A True Detroit Hero

July 17, Detroit

Despite some small protests from people who didn't think his 325 homers were enough to warrant Tiger immortality, Detroit retired power hitting outfielder Willie Horton's number 23 on Saturday.

In a short ceremony, Horton talked about what the city, baseball, and the chance he had meant to him, but what he meant to this city was more important.

Horton was raised in Detroit and signed with his hometown club. He broke into the majors in 1963, and became part of Detroit's magical 1968 world championship team. But the Horton video on the big scoreboard really explained what made him so important to this city.

The World Series championship coincided with some of Detroit's darkest days.

The 1968 championship arrived a year after the race riots that signaled the beginning of the end for this city. The riots illustrated just how divided blacks and whites were in this city, and gave the whites an excuse to move away.

But the 1968 Tigers brought the city together in a way only a baseball pennant race can. It happened every day. The situation changed and there were always some decisions of Manager Mayo Smith to second guess. But people talked baseball. People sat in the stands and had three-hour long conversations that ranged from team to team, from player to player.

At the center of these discussions was Willie Horton: the fan favorite. He was the player many of the kids in Detroit looked up to. His autograph was the big prize.

Horton was a very good baseball player, yet not a great one, but his value in Detroit went far beyond the baseball field. Horton played here until 1977. He didn't put up Hall of Fame statistics and his name does not evoke the same awe that his teammate Al Kaline's does. But Horton's name and jersey belong on the wall of retired numbers just for what he meant to the city.

During those riots in 1967, Horton put on his uniform and walked down Livernois Avenue on the city's west side trying to help calm the situation. Horton was part of both the black and white communities. His words helped more than Baltimore native Kaline's ever could.

He helped pacify a city, and a year later he helped inspire it.

We have statistical platitudes for baseball players: there are magic numbers like 500 home runs, 3,000 hits, or 300 wins that mean greatness and signify a Hall of Fame career. Horton's numbers do not qualify him for the Hall of Fame.

But more than any other sport, baseball is about what it does to us. It is a game that lingers like a warm summer day. It is a game that allows us to sit with strangers and talk. Remember the Miracle Mets last year, where fans held up signs that said, "I Believe"? Baseball does that to us, it is a game where time never runs out. It is a game where a team keeps itself alive as long as it has another hit left in it. In a sense, it is a perfect game for Detroit.

I want to believe that this city has just gone into a slump and that the new stadiums and the increased investment will keep it alive. This city is not dead yet. For me, that is what Willie Horton represents. He is the hometown boy who made good and who now does good.

The Tigers, after an awful start, have become one of the hottest teams in baseball. Fans fill the new stadium in a way I can't remember them filling the old one. And on Saturday, I had one of those good old baseball conversations with my friend Joel and two guys from Wisconsin. The streets were full after we left the game. Some people walked directly to their cars, others ducked into restaurants.

If Detroit comes back, its recovery will be from the 1967 riots. The city is still dealing with them. Perhaps Horton knocked the first base hit in the city's revival, and perhaps this stadium is another.

Either way, Horton deserves to be mentioned with Kaline and Gehringer and Greenberg. What the rest of them did for baseball as a whole, he did for this city.