Today the Hall of Fame announced that Roland Hemond is the second recipient of the Buck O’Neil Award.
Hall’s Buck O’Neil Award Goes To Roland Hemond
The first recipient, of course, was Buck O’Neil himself. That honor was posthumous, and it’s hard to avoid the suspicion that the award was created to calm the furies of Buck’s friends who were so incensed when he wasn’t elected to the Hall of Fame in his only real shot at the honor.
When the Hall of Fame announced the creation of the Buck O'Neil Award -- "presented to an individual for extraordinary efforts to enhance baseball's positive impact on society" -- I thought, "Perfect! Now Buck's name will be in the news every year, rather than consigned to some dusty corner of the Hall of Fame."
I didn’t read the fine print. The Buck O’Neil Award is given at the Hall’s discretion, but not more than once every three years. Which is why we haven’t heard anything about it since 2008.
Anyway, I’m thrilled for Hemond, who has been regarded as one of the nicer men in the game for many decades and shows up at the SABR Convention almost every year.
Hemond, currently an advisor with the Diamondbacks, has been in baseball since the late 1950s and served as general manager of both the White Sox and Orioles. But it's probably Hemond's other work that got him the Buck O'Neil Award ...
Hemond also serves as the president of the Association of Professional Baseball Players of America, which provides financial assistance and college scholarships to current and former players, scouts and others connected with pro baseball. Hemond also helped found the Professional Baseball Scouts Foundation, designed to provide assistance to longtime scouts who are in need of special support.
Hemond was named "King of Baseball" in 2001 by Minor League Baseball and also has baseball awards named in his honor by three organizations, recognizing his service to the game: the Chicago White Sox, "Baseball America" and the Society of American Baseball Research.
Like I said, it couldn’t have happened to a nicer guy.
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