Baseball writers' dinner

I had the pleasure of attending the 49th annual Baseball Writer's Awards dinner last night at the Millenium hotel in downtown St. Louis. Thanks to my father-in-law Ron Stenson and his friend Kevin Risinger for setting me up with the ticket. This is the second time I have been and I was a little disappointed, but not nearly as much as other people I know.

The dinner was celebrating three World Championship teams. Of course the '06 team-but also the 1967 and 1982 teams. Great, except that the marquee names from those teams were not even there. No Bob Gibson, Red Schoendienst, or Stan the Man (the GM that year) were there from 67. No Willie McGee, Ozzie Smith or Whitey Herzog from the 82 squad. No Albert Pujols, Scott Rolen, Jim Edmonds or Yadier Molina from the current champs. So that was a bit of a downer. It ran a bit longer than it probably could have, especially considering the number of folks that were not there to accept awards.

Tony LaRussa was far and away the best speaker. He plays to the crowd, is eloquent and most of the time (perhaps unexpectedly) funny. He certainly knows when to say what-and what will play to the St. Louis fans. He's not afraid to make light of himself either. With so many of the players being gone-he accepted quite a few of the awards, including Scott Rolen's gold glove award. I think most are aware of his "fued" with Rolen during the post-season. . .TLR referenced Rolen not being able to make it because of the weather. . ."and then he heard I would be accepting on his behalf and he said he take a rocket to get here on time," LaRussa said. Funny stuff.

The other highlight was the commissioner, Bud Selig, who was attending the dinner for the first time in a few years. Say what you will about the commissioner, I still thought it was pretty cool of him to make it in for the dinner. I don't think that I have seen him speak in person before. Of course we was very complimentary to St. Louis as a baseball city. He accepted an award, but brought the house down with his official announcement that St. Louis will play host to the 2009 MLB All-Star game.

Overall I enjoyed the night, and think the dinner is generally a nice night for baseball fans. I have heard that the tradition is becoming more and more rare. In fact some one told me last night that only Boston, New York and St. Louis continue with the baseball writer's awards dinners. I don't know if that is true but if so that is too bad. It's nice to think about warm baseball on a cold winter night!