12/21/24
May 23, 2010
Jose Lima Passes Away: apparently of a heart attack.
posted by TheQatarian to baseball at 01:06 PM - 19 comments
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Got to meet Lima once. He was a "friend of a friend" of a parent on a youth team I coached. The Dad got him to come to a practice once. He threw B.P., signed some stuff, talked to the kids, worked with the pitchers for a little bit.....made a good impression. He was fairly popular during his short stint here in KC. The guy had a lot of energy. I hope the energy was natural, and the heart attack wasn't the result of something else.
posted by kcfan4life at 02:23 PM on May 23, 2010
Linking to individual comments (#34) on BaseballThinkFactory.com is difficult to do, so I'll reproduce my favourite one about Jose Lima's passing here, and link to the discussion instead.
I took a girl to game at Turner Field once, and we went there early to watch batting practice. We got to enjoy watching him interact with some fans for an hour or so. Never before or since have I seen a player so friendly with so many strangers. Near the end a family friend came up with a five or six-year old son. Mr. Lima put the kid on his shoulders and ran him around the outfield in circles. The joy in the eyes of that kid and that pitcher... indescribable.
After that day, the girl and I both adopted Mr. Lima as a favorite player. When her birthday came up a few months later, I wrote letters to three favorite players of hers- David Justice, Bill Spiers, and Jose Lima- asking them to sign birthday cards for her. Spiers and Justice each did so, sending a card with a signature. Mr. Lima sent back a card completely filled with several hundred words, all in Spanish- jokes, a story, and most of all profusely thanking her for being a fan.
I am gutted to read of his passing. RIP, Jose Lima. You will be missed.
posted by grum@work at 04:18 PM on May 23, 2010
Nice piece, grum. The stuff I've been reading and hearing today have been nothing but great things about Lima. I guess the guy really loved his fans, and really loved being in a position to touch people in the way he often did. He'll obviously be greatly missed by many.
posted by kcfan4life at 06:12 PM on May 23, 2010
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posted by boredom_08 at 08:05 PM on May 23, 2010
Jose Lima threw a complete game shutout for the Dodgers against St. Louis in the 2004 NLDS. Gave Dodger Stadium and the fans a blast of energy and (ultimately) short lived hope.
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posted by Newbie Walker at 09:26 PM on May 23, 2010
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I was always entertained when Jose Lima took the mound. Such a shame. R.I.P.
posted by BornIcon at 07:24 AM on May 24, 2010
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posted by yzelda4045 at 08:32 AM on May 24, 2010
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posted by tommybiden at 09:16 AM on May 24, 2010
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posted by Ying Yang Mafia at 10:03 AM on May 24, 2010
He certainly was larger than life. I hope The Smoking Gun gets a copy of the will to see who he left his wife's implants to. Someone with a full-size trailer, I assume.
posted by yerfatma at 10:08 AM on May 24, 2010
"They had a moment of silence for him at the stadium in Kansas City, before the Royals-Rockies game, though I'm not sure that in this case that was quite right. It probably should have been a moment of music— Lima never cared for silence."
posted by yerfatma at 10:20 AM on May 24, 2010
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posted by DrJohnEvans at 12:45 PM on May 24, 2010
Yeah, I loved this guy - just a great, great classic baseball guy. My condolences.
posted by WeedyMcSmokey at 03:10 PM on May 24, 2010
The really entertaining ones seem to go way before they should. I'm thinking of Mark Fydrich as being in a similar mold to Jose Lima. It's almost as if God is telling us humans that we should never have too much of a good thing. I guess that's my Calvinist New England theology coming to the fore. Anyway, "I hurt on the inside...."
Gracias, Senor Lima. Adios.
posted by Howard_T at 04:25 PM on May 24, 2010
Nice memories from C.J. Nitkowski (not so much on the site design).
posted by yerfatma at 05:21 PM on May 24, 2010
Cumulative RSAA (1950-2010) (runs saved against average, so a negative number means the pitcher gave up more runs than an average pitcher (for that time period he pitched))
RSAA RSAA PCT 1 Kevin Jarvis -139 .410 2 Jose Lima -137 .466 3 Bobby Witt -130 .475 4 Mike Kekich -127 .433 5 Jimmy Haynes -120 .414 6 Phil Ortega -119 .426 T7 Jack Fisher -118 .382 T7 Todd Van Poppel -118 .435 T9 Jay Hook -109 .319 T9 Mark Gardner -109 .516 T9 Herm Wehmeier -109 .446
He's the second worst pitcher for the past 60 years, in terms of giving up runs over a career (compared to an average pitcher).
And still, he won 20 games one season.
RIP, you wonderfully terrible and terribly entertaining pitcher.
posted by grum@work at 05:41 PM on May 24, 2010
Jose Lima having some fun at a bar at LAX while in the minors.
"Sweet home Dominicana, where you can lie about your age."
posted by grum@work at 08:06 PM on May 24, 2010
Seen him pitch here in Houston, Adios Jose.
posted by texpat at 10:49 AM on May 25, 2010
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37 year old athletes don't just die of heart attacks. Methinks there will be more to this story...