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The greatest player
we never knew

YOU have heard that there are two sides to every story, you've heard the rest of the story, you've heard the story behind the story and, of course, the greatest story ever told.

Today we bring you the story behind the story that never was.

It starts in an observation tower above the Little League World Series, many years ago. The four semifinal teams were practicing down below on four fields, a nice little quadroplex, or whatever you would call it. The tower stood above it all, so you could see all four teams at once.

In those days they sent two major leaguers to the LLWS for promotional purposes. The players showed up, did some publicity, said a few words to the kids. It was nice.

So up in this tower, surveying the scene below, was Ted Williams, Jackie Robinson and former Star-Bulletin writer Jim Becker, who'd been sent from New York to cover the series.

Becker had been an acquaintance of Robinson's for a long time. They were both L.A. boys, and Becker had covered Robinson's first season in the majors (more on that as Opening Day approaches).

"He was a hell of a lot of fun," Becker said. "He would tell wonderful stories."

But Williams. Well, Williams was, as Becker said the other day, a little "crusty." In some ways he was kind of like Barry Bonds is today -- both on and off the field -- but, luckily, he didn't have any SportsCenter TV cameras to play to. So thankfully, over the years many of those bitter memories have faded away.

"After he retired he became a human being," is how Becker put it.

In fact, he and Becker became friendly enough that Williams told a few war stories, including the time -- with future astronaut John Glenn as his wingman -- Williams was shot down in Korea.

He'd made an emergency landing without landing gear, skidding forever. All the emergency equipment was rushed out to meet him, and Williams climbed out of the cockpit, looked around, and said, "Bleep this bleep."

"He told me what he actually said," Becker said.

We can imagine.

"If you want to ..."

No, no, we get the idea.

SO THERE they were, the three of them, up in the tower looking down at the kids below. And then Williams -- he always had an eye -- saw something that made him perk up.

"You see what I see, Jackie?" Williams asked.

Becker squinted, looking down.

"Yeah," Robinson said. "He can play."

Now Becker's gaze jumped from kid to kid, trying to spot him. He couldn't tell. But these players -- these Hall of Famers -- they knew talent when they saw it. If Jackie Robinson and Ted Williams said so, this kid was the real deal.

The shortstop, Robinson and Williams told him. They nodded at the kid on the California team.

So now Becker was excited. His bells and whistles were going off. This was a story.

He scrambled down the tower. He was going to talk to this kid.

"Someday when he makes it BIG I'm going to be able to write this story about how Ted Williams and Jackie Robinson had spotted him in Little League," Becker said.

"So I took a lot of notes and filed everything away for when the kid became famous."

And that kid was ...

"And his name was never heard of again," Becker said.

Oh.

"And I still got the notes, though," Becker said.

"I figure he must be about 65 now."

So there we have it. There's a story even in a story that never was.

At least not yet.

"If there's any age-group sport that he excels in ..." Becker said.