Congratulations, Mr. Kubek

The Prodigal Beat Writer was not at Friday's Timber Rattlers game.

He can be forgiven due to the reason for his absence. He was talking with Tony Kubek about his induction into the Broadcasting wing of the Baseball Hall of Fame in Cooperstown.

Here is the result.

There's a perception in baseball land that Tony Kubek no longer wants anything to do with our grand game.

That the pastime, once the everything of a dream life glazed with legends and pinstripes and rings and cathedrals, tugged no more at his 72-year-old heart.

That the game was dead, and as such, carried no significance.

You should have heard him on Saturday, gushing and giggling and revering.

"I never fell out of love with it," Kubek said by phone on the eve of his enshrinement into the National Baseball Hall of Fame in Cooperstown, N.Y.

Kubek, an Appleton resident whose entire nine-year major-league career — a glittering resume that includes six World Series appearances and three championships — was spent with the New York Yankees, will be honored today as the recipient of the annual Ford C. Frick Award, which is given to a broadcaster deemed to have made major contributions to baseball.

The award is presented in conjunction with the hallowed Hall's induction ceremony, and Kubek was having a blast reminiscing with old pals, recalling old games and rekindling an old flame.

"The passion from the people who come here for the game of baseball, it's unlimited," said Kubek, whose nearly 30-year broadcasting career included a 24-year stint as an analyst with NBC Sports and its longtime "Game of the Week" series. "Even with all the scabs and sores and the warts and everything else that baseball is going through, they're here to have a good time. This is a marvelous place."

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