Garr retains love of game
Ex-GSU star believes baseball keeps people young
, buddy@rustonleader.com
06-21-2009
GRAMBLING — Ralph Garr will fool you.His outstanding baseball career ended with his final at-bat for the California Angels in 1980.
He will turn 64 years of age in December.
But “The Roadrunner” still looks as if he could leg out a bunt for an infield single and contend for another batting champion, just as he won in 1974 while batting .353 for the Atlanta Braves.
Oh, there are intermittent shreds of gray hair sprouting on parts of his always smiling face, but — overall — Garr appears to have managed this age thing quite well and especially so when it comes to how he looks at it.
“For one thing, I’ve always been one to try and keep an upbeat attitude and be friendly with everybody,” he said during an appearance at the inaugural Juneteenth Festival ‘Baseball Legends Tribute’ held at the Grambling Community Center Friday night. “Plus, baseball keeps you young. I really believe that because, once you get around baseball, you are talking about great people or great times that you remember for the first of your life.”
That was evident during the hour-and-a-half long tribute that recognized Garr and other players, coaches and organizers who had helped contribute to the legacy of black baseball in Lincoln Parish.
No sooner had longtime friend and former Braves’ teammate George Stone, Jr., and brother Mike Stone walked into the banquet room did Garr jump up and give both of them a big hug.
The same when former major league pitching star James Rodney Richard — a living legend from now defunct Lincoln High School — came over and tapped Garr on the shoulder.
“The great game of baseball could solve a lot of the racial problems that are out there because, once you are together on a team, color doesn’t mean a thing,” Garr said. “It’s no longer black or white, but a lot of different people from a lot of different backgrounds and places coming together.
“You look around here tonight and you see everybody talking and happy because most of what they’re talking about is baseball and the happiness it has brought into their lives.”
Garr, who remains active in the sport as a regional scout for the Braves, made a lot of people happy during his playing career.
While at Grambling State University in the 1960s, he was one of the country’s best players, winning an NAIA batting championship as a senior in 1967 with a .568 average.
The left-handed hitting Garr then used a mixture of great awareness at the plate with bat speed and base running skills in the big leagues. He hit .300 or better five times and averaged nearly 30 bases during a five-year period in the early 1970s while in Atlanta.
His best season was in 1974 when he totaled 214 hits (17 were triples), stole 26 bases and compiled the best average (.353) of his 13-season career in The Show.
“Ralph was as good a hitter as there was in the game during that time,” said Stone, a former Ruston High School pitching standout whose major league stint also began with the Braves.
“Stoney and I are like family,” Garr said. “His brother Mike, his mom and dad, they were great friends of ours. That’s the kind of thing I’m talking about, as to how baseball brings a lot of people together. We knew each other growing up in Ruston, but there were other players that Stoney and I got to know while we both played in Atlanta and they’re friends you have for life.”
The tributes being presented brought back plenty of memories for Garr, Richard, Stone and others.
“When I was 15 or 16 years-old, Curtis Mayfield asked me to come out and play with the Ruston Black Sox,” Garr recalled about the founder of the team that barnstormed through the north Louisiana area and attracted large crowds for its home games at Fraser Field, located off of the Chatham Highway where the North Louisiana Fairgrounds was once located. “I hung around them a little when I was younger, but once I got a little bigger and they saw I could hit the baseball pretty well, they took me in.
“They had some great players on some of those Black Sox teams, guys like James Earl Albritton, who was good a hitter and infielder as there was in the area back then. Then, when we went to Grambling, we had guys like Matt Alexander, Ben Williams, Jimmy Jackson and others who went on and played some pro ball. Then there was Lynn McGlothen, Stoney, J.R. and others around the area that were great players. As long as I can remember, it’s been this way around here.”
And all the while, the game bonded teammates and friendships.
“One of the greatest things about baseball and sports overall is that it can help everybody feel the same,” said Garr, who had a career batting average of .306 in the major leagues. “You can come from different parts of the country, be different in color or whatever, but then you don’t even think about it or make a big deal over it once you are together on the same team.
“Then, all you want to do is try and win and be the best you can be, And if a fight breaks out, you don’t care what color that teammate of yours is, you know he’s got your back and you’ve got his back. Baseball brings everybody together.”
And in the case of Ralph Garr, keeps you feeling young.
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