“Years ago while quenching his thirst at some forgotten oasis in Cleveland, Ohio, Paul Hoynes, veteran “beat writer” for that city's Guardians major-league baseball team, noticed an intriguing photograph on the wall.

The image depicted eight tuxedo-clad men who sat at the head table of the “1928 Champions of Sport Banquet” in New York City. Hoynes's chest swelled with pride when he spotted a familiar face among such luminaries as baseball's Babe Ruth, heavyweight champ Gene Tunney, tennis titan Bill Tilden, Olympic champion swimmer (and later Hollywood's original Tarzan) Johnny Weismuller, and others from the so-called "Golden Age of Sports." Bookending the top row with the Sultan of Swat and standing just behind the golfer Bobby Jones is New York Rangers great Bill Cook, the National Hockey League team's first captain who that year spearheaded the upstart “Broadway Blueshirts” to the Stanley Cup in just their second year in operation.

Picking out Cook from the octet of sports heroes, Hoynes grinned and thought: “Well, look at that, it's Daddy Bill.”

"As youngsters growing up north of Kingston in the village of Delta, if ever the three sports-minded Huddleston brothers, Dale, Lee and Gerry, were forced to choose their “favourite' uncle, it would've been a toss-up, a too-close-to-call decision. A “pick 'em,” as Vegas oddsmakers say."

"Whether you're watching a game at Doubleday Field in the broiling afternoon sun, or perusing the endless line of merchandise in theme shops, or simply walking the empty streets in the coolness of dawn, Cooperstown is a fulfilling wonderland of nostalgia for any die-hard hardball fan."

“Yet there is one baseball rule that gets broken every day and by virtually every player, coach and manager. Disobedience is rampant, and not only are the rule-breakers never punished, they're never caught. They defy and disobey the rule with a sort of unwritten impunity. The illegal practice is far too widespread. Rigid enforcement and suspensions would wipe out the rosters of every team. We speak of Major League Baseball Rule 4.06, the most fractured, least-honoured, oft-overlooked law in the MLB rule book.

Rule 4.06 states: “Players in uniform shall not address or mingle with spectators, nor sit in the stands before, during, or after a game. No manager, coach or player shall address any spectator before or during a game. Players of opposing teams shall not fraternize at any time while in uniform.

Haha! Rule 4.06 gets battered and broken before and after each game, whether it's signing an autograph or tossing a ball into the stands. Opposing players, usually a baserunner and an infielder, break the rule each time they talk on the field, even if they're just comparing the amount of zeros in their new contract extensions.”

Canadian Baseball Network contributor Patrick Kennedy writes about legendary Chicago White Sox shortstop Luis Aparicio now being the Hall of Fame’s oldest living member (OLM) after Willie Mays’ death on June 18.

Being the “OLM” is a “strange accolade,” Kennedy writes, “one that’s earned simply by waking up each morning and, as the Irish like to say, “looking down at the grass and not up at the roots.”

Former Baltimore Orioles manager and longtime baseball coach Dave Trembley is still applying some of the lessons he learned while playing in the Kingston Senior Baseball League in 1974. Canadian Baseball Network writer Patrick Kennedy recently reconnected with Trembley to talk about that year in Kingston.

Canadian Baseball Network writer Patrick Kennedy can hardly wait for the World Baseball Classic - or as he calls it the “real World Series - to begin.