How often does an obituary make you laugh? The obituary of Wilma Eckert may not seem funny to most folks, but if you're a Cardinals fan you probably understand the end of the second sentence and depending on your view of the situation it may make you chuckle.
To those unfamiliar with Ray King and the Cardinals, or baseball in general, allow me to provide some background details. King is a lefthanded relief pitcher, a valuable commodity in baseball, especially to a manager like Tony La Russa, who has been known to use -- some might say overuse -- his bullpen. I believe King was generally considered to be an above average reliever. In 2004, after being acquired from the Atlanta Braves in a trade, King had what I thought was a pretty good year on a team that got to the World Series. In 2005, King struggled. It was eventually reported that his father was terminally ill, ultimately passing away late in the season. There's no doubt it was a tough situation for King.
Down the stretch and into the playoffs it became clear that La Russa had lost confidence in King and essentially benched him. King then announced that he wanted to be traded. It seemed that the situation had calmed down, when King was recently traded to the Colorado Rockies for two players the locals don't seem to be all that impressed with.
I didn't care either way what happened to King in 2006. He said he would get in better shape and have a better season. On the other hand, could the team really keep a guy around that didn't see eye-to-eye with the manager and had expressed his desire to be elsewhere?
Anyway, I got a chuckle from the obit, which I found on a message board from the local newspaper. It reminded me of the obituary from earlier this year in which a man wanted his son to criticize what had been going on with the National Hockey League.
[genealogy]
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