A sad day for Baseball Monday, especially in Boston, with the loss of star player and star human being, Johnny Pesky (See Aaron G…).

I never saw Pesky play. But I enjoyed watching Pesky teaching young players to bunt before spring training games in Winter Haven, Florida, where I was working as a reporter in the seventies.

He was a natural, and you could see the youngsters responding to him. I experienced the Pesky charm first hand at a Red Sox media function where I got to talk a little baseball with him. It was clearly his favorite subject. The stories were first-rate and well told. And he put as much into the stories if he were telling them to Ted Williams, or to a local reporter stealing a little time away from the job.  

Guys like Johnny Pesky make baseball special. He will be missed.