# Sparky Anderson has died **URL:** \ **Category:** The Game Room\ **Created:** [November 4, 2010, 8:08pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/sparky-anderson-has-died/559502 "2010-11-04T20:08:13Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 20\ **Page:** 1
**Author:** ![Leaffan](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/leaffan/32/299_2.png) [@Leaffan](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Leaffan)\ **Post date:** [November 4, 2010, 8:08pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/sparky-anderson-has-died/559502/1 "2010-11-04T20:08:13Z")
I’m sure you can find your own links. Quite a character for many, many years. RIP Sparky ---
**Author:** ![What\_Exit](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/what_exit/32/10652_2.png) [@What\_Exit](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/What_Exit)\ **Post date:** [November 4, 2010, 8:11pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/sparky-anderson-has-died/559502/2 "2010-11-04T20:11:15Z")
Oh damn. Another part of my childhood gone. One of those rare managers that were bigger than the game. I’m not sure if they really exist any more. ---
**Author:** ![gonzomax](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/g/e8c25b/32.png) [@gonzomax](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/gonzomax)\ **Post date:** [November 4, 2010, 8:28pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/sparky-anderson-has-died/559502/3 "2010-11-04T20:28:54Z")
Sparky could give a long winded explanation after a game and you would wonder what the hell he said when he finished. He had a bunch of platoon players when he was in Detroit. When he put them in, they did something important, over and over. It was amazing. He was involved in several charities too. ---
**Author:** ![RickJay](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/r/bb73d2/32.png) [@RickJay](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/RickJay)\ **Post date:** [November 4, 2010, 8:29pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/sparky-anderson-has-died/559502/4 "2010-11-04T20:29:04Z")
I guess you don’t know until they’re done. Sparky, is, I’m sure, already filling out a lineup card in God’s league. Probably gonna get into an argument with an ump, too. ---
**Author:** ![running\_coach](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/running_coach/32/15836_2.png) [@running\_coach](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/running_coach)\ **Post date:** [November 4, 2010, 8:33pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/sparky-anderson-has-died/559502/5 "2010-11-04T20:33:27Z")
> [@RickJay](#): > > I guess you don’t know until they’re done. > > Sparky, is, I’m sure, already filling out a lineup card in God’s league. Probably gonna get into an argument with an ump, too. There’s umps in heaven? 😃 RIP, Sparky. ---
**Author:** ![Justin\_Bailey](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/justin_bailey/32/8792_2.png) [@Justin\_Bailey](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Justin_Bailey)\ **Post date:** [November 4, 2010, 8:33pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/sparky-anderson-has-died/559502/6 "2010-11-04T20:33:39Z")
> [@What\_Exit](#): > > Oh damn. Another part of my childhood gone. One of those rare managers that were bigger than the game. I’m not sure if they really exist any more. Hear hear. They don’t make managers like Sparky Anderson anymore. At least Jim Leyland is still kicking around (and managing the Tigers no less!). ---
**Author:** ![missred](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/missred/32/14096_2.png) [@missred](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/missred)\ **Post date:** [November 4, 2010, 8:37pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/sparky-anderson-has-died/559502/7 "2010-11-04T20:37:54Z")
> [@What\_Exit](#): > > Oh damn. Another part of my childhood gone. One of those rare managers that were bigger than the game. I’m not sure if they really exist any more. Here, here! RIP Sparky. ☹ ---
**Author:** ![pseudotriton\_ruber\_ruber](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/p/a9a28c/32.png) [@pseudotriton\_ruber\_ruber](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/pseudotriton_ruber_ruber)\ **Post date:** [November 4, 2010, 8:43pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/sparky-anderson-has-died/559502/8 "2010-11-04T20:43:36Z")
He suffered from Dementia these past few years. ---
**Author:** ![What\_Exit](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/what_exit/32/10652_2.png) [@What\_Exit](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/What_Exit)\ **Post date:** [November 4, 2010, 8:58pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/sparky-anderson-has-died/559502/9 "2010-11-04T20:58:41Z")
> [@Justin\_Bailey](#): > > Hear hear. They don’t make managers like Sparky Anderson anymore. At least Jim Leyland is still kicking around (and managing the Tigers no less!). Leyland is a youngster by comparison. He is only 65. He just looks old and always has. I guess Torre was the man with the earliest manager’s job of those that were active this year. He was player/manager of the Mets in '77, 9 years before Leyland got the Pirates job. ---
**Author:** ![wolfman](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/w/a8b319/32.png) [@wolfman](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/wolfman)\ **Post date:** [November 4, 2010, 10:34pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/sparky-anderson-has-died/559502/10 "2010-11-04T22:34:19Z")
Man, Sparky and Ernie in one year. ☹ ---
**Author:** ![Magiver](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/4491bb/32.png) [@Magiver](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Magiver)\ **Post date:** [November 4, 2010, 11:04pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/sparky-anderson-has-died/559502/11 "2010-11-04T23:04:44Z")
I still remember the 75 and 76 World Series and I’m not a sports fanatic. He and the reds were larger than life. It wasn’t one or two players, it was a whole universe of shining stars. ---
