He Was One of Us

On this week’s podcast, I noted that Facebook’s habit of reminding you of what you were doing on this date several years ago can have an odd effect for Orioles fans. Recently, it showed me a picture I took in 2011 from the center field bleachers and posted with the caption They hurt me on a nightly basis, but I do love my Orioles. Today, it provided me with a less happy remembrance.

There are a lot of reasons I’m glad we didn’t start the podcast until 2012. Though we were expecting another horrible season, Scott and I have never had to chronicle a truly terrible team, nor a truly terrible event. We’ve talked about serious topics before. We addressed (inadequately) the Boston Marathon bombings, and the unrest in Baltimore this past spring. We’ve hopped on the mic on two occasions, directly after watching Manny Machado go down with a serious knee injury.

But none of that competes with what happened on this date in 2011.

Mike Flanagan was found dead at his home, as a result of a self-inflicted gunshot wound. He left no note, so the rest of us are left to wonder why something so horrible happened. News reports seemed to have settled on “financial difficulties,” but the first reports were much more heartbreaking. When they broke the story, WBAL’s sources indicated that Flanagan was “despondent over what he considered a false perception from a community he loved of his role in the team’s prolonged failure.”

That sentence is heartbreaking to read.

Mike Flanagan’s teams were never very good, whether it was a result of meddling ownership or his own inability to guide the Orioles back to respectability from 2002-2008. However, none of that mattered on August 24, 2011. The Baltimore community took the loss very personally. Those of us who did not know Flanny, and had never seen him pitch in his prime, were just as devastated as those who did.  I remember that my wife cried when she heard the news.

Jim Palmer said it best in his moving on-air remembrance of Flanagan that evening on the MASN post-game show. He was one of us.

Palmer meant ballplayers, or the members of the organization when he said “one of us,” but it was just as true of Orioles fans. The New Englander who made his home in Monkton, MD after a long, distinguished career as an pitcher, coach, executive, and broadcaster, Flanagan was a real part of our experience of Orioles baseball. That is something worth noting in this community – we take our baseball too seriously. We love it. So much that it (often) hurts. And we love the names on the back of the jersey as much as we do the front. He was one of us.

There is literally nothing I can say of any value in this space on the passing of Mike Flanagan. It was a terrible loss to this community, and a worse loss for those whose lives he touched on a personal level. Instead, I hope that all of us take opportunities like this to reflect on how we treat those around us. Remind your love ones that they’re loved. Hug a little tighter, laugh a little longer. If you have family or friends who struggle with depression, don’t wait for them to come to you – let them know you’re there. Consider a little longer before lashing out on social media. The effect of your words are more profound than you can imagine.

Today, take a moment from complaining about the wins and losses (I for sure, am doing my fair share), and remember Mike Flanagan: a heck of a ballplayer, and a man who is missed both by those who knew him, and for those who felt connected to him by this thing we call Orioles Baseball.