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McCoy: Larkin joins game’s best in Hall of Fame

File photo Cincinnati Reds shortstop Barry Larkin.

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By Hal McCoy, Contributing Writer Updated 10:07 AM Tuesday, January 10, 2012

The writers got it right this time. They let their brains do their voting and put Barry Larkin in the Hall of Fame.

He should have made it last year. Call it brain cramp. Or writer’s cramp.

This is not to pick on my voting peers — members of the Baseball Writers Association of America for 10 or more years. It is strictly prejudicial on my part.

If Lou Boudreau, Ozzie Smith, Pee Wee Reese and Phil Rizzuto, all shortstops, are in the Hall of Fame, then Larkin deserves a seat, too, maybe at the head of the table.

Last year, Larkin received only 62.1 percent of the necessary 75 percent. His 24.3 percent vault to 86.4 percent was the biggest one-year improvement since 1948.

Question. What made Larkin 24.3 percent better this year than he was last year? His statistics didn’t improve — he didn’t add any hits or add any home runs or add any stolen bases.

Whatever — as my grandson says. He is in.

I covered Larkin for all 19 years he played for the Cincinnati Reds, and from the first day he walked into Riverfront Stadium, it was clear he was something special.

It was the way he carried himself on the field, that aura that follows special people. It was the way he conducted himself off the field, class exuding from his pores.

Larkin has that animal magnetism that draws people to him. It was the way he wore the captain’s ‘C’ on his shirt. It was the way teammates were pulled like gravitation to his locker to seek baseball knowledge and knowledge about life as it should be lived.

During his press conference, the first words out of his mouth were after the first question — who was the biggest influence on him — were perfect: “It started at home with my mom and father. They both had strong character and strong morals. That paved the way to the type of person I am as a person and a player.”

And he lived it for 19 years, playing during the soiled steroids era. Never once did his name become associated with the genre of bloated, overgrown behemoths that populated the game.

There were times I wrote critical and uncomplimentary stories about him. He never brought it up, never screamed at me or even questioned me. He understands the media’s function. He came to me one spring training, when there was a particularly critical writer covering the Reds, and asked, “How does this guy tick? What do I need to do to help him?”

Help him. That was Larkin’s way. Always help.

It was startling to hear him say that he always considered himself a complementary player, “Somebody who goes beyond the X’s and O’s of hits, homers and stolen bases to do what it takes to complement the other players to help win games.”

That certainly was Larkin, but Hall of Famers seldom feel they are merely a piece of the puzzle instead of the whole puzzle.

Larkin learned Spanish early in his career and he says, “My idols were Dave Concepcion and Tony Perez and I thought the only thing they could do that I couldn’t was speak Spanish, so I went to school to learn it.”

That’s his story. The real story, though, was that as captain of the team he felt a need to communicate with his Latino teammates. Instead of making them learn English, Larkin learned Spanish and spoke fluently.

As Tom Browning, Mr. Perfect, once said of Larkin, “He was the perfect teammate in every way.”

And he was a manager’s delight, too.

As manager of the New York Mets, Cincinnati Reds, Los Angeles Dodgers, Baltimore Orioles and now the Washington Nationals, Davey Johnson was in command of some extremely talented baseball players.

Wind ’em up, push their buttons and let ’em play.

And who might be the best player he ever managed? Nobody asked that question before a game last year, but Johnson volunteered it.

Barry Larkin. Larkin was the National League Most Valuable Player in 1995, the last Reds team to win a division title until the 2010 team, and Johnson was the manager.

“Larkin played his butt off that year,” said Johnson. “I had to get on him one day in Chicago. When I took the job, they told me that Barry got hurt a lot. But we were in Chicago and it was about 120 degrees and he was stealing bases, stole about three, and I told him, ‘Barry, last time I checked we were about eight games up, so take it easy.’ ”

Larkin, of course, played even harder and he played his way into the Hall of Fame.

Barry Larkin career highlights

In 1991, became the first shortstop to hit five home runs in two games.
Became the first shortstop to hit 30 homers and steal 30 bases in the same season (1996).
Named to 12 NL All-Star teams.
Won nine Silver Sluggers, three Gold Gloves, an MVP Award and a World Series.
Batted .338 in the postseason.
Stole an average of 20 bases a year with an 83-percent success rate.
Batted .293 against right-handed pitching and .299 against lefties.

Source: Baseballreference.com

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