.

I couldn't describe him better than this if I tried to:

A brother to Melido Perez and Carlos Perez, both of whom also had substantial major league careers, Pascual Perez could follow a 95 mph fastball with a sleepy eephus pitch — just for fun. Listed at 6-foot-2 and 162 pounds, Perez was all arms and legs on the mound with a Jheri- curl mullet hairdo on top.

His rainbow pitch was a marvel to witness. It flew 15 feet in the air and looked like an easy, Little League pitch that was certain to get knocked outside the park - except it never was.

He, like many Expos, had a pretty bad cocaine problem, twice going into rehab in his three-season stint in Montréal. His brother Carlos also played here, and Éric Gagné mentioned him in his autobiography, saying ''he always had two things on him: a million dollars in cash, and a loaded gun''. Freak family, but beautiful to watch play.

R.I.P. Gary Carter

As a kid and teenager, my favourite baseball player was Tim Raines (still my all-time favourite), but Gary Carter was the one that got me interested in the sport itself.

Heck, when I was growing up - and even after he was traded to the New York Mets in 1984 - all of us kids in Montréal wore our caps backwards to be ''just like The Kid, as he was known, despite the fact that all catchers wore their caps backwards when behind the plate. To us, it was a way to identify with him even more than we already did, and we did a lot.

He loved the cameras, loved to smile for them, talk in front of them, pose for pictures - and all the cameras - and the people behind them - loved him back.

In a city all about hockey, he was as big a star as Guy Lafleur, the Montréal Canadiens' last star forward; he was the playoff hero in the failed 1981 NL run, one of four starting Montréal Expos at the 1982 All-Star Game (a fifth starter, Pete Rose, then of the Philadelphia Phillies, was a former Expo), the most charismatic figure in the history of the team.

I still remember when he was traded in 1984 (December 10th!) and against whom (Hubie Brooks, Floyd Youmans, Herman Winningham and the guy who replaced him behind the plate for half a decade, Mike Fitzgerald), and the World Series he won with the Mets in his second season in New York still stings.

He was treated like the living legend he was when the Expos brought him back to finish his career here in 1992, a year removed from Dennis Martinez' perfect game, two years before the kids (Delino DeShields, Marquis Grisson, Moises Alou, Larry Walker, Mel Rojas and John Wetteland) unexpectedly became the best team in the NL two years too early under the watchful eye of Felipe Alou.

When he was inducted in the Hall Of Fame in 2003, he said he'd want to be inducted as a member of both the Mets and Expos, but since Cooperstown decrees players can only represent one team, he favoured NYC because of his championship, but felt like a Montrealer despite this. The Hall decided to make him an Expo, and he was always bittersweet about it. He is now joined in the Hall by Andre Dawson, who was his enemy in the clubhouse. I hope Raines joins them soon, he is also very worthy of the Hall.

Today, Carter died from the multiple tumours in his head. Today, baseball died again in Montréal.

Video Of (Last) Week: Magnum

I know nothing of this Magnum character, but I know this much: when I was a kid, every summer was Expos time.

Tim Raines, the base-stealing wonder who wore #30, was my favourite, and I learned later that he slid head-first when he was stealing bases for the sole purposes of not taking chances on anything happening to the cocaine bags he kept in his back pocket...

Third baseman (#29) Tim Wallach and I shared a birthday, September 14th, and I'd go to the Olympic Stadium almost every year on that date to celebrate it, usually against either the Los Angeles Dodgers or Atlanta Braves.

Dennis Martinez' perfect game, Dennis 'Oil Can' Boyd's perfect name, Tim Burke in with the saves at the end.

Then came the 1994 players' strike, when with Delino Deshields, Marquis Grissom, Larry Walker, Pedro Martinez, John Wetteland, Spike Owen et al, we had the team to beat, ahead of even the damned New York Yankees. It was never the same. The team sold or traded all of its stars and just when they'd start climbing the rankings, every two years, they'd start over. But we still loved those underdogs and cheered for them until they'd inevitably fall to the Braves (who often had 6 times the payroll the Expos had) for the division title.

And then it got worse, when the team was sold to the thieves currently running ruining the Florida Marlins and making money not by gate revenue or winning, but by revenue-sharing alone.

But we have the memories. And the Expos Fitted caps.




Thanks to Martin from La Vie Est Une Puck.

Goodbye, Ken Griffey Jr.

I've pretty much abandoned baseball since the 1990s - some time between the strike of 1994 and the departure of Pedro Martinez and Vladimir Guerrero from our beloved Montréal Expos. In the 80s and 90s, two players had the genes to one day challenge to be the best of all time: Barry Bonds (son of Bobby Bonds) and Ken Griffey Jr. I mean, it's pretty good genes to be Moises Alou, son of regular player Felipe Alou, but to be the son of an All Star is a step up from even that.

Some time in the late 1990s, though, Bonds' stats skyrocketed - as his body mass was strangely increasing in size. His head more than doubled as he broke the single-season home run record. Griffey, on the other hand, had his body and body of work stay consistent throughout his career, and no one even alleged he had juiced up.

He retired last week sitting fifth of all time for career home runs and is tied for most consecutive games with a home run. All of this while being a steady presence defensively and in the locker room, unlike the other guy.

The prince ended up surpassing the hype and making a name for himself, and his career is ending, retiring himself from the game, unlike Bonds, who is still officially a free agent, just hasn't had any offer for the past 3 years.

Congrats.