MIKE BURKE

Allegany Communications Sports

It was announced on Tuesday that Andruw Jones and Carlos Beltrán had been elected to the National Baseball Hall of Fame by the Baseball Writers’ Association of America and will join slugging infielder Jeff Kent for enshrinement this summer.

Given they were likely the top center fielders of their era, with “era” being one of the most significant factors in Hall voting, who can argue? Though there has been buzz about Beltrán because, as a coach, he was a central figure in the Houston Astros’ sign-stealing scandal in 2017.

That said, what caught my attention the most about the news is that there are currently just eight center fielders – soon to be 10 – in the Hall of Fame, given that a team’s center fielder is usually one of the best of a small number of best players on any team.

But as they were saying on MLB Network on Tuesday, after the golden era of center fielders with Willie, Mickey and the Duke another Hall of Fame center fielder didn’t come along until Ken Griffey Jr., though I’m sure Richie Asburn, who is in the Hall, would have something to say about that.

Naturally, it prompted me to think of all of the great center fielders I’ve been lucky to see, and while defensively Andruw Jones and Griffey Jr. are up there with any of them, the greatest defensive center fielder I’ve ever seen remains Paul Blair, the center fielder for the greatest Baltimore Orioles teams in history, and of whom it can be said, quite simply, was a beautiful baseball player.

Having missed Willie Mays in his prime, I know Blair, who died December 26, 2014 at age 69, to be the greatest center fielder I ever saw. He played almost every day for the Orioles from 1965 to 1976 and in those 12 years, the Orioles won 95-plus games six times, won four pennants and two World Series.

Blair made every play seem routine, even though, much to the chagrin of manager Earl Weaver, he played the shallowest center field of his day. Nobody of his generation, though, got back on a ball the way Blair did and nobody of his generation covered the alleys the way Blair did, leaving only the lines for left fielder Don Buford and right fielder Frank Robinson to cover.

It was as though Blair was placed in this vast green expanse to run and run and run the way a delighted child runs in a beautiful summer field. But Paul Blair glided, as nobody had a more graceful and stylish stride than he did. He was a thing of beauty to watch play baseball.

He got to everything, he caught everything, and nobody ever took an extra base on him.

Blair twice led the American League in putouts and threw out 104 runners from center field in 17 seasons.

He won eight Gold Glove awards, including seven in a row from 1969 to 1975. Based on range factor – defined as putouts plus assists per nine innings – Blair was, over the course of his career, superior as a center fielder to both Mays and Griffey.

At the plate, he hit with power and for average through the middle of his career and was a great baserunner. He was on his way to becoming one of the best all-around players in the game until he was hit in the face by a Ken Tatum pitch in May of 1970, and though he returned to the lineup three weeks later and produced the highest batting average in the World Series, he wasn’t the same hitter again.

Three of the most beautiful images that live forever in an Orioles fan’s mind are Brooks Robinson flying through the air and into the arms of Dave McNally, the elegance of Jim Palmer’s wind-up and delivery and Paul Blair’s game.

When you saw Paul Blair you saw the real thing. You saw a baseball player.

They called him Motormouth and he was in the center of everything those Orioles did in a day when the players actually socialized with each other and within the community. Even though Blair was born in Oklahoma, grew up in California, and was traded to the Yankees in 1977, helping them win two World Series, he lived in Baltimore and remained an Oriole for the rest of his life.

He was active with Orioles Charities. He came to the ballpark to sign autographs. On one such night many years ago, I received a text from my friend Rich Hawse, who grew up with me an Orioles fan and has since become a seasoned season-ticket holder, telling me “Made son get Paul Blair’s autograph.”

Blair was signing along with former O’s pitcher Ken Dixon, and Rich said Blair took the time to talk to every person who came to his table, making them laugh and smile. And when Rich told his son Evan, “This man is the greatest center fielder to ever play the game,” Blair stopped writing, tapped Dixon on the shoulder, smiled and said, “Did you hear what this man said?”

I reminded Rich that Paul Blair was my mother’s favorite player, and five days later a Paul Blair autographed postcard arrived in the mail from Rich, one day before my mother’s birthday. All of these years later, the postcard remains on her refrigerator.

This is the game of baseball. This is the family of baseball and the love we share for the members of this family, even though we rarely meet them in person. But we know them. We know them because the game, by its very nature, ensures that we know them.

The game makes them visible and accessible day-in and day-out and forces us to care. And in a time and a place seemingly so far away yet always so near, the game makes certain they care about us.

No, Paul Blair, was not a Hall of Fame player, though he is in the Orioles Hall of Fame, and who knows if not for that errant pitch by Tatum in the prime of Blair’s career?

But when I think of the 10 center fielders in baseball history who are in the National Baseball Hall of Fame, I know in my heart that with the glove in hand, not one of them had a thing on Paul Blair.

Sixty-three days until Opening Day.

Mike Burke writes about sports and other stuff for Allegany Communications. He began covering sports for the Prince George’s Sentinel in 1981 and joined the Cumberland Times-News sports staff in 1984, serving as sports editor for over 30 years. Contact him at [email protected]. Follow him on X @MikeBurkeMDT