The Boston Dirt Dogs site reported last Friday that Tony Conigliaro’s #25 will be retired by the Boston Red Sox after Ellis Burks retires (half way down).

For an excellent rendition of what Tony C was read Shaun Kelley’s post from SoSH called Tony Conigliario Forty Years Later: A Remembrance.

When I was growing up, I was in awe of the Red Sox history. That’s before I knew about the racism, the incompetence, and the managerial malpractice. I loved learning about the history of the Boston Americans. The people from that time were larger than life. Cy Young, Smokey Joe Wood, Tris Speaker, Harry Hooper, Babe Ruth, Joe Cronin, Jimmy Foxx, Lefty Grove, Johnny Pesky, Ted Williams, Dom DiMaggio, Bobby Doerr, Mel Parnell, Dick Raditz, Carl Yastrezemski, Tony Conigliaro, Jim Longborg, Carlton Fisk, Dwight Evans, Jim Rice, Fred Lynn, Luis Tiant, Bill Lee, Wade Boggs, Roger Clemens, Bruce Hurst, Dave Henderson, Mike Greenwell, and Ellis Burks.

When I was twelve, I went to see the Pawtucket Red Sox quite a bit, and saw such gentlemen as Mo Vaughn. When Vaughn made it to Boston, I felt like I grew up with him.

Some thing happened between when I was twelve and now. I grew up. Speaker was a member of the KKK. Ruth was an alcoholic, as was Foxx. Grove, Williams, and Yaz were assholes. I realized that I can root for them to win, but I can’t look up to them. Baseball players aren’t mythical beings that used superpowers to hone their craft. They are ordinary human beings that have enough skill at something to make a living doing it.

Because of that realization, I no longer look at baseball players as heroes. I look at them as men. I work hard at not being a slave to sentimentality.

And that is essentially what the discussion about Tony C having his number retired has become. A agrument over the value of sentimentality. Tony C was from the Boston-area. He hit a obscene amount of home runs at a young age. He was handsome, and his decline was tragic (thanks to a Jack Hamilton fastball).

First, a digression.

If you read my Hall of Fame pieces from a few months ago, I tend to err on the side of exclusion of honors. If you are a borderline Hall candidate, you don’t make it. The Hall of Fame is the highest honor that the sport can bestow upon it’s players. A number retired is the highest honor of each team.

The Red Sox, despite 102 years of existence has only retired five numbers. Under the old Yawkey regime, the rule was in the Baseball Hall, 10 years as a Red Sox, and retired as a Sox. The standards were relaxed to retire 27 in honor of Carlton Fisk, who retired as a Sox Blanc. The other retired numbers are 1 (Doerr), 4 (Cronin), 8 (Yaz), and 9 (Williams).

Doerr is a HOFer, and the best 2b the Red Sox ever had.

Cronin served as a shortstop, and team manager. He was the first player ever to become president of a league. (As an aside, I would take his number down. According to most histories of the era, he was as much to blame as Yawkey, Collins, and Higgins for the fact the Red Sox were the last team to intergrate.)

Yaz and Williams are all-time greats.

Back to Tony C. I don’t think his number should be retired. I think that there are too many other Red Sox who were better than he was that haven’t had their numbers hung. The points in Tony C’s favor just aren’t enough to convince me that #25 should be retired, and #10 (Grove) or #3 (Foxx) aren’t. I know he was a local boy. I know he was very prolific in the home run category. I know he was insanely popular. I know the beaning ruined every chance he had to be named as one of baseball’s elite players.

Sentimentality is a result of hero-worship in this case. Little New England boys loved Tony C in the 1960s. They honor him in their minds, and tell us how he was larger than life until his fate was met with a Jack Hamilton fastball. Unfortunately, we aren’t little kids any more. “Because I loved him” isn’t a strong enough argument to say Conigliaro in the same breath as Williams.

Two questions to ponder…
1. If there is a disservice done in not retiring Tony Conigliaro’s number, why wasn’t it done when he was alive? Why wait until 15 years after he died?
2. Wouldn’t you be pissed if you were Harry Agganis’ kids?

(By the way, Agganis, the Golden Greek, was a first baseman from Lynn that played for the Red Sox in the 50s. According to reports of the time, just about as much glowing praise was written about him as Conig. Agganis died of a pulmonary emballism before he turned 26.)