Day Forty Two: Dave Henderson

Dave Henderson is from Dos Palos, California. Dos Palos is "the next town over" (I'll need to verify the actual geography of this) from the town that my dad grew up in, Chowchilla. I'm pretty sure it is accurate to say that my father and Dave Henderson were born in the same hospital, in the only town of any size in the area, Merced. From a very young age, Dave Henderson was the main connection that I had to the unknown and mythical stretch of land that my dad had grown up in. There were three figures that loomed large for me as a kid living in Seattle hearing about the San Joaquin Valley: Tommie Smith, Cesar Chavez, and Dave Henderson. Those were the three names that rang out to me from what my father told me about where he grew up. I don't know if those three names are representative of the area (I would later see a Kenny Rogers video filming that changed my mind a great deal about the central valley. Yikes!), but for me as a little city kid they were a part of my dad's prehistory and therefore incredible present and pertinent to my existence. I am very lucky and grateful that those three men existed in my mind from an early age in the ways that they did. And no disrespect to Dave Henderson, but he's kind of out of place with Tommie Smith and Cesar Chavez. But nevertheless, Dave Henderson was awesome.

I don't really remember Hendu as a Mariner, but he was always a member of our household in some sense. I think at times I thought that my dad probably knew Dave Henderson because the towns they were from were so much smaller than Seattle. We knew most of the people in our neighborhood and probably Dos Palos and Chowchilla weren't much bigger than that. I don't know. It is so amazing how kids' minds work, how small and huge their imagined worlds are. And how utterly central our parents are to everything that happens to us in those early days. I am experiencing it myself right now with my wonderful daughter Winona. To be a parent is the greatest privilege that I have ever been given. And to be a parent to this little girl is just perfection. I am very much looking forward to the years ahead when we can talk about Dave Henderson with her grandpa. Anyways, Hendu became an actual player that registered in my baseball mind in the ill-fated 1986 playoffs when my baseball memory truly begins (I was rooting for the Mets to make my sister Poppy mad. And it worked!). Hendu had a monumental homer off Donnie Moore which ended up contributing to Donnie Moore taking his own life some years later, but it cannot be put on Dave Henderson. He just hit a bigass homerun. Baseball is a hard thing. And to be on the losing end of that. It's tough. I always say a little prayer for Donnie Moore whenever I think about Dave Henderson (and now a prayer for Hendu and his family as well).

Luckily, that wasn't the defining moment of Dave Henderson's career. He was a huge contributor in the 3 World Series teams in Oakland (which I know was always tough for Central Valley Giants folks) from 88 to 90. Between him and Rickey they had the most elegant out of the box first steps and the most flare on routine flyballs. Watch the way that Hendu used to approach a routine pop-up if you get the chance. It's magnificent. He just had that way of being.

Those great years as an Athletic cemented Hendu's legacy and although he is not a hall of famer or anything like that, he was always a guy who got a lot of respect around the game. And he was also a guy who had played with the early Mariners who didn't hate Seattle. In fact! he liked Seattle so much that he ended up living here after his career finished. In the hard luck early days of Marinerdom (returned once again for this last ten years), anyone endorsing the city was pretty specia. Hendu became a regular part of the Mariners broadcast in 1997 and was there with Rico and Dave through all the good times. He had health issues and unfortunately died young of a heart attack in 2015 at Harborview. He is greatly missed by all who love the Mariners. And baseball in general.

And it was always a pleasure to hear Dave Henderson tell us how good he was during the 5th inning of a blowout in mid May. Cuz Hendu knew what he could do and was glad to let ya know. RIP to one of the great originals.