It's always the same when you lose a legend. The memory bank overflows, but you don't know exactly how or where to start.
That certainly is the case with Frank Robinson, one of the greatest players in baseball history and almost certainly the best to ever play for the Orioles. Robinson passed away Feb. 7 at the age of 83. He did a lot of great things during the six years he played in Baltimore, and I was fortunate enough to see many of them, but I've never had a problem knowing where to start. And, in fact, in some ways it haunts me to this day.
It goes back to a few days before the much-heralded trade that brought Robinson to Baltimore, when I had access to just enough information to be dangerous -- and the best story I was never able to write. It was the first weekend of December in 1965, right after a farewell party for Lee MacPhail, who was leaving to become president of the American League and turning over the Orioles' general manager's job to Harry Dalton.
