how hard is it to get it right?
Like most of the sports watching world, yesterday I sat and watched the complete highlight reel of Kirby Puckett. As I watched I started to grow irritated… I finally hit my boiling point as I sat in the back booth at brother jimmys watching one of their screens. On this particular screen was sportscenter playing a tribute to Kirby. The screen was divided into 3 parts… The top with a scrolling list of news, the middle feature, and a static info box at the bottom (wish I had a screen shot). The top line said “Hall of Famer Kirby Puckett dies at age 45”, The middle feature stated bodly “Kirby Puckett dead at age 45”, and finally the bottom static info box said “Kirby Pucket dies at age 44.” I stared blankly at the screen thinking to myself how hard is it to get this mans age correct. A quick search reveals that he was born in 1960… if you are born in 1960 and pass away in 2006 - there is NO WAY you can die at the age 44. To the media’s credit he was born on March 14th and that might have caused a little bit of confusion - but to say 44 is completely wrong. My rage was fueled this morning on the subway where I picked up a paper that said “Kirby leaves us at age 44”. Kirby stopped being 44 on March 14, 2005 - he is/was much closer to 46 than 44. To me this unacceptable. If I was part of the Puckett family I would be livid.
I will end this post with a quote from Kirby that I found on flickr while writing this blurb.
“Kirby Puckett’s going to be all right. Don’t worry about me. I’ll show up, and I’ll have a smile on my face. The only thing I won’t have is this uniform on. But you guys can have the memories of what I did when I did have it on.” - it was accompied by a cool photo of an emotional baseball
UPDATE
Puckett’s birth date was frequently listed as March 14, 1961, but recent research by the Hall of Fame indicated he was born a year earlier. found here
Quote about prince
me: this doesn’t sound like prince
jason: prince never sounds like prince
me: thats why prince is prince
jason: dude, write that down