Willie Mays and the Negro Leagues, and Steve Glazer's Celebration of Life
Connecting Steve with Willie with a special day
Greetings, friends. We are celebrating today. Not just one celebration, but two. You up for it?
One celebration involves Willie Mays, the Birmingham Black Barons of the old Negro Leagues, and major league baseball. The other celebration focuses on our friend Steve Glazer and as unlikely as it may seem, the two celebrations are intertwined.
Let’s take Steve’s celebration first. A few days ago a text lit up my phone. It was from Kyle Trinosky, Steve’s nephew. He had news, good news. Thursday, July 11 is the date for the celebration of life for Steve being hosted by his family. All are invited. It will take place that day at 1:30 p.m. at the Tahoe City Golf Course, Tahoe City, California. The clubhouse there is located at 251 N. Lake Boulevard in Tahoe City, behind the old Save Mart store that is now a Safeway.
What’s more, Kyle needs our help. He and the family are putting on a slide show that will mark some of the moments and highlights of his uncle’s life. They are looking for photos that will help tell Steve’s story. If you’ve got something to share, contact Kyle at ktrinosky@gmail.com or text 530-902-1541. “Thank you for helping us create a beautiful tribute,” he says. “Your contributions are greatly appreciated.”
Glazer died March 3, 2024, days before his 71st birthday, in the place he loved, Homewood, on the shores of Lake Tahoe. Our piece on him in the aftermath, A Few of Steve’s Favorite Things, is one of the most widely viewed posts we have ever had at Tilting West. I am still hearing from people who wish to share their feelings of love and respect for Steve.
"Steve Glazer was a family friend and friend to me,” writes Michael Hogan of Civil Engineering Construction in Loomis. “Your stories of him hit my heart. My company installed a waterline on Grand Ave. for him. It was the last construction project we completed. As a hard driving contractor he taught me to relax a little and just roll with the flow. Thanks for the tribute you wrote."
Another who has reached out is Cindy Palffy. Steve was her “long-time boyfriend,” as she explained. “We lived next to each other.” In another message she poured her heart out on what his loss meant to her, “My life will never be the same. I lost my rock, love and anchor. He was the happiest man. The epitome of no bad days. I never had a day without texting, talking and being around him. A kind, honest loving man who left too young.”
Come Steve’s celebration the tears and the laughter will be real. The same will be true a week from today, Thursday, June 20, at the oldest professional ballpark in America, Rickwood Field in Birmingham, Alabama. This 10,800-seat “spearmint green, mission-style gem,” in the words of a writer, served as the home field for the Birmingham Black Barons of the Negro Leagues for nearly 40 years beginning in 1924. In 1948, the greatest player to ever suit up for the Barons, and arguably the greatest player to ever suit up for any baseball team, anywhere, at anytime, began his pro career as a centerfielder. He was a teenager then.
His name was Willie Mays.
Despite the presence of the young phenom, the Birmingham Black Barons lost that year’s Negro League World Series to the Homestead Grays in five games. This was the last true Negro League World Series. In 1947 Jackie Robinson joined the Brooklyn Dodgers, smashing the color barrier that prohibited Blacks from playing with whites in organized professional baseball. As more gifted young Black men followed Robinson’s lead into the major leagues, the Negro Leagues lost their reason to exist and faded out.
In 1951, when the Alabama-born Mays became a member of the major league New York Giants, Steve Glazer was not even a twinkle in Irma and Sam Glazer’s eyes. By 1954 a twinkle had formed and it had turned into a baby boy, age one. That same year Mays won his first National League Most Valuable Player Award with a prodigious .354 batting average. In 1958, when Steve was five, Willie and his club switched coasts and cities and became the San Francisco Giants. The Giants of San Francisco played in their first-ever World Series, at Candlestick Park, in 1962 (they lost, to the Yankees). Steve was nine. By the time the Giants actually won a World Series in California it was 2010, and Steve, celebrating like all Giants fans everywhere, was a seasoned 57 years old.
On June 20, 2024, Steve’s favorite team will play the St. Louis Cardinals at Rickwood Field, the first-ever regular season major league game ever played there. It will be a celebration of Negro League history and all the Negro Leaguers who, in the words of Rickwood president Randall Wooden, achieved “victories in two forms, both in winning games and chipping away at the barriers that blocked Black athletes from the recognition they deserved.”
Some 150 past Negro Leaguers, including the 93-year-old Mays, are expected to attend the game and the accompanying ceremonies. Broadcaster Jon Miller of the Giants will emcee the proceedings on KNBR Radio and Fox will televise it. Opening pitch is scheduled for 4:30 p.m. PCT.
There is a wonderful line in a Paul Simon song that applies here: “If he could, he surely would.” If Steve could listen to that game or watch it on TV, he surely would. Enjoy the celebration in Alabama on the 20th, and then if you can, join us in July for the one in Tahoe City.