The great Osborne Earl Smith. Have a couple of Ozzie stories. Road tripped it to the Lou in the ‘80s for some games. Took my son who was 7 or 8 at the time. After a game, a Cardinal win, we kicked around downtown for awhile and Ozzie was walking maybe 20 feet away with his family. He was carrying a toddler and had a couple of other kids and his wife with him. I yelled out to him “Nice game Ozzie!” He responded back, “Hey, thanks man!”
A few years ago I met him at a collectibles show. I told him that when we traded for him … and he goes, “I don’t know, Templeton…” And I am like, “Yeah, we had Templeton, a Southern California guy who wanted to play in Southern California. Now we get another Southern California guy – he will just leave after a couple of years.” Ozzie laughed and I said, “Thanks for sticking around.” He loved it and was such an easy guy to chat with.
So back to the game, heck with the three runs, will we get three hits??