I Heard the News Today, Oh Boy...

There's no way to tell how much Gary Carter meant to die hard Mets fans in the mid 1980s. What with Daryl Strawberry, Dwight Gooden and Keith Hernandez putting up good numbers, acquiring Carter gave fans the sense the team was a serious contender. And for once it wasn't a false hope. In 1986, he led the way to a world championship. He hit like the Hall of Famer he was and caught a relatively inexperienced pitching staff and made them all look better. Didn't he hit a game-winning homerun in his first game with the Mets? And he smiled. Always. Nothing fake. The Kid. My God what a great name for such a man. Then a tumor in his brain. In the last months, Carter's been out of the public eye. That's to be expected. But even months after his diagnosis and the word that this wasn't one of those things that doctors can help with - a death sentence in essence - The Kid kept smiling, kept working for his charities as much as he could, kept upbeat, kept his faith. Baseball hero? Of course. And so much more. I miss the man though I didn't know him. That's a testimony, no?