The mother of my youngest grandson had been reading reports of the Mets’ dismissal of Omar Minaya as their general manager and was curious about the part that said he might remain with the team in a lesser capacity.

“Why would he do that?” she asked. “Wouldn’t that be embarrassing?”

Good question, and the simple answer is “that’s baseball.” Once you’re in it, you never want to leave it. With some exceptions, baseball people are baseball lifers. Pride doesn’t enter the equation.

If a team offers a job – in the front office for a fired general manager, in the dugout for a fired manager – more often than not he says yes.

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In his concession speech after losing the 1962 California gubernatorial race, Richard Nixon told the assembled reporters they would miss him. “You don’t have Nixon to kick around anymore,” he said.

The baseball Hall of Fame this week made sure it would have Marvin Miller to kick around some more. It put Miller on the ballot that the veterans committee will vote on next month.

Miller, probably the most successful labor leader in United States labor history, has been on the ballot four times in the past seven years and has failed to gain the requisite number of votes each time. He is batting 1.000 or .000, depending on one’s point of view.

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Sparky Anderson always looked older than he was and he has died much younger than he should have.

Sparky is at or near the top of my list of people who, when they die, I wish that I could have had one last conversation with.

I don’t recall the last time I spoke with him; it was since he retired. But too many years had passed. Unfortunately I think that happens with most of us. Especially today, when people live longer than they used to, we put off calling someone until he can no longer answer the phone.

Dan Ewald was a close friend and confidant of George Anderson. He even called him George at times.

“He died of complications from dementia,” said Ewald, the former public relations man for Anderson’s second team, the Detroit Tigers. “It developed over the last couple years. He would occasionally forget something or where something was, and he would say there’s that Alzheimer’s again.”

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