The Luckiest Man

Winding up his gracious farewell speech to the Giants fans, players, executives, and friends who filled Oracle Park yesterday to thank him, Bruce Bochy, ever the baseball man, mindful of the game's tradition, and resolutely modest about himself without conceding any of the glory his team accomplished during his 13 years as manager, echoed the words of Lou Gehrig as he surveyed the scene before him. "Today," Boch quoted, "I consider myself the luckiest man on the face of this earth." Facing the sea of fans whom he had just thanked for their "kindness," the greatest manager in San Francisco history doffed his cap to the crowd in salute, and then stepped away, joining his beautiful wife Kim and riding off into history, serenaded by the voice of Tony Bennett, and the heart he left in San Francisco.

Tim Lincecum was there, cap on backwards, Giants jersey failing to hide a trademark unbuttoned flannel shirt underneath. He walked right up to the man who never stopped believing in him, and they embraced in a warm bearhug as throats all over the place tightened. Brian Sabean, who never stopped believing in Bruce Bochy, stood alongside Larry Baer and the new guy, Farhan Zaidi. Madison Bumgarner, who has nothing in common with Lincecum except that same undefinable presence on the mound, stood somberly on the infield dirt, watching the only man he's ever played for say farewell. A happy crew of Giants from the 2014 World Championship team, perhaps Bochy's crowning achievement, clustered together on the grass nearby-- Ryan Vogelsong, whose storybook career owes so much to Bochy, and Jake Peavy, effusive as always, who can certainly say the same. A familiar bearded presence among the throng revealed Brian Wilson, and Aubrey Huff's beaming face lit up the infield.

All of these guys, and more, were there because Bruce Bochy's genius as a manager has never been focused on strategy and tactics-- though he has those and other in-game skills in spades-- but on the people whom he gathered around himself and who gathered around him. His whole farewell speech was about everybody else-- the fans, the players, the executives, the friends. Before and after Bochy's own address, over and over came the same comment, delivered in many different ways in many voices: he changed me, he believed in me, and he made us all better; for many of us, he made us better than we thought we could be.

In that moment, for those of us whose lives were enriched by Bruce Bochy on and off the baseball field, we all had right to consider ourselves the luckiest men on the face of this earth.