Larry Dierker
We’ll miss you, Larry, but some of us won’t say goodbye. After all, our Houston SABR group isn’t named the Larry Dierker Chapter for any idle reason. When we picked your name to carry our banner of Houston MLB history a few years ago, we did so because we wanted for our own identity the one name that has characterized the full length and breadth of things over the long course of Houston big league history. And that person was you, by length of service and depth of contribution at so many essential levels as a player, communicator, and manager.
Your resignation from the Astros yesterday also flies with no impunity upon the reputations of all the other former Astro stars who remain on the club’s payroll as public relations specialists that you have now chosen to leave the club rather than stay on the payroll as a greeter or personal appearance icon. Those roles are legitimate service and the kind of work that many former players can handle just fine. It’s just not the kind of substantive work that your soul cries out to do at this point in your life. You’ve either got more books to write or new creative job dragons to slay.
Now you will just have to do what all of us non-icons do when faced with the same challenge: Find some place to work in which there appears to be a true opening to the blue sky of possibility, however modest it may first appear to be – or ultimately turn out to be. You, at least, will always have the Dierker Charisma rolling out the road-to-downtown path for what you really want to do.
And you will be OK because – you already are. And because you are loved. And revered by the fans of Houston baseball.
David Barron’s column in this morning’s March 23rd Houston Chronicle is well worth the read. We are going though a change in Houston MLB ownership that is much larger than the single departure of Larry Dierker. You may want to give it a fresh read, if you haven’t yet seen it:
Good luck, Larry! We’ll see you around.
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