**Author:** ![Intelligently\_Designed](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/intelligently_designed/32/20957_2.png) [@Intelligently\_Designed](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Intelligently_Designed)\ **Post date:** [November 4, 2010, 11:12pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/sparky-anderson-has-died/559502/12 "2010-11-04T23:12:32Z")
If my memory doesn’t trick me, it was: C Bench 1B Perez 2B Morgan 3B Rose SS Concepcion LF Foster CF Geronimo RF Griffey Sr SP Gullett SP Nolan RP Eastwick MGR Anderson Man, that Big Red Machine could kick butt. ---
**Author:** ![lieu](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/l/c2a13f/32.png) [@lieu](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/lieu)\ **Post date:** [November 4, 2010, 11:27pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/sparky-anderson-has-died/559502/13 "2010-11-04T23:27:52Z")
Wouldn’t today have been the last game of the World Series? Kinda fitting. Lots of fond memories of one very distinguished character. ---
**Author:** ![FoieGrasIsEvil](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/foiegrasisevil/32/16638_2.png) [@FoieGrasIsEvil](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/FoieGrasIsEvil)\ **Post date:** [November 4, 2010, 11:32pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/sparky-anderson-has-died/559502/14 "2010-11-04T23:32:17Z")
He also was one of if not the first managers in those days to yank a starting pitcher early if necessary and make full use of his bullpen, hence the nickname “Captain Hook”. 🙂 RIP Sparky. ---
**Author:** ![Tom\_Scud](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/t/f08c70/32.png) [@Tom\_Scud](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Tom_Scud)\ **Post date:** [November 4, 2010, 11:48pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/sparky-anderson-has-died/559502/15 "2010-11-04T23:48:19Z")
Has anyone been better at putting together good offensive lineups? There was the Big Red Machine, obviously, but all of his Tigers teams had great hitting, even when the pitching wasn’t all there. ---
**Author:** ![RickJay](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/r/bb73d2/32.png) [@RickJay](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/RickJay)\ **Post date:** [November 5, 2010, 2:06am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/sparky-anderson-has-died/559502/16 "2010-11-05T02:06:49Z")
> [@What\_Exit](#): > > Leyland is a youngster by comparison. He is only 65. He just looks old and always has. Which makes him just like Sparky. Remember the great Tigers team in 1984, when white-haired Sparky led them to 104-58 and the World Series? Anderson was just 50. He always looked 15 years older than he was. [QUOTE=Intelligently Designed] Man, that Big Red Machine could kick butt. [/QUOTE] It has often been said that those Reds teams might well have had the best lineup ever fielded. I think perhaps they were. The 1976 Reds scored 33% more runs than the AVERAGE NL team. If any other team in baseball has ever scored 4 runs to the average team’s 3, I cannot find them. The 1927 Yankees didn’t do that. The 2001 Mariners didn’t do it. The 2010 Reds were the best offensive team in the NL but to be as dominant as the 1976 Reds, they were have had to score 145 more runs then they did; it would be like the same team except Orlando Cabrera hits 30 homers, Jonny Gomes bats .380, and Ramon Hernandez hits like Joe Mauer. Maybe that would be enough. Plus the '76 Reds could pick it and throw it, I’ll tell you. Bench, Morgan, Conception… back then George Foster wasn’t half bad. There isn’t a bad glove in that lineup. I dunno if Sparky had much to do with assembling that team but he got as much out of that lineup as anyone has ever gotten out of a lineup. ---
**Author:** ![dalej42](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/d/67e7ee/32.png) [@dalej42](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/dalej42)\ **Post date:** [November 5, 2010, 2:14am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/sparky-anderson-has-died/559502/17 "2010-11-05T02:14:28Z")
I met him once at a spring training game between the Tigers and the Dodgers. I couldn’t believe that anyone was smoking in the stands at a baseball game in the late 1990s. ---
**Author:** ![gonzomax](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/g/e8c25b/32.png) [@gonzomax](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/gonzomax)\ **Post date:** [November 5, 2010, 3:11am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/sparky-anderson-has-died/559502/18 "2010-11-05T03:11:17Z")
I met him several times. My son met him too,but I doubt he remembers it. Sparky went to the Reds and the Tigers at exactly the right time. He could have run the Reds from Hawaii by postcard. Then he moved to Detroit just when the farm club had stocked him up with a bunch of talented young players. Sparky said often, write down the lineup and let them play. if they are good enough, you will be thought of as a great manager. ---
**Author:** ![astorian](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/a/ad7895/32.png) [@astorian](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/astorian)\ **Post date:** [November 5, 2010, 5:19am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/sparky-anderson-has-died/559502/19 "2010-11-05T05:19:48Z")
Sparky was only 36 when he took the Reds to the World Series in 1970, but he already had white hair. He always seemed like an old timer, even when he was pretty young. I remember an umpire named Al Clark used to pointedly call him George at all times. “I refuse to call a grown man Sparky,” he used to say. ---
**Author:** ![Justin\_Bailey](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/justin_bailey/32/8792_2.png) [@Justin\_Bailey](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Justin_Bailey)\ **Post date:** [November 5, 2010, 12:07pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/sparky-anderson-has-died/559502/20 "2010-11-05T12:07:26Z")
> [@What\_Exit](#): > > Leyland is a youngster by comparison. He is only 65. He just looks old and always has. I guess Torre was the man with the earliest manager’s job of those that were active this year. He was player/manager of the Mets in '77, 9 years before Leyland got the Pirates job. Jim Leyland is only 65? Wow. I remember him managing the Pirates in the late 80s and looking like an old man then. Hard to imagine he was only in his early 40s, and according to Wikipedia, his kids weren’t even born yet. [Next page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/sparky-anderson-has-died/559502.md?page=2)