Cleaning out the Inbox: Passings

 Recently, the passings of note have slowed, which is always good news!

Goodbye to Grindstone at the age of 29.

The winner of the 1996 Kentucky Derby by a head over Cavonnier, Grindstone was the oldest living Derby winner for less than a month after the death of Go For Gin before his recent passing in Oregon.

Grindstone's off-the-pace rally to nip Cavonnier was his final race, before the Preakness, he was retired with a bone chip in his knee and Grindstone would be the first Derby winner since 1926 to never race again.

Grindstone had won the Louisiana Derby as his only graded stakes win and would be a moderate success at stud siring 2004 Belmont and Travers winner Birdstone.

The mantle of oldest living Derby winner now passes to the 1997 winner Silver Charm.

Goodbye to Tommy Davis at the age of 83.

Davis, a two-time National League batting champion, played for ten different teams but had his biggest success with the Dodgers where he won his batting titles in 1962 and 63, led the league in RBI in 1962, and won two World Series rings in 1963 and 1965.

Davis didn't play in the 1965 Fall Classic after breaking his ankle in May 1965 causing him to miss the remainder of the season and changing his career as it took away much of Davis's speed and some of his power.

Davis would play for nine teams after 1965 and would be a key member of both the Seattle Pilots and Houston Astros in Jim Bouton's Ball Four before being the first designated hitter of note for the Baltimore Orioles from 1973-75.

Davis won the Outstanding Designated Hitter award in 1974 and finished second to Orlando Cepeda in 1973.

Goodbye to Tom Young at the age of 89.

Young won over 500 games in his three career stops (American, Rutgers, and Old Dominion), is the winningest coach in Rutgers history, and is best remembered for coaching the 1975-76 Rutgers Scarlet Knights to an undefeated regular season and a Final Four appearance, the only visit in school history.

Rutgers would lose to Michigan in the Final Four and lose the now-defunct consolation game to UCLA to finish 31-2 but did place three players in the NBA in Phil Sellers, James Bailey, and Eddie Jordan.

Jordan would later hire Young out of retirement to be one of his assistants with the Washington Wizards from 2003 to 2007.

Goodbye to Rocky King at the age of 64.

King was homeless before being hired by Jim Crockett Promotions as a wrestler despite having no experience in the ring.

King progressed quickly and became one of the better "enhancement talents" in the company but never moved out of that level other than a brief and silly stint as "Little Richard Marley" the roadie for the Freebirds composed of Michael Hayes and Jimmy Garvin.

After the Freebirds turned on King, he would return to prelim status before becoming a referee before leaving WCW in 1997.

Goodbye to Gene Shue at the age of 90.

Shue was likely Maryland's best basketball star before the Lefty Driesell era and played ten seasons in the NBA before a long career as a head coach with the Bullets (twice), Clippers (twice, once each in San Diego and Los Angeles), and Philadelphia.

Shue took the Bullets to the 1971 NBA Finals and the 76ers to the 1977 Finals but both teams lost those series and won two Coach of the Year awards-both with the Bullets in two different cities winning in Baltimore in 1968 and Washington in 1982.

Shue's NBA playing career is sometimes forgotten but Shue made five straight All-Star teams as a member of the Detroit Pistons from 1957-to 62.

Shue averaged over 22 points in 1959-60 and in 1956-57, Shue played for the Piston's final season in Fort Wayne Indiana.

Goodbye to Lee Rose at the age of 85.

Rose took two teams to the Final Four in five years and only an arguable bad call cost one of the two a trip to the finals.

Rose took UNC-Charlotte to the 1977 Final Four and lost to eventual national champion Marquette by two points when a long pass with three seconds to saw Jerome Whitehead push Cornbread Maxwell and then laid the ball in just before the buzzer.

Rose moved to Purdue in 1978, won over 20 games in both seasons, and made the NIT Finals in his first season before taking the Boilermakers to the Final Four the following season.
Rose surprisingly left Purdue after the season for South Florida, where he won over 100 games in six seasons but never made the NCAA Tournament.