The Midnight Ramble: Remembering Darryl Kile, 20 years after his sudden passing
The former Cardinals pitcher was just 33 years old when he died in Chicago.
If you ever need concrete proof of the impeccable grip that baseball can have on a St. Louis Cardinals fan, look no further than June, 2002. Calling it a rough month is like comparing the Bay of Pigs to a rough weekend in Vegas.
The team lost Hall of Fame announcer Jack Buck on June 18, after a prolonged battle with a combination of illness. It wasn’t allowed to discuss it much then, but my dad happened to be on the floor that took care of Buck during his final weeks. Knowing how much my mother adored him, my dad would spare her the tales of how feeble a titan could look.
That’s death. It comes knocking at your door whenever it pleases, taking good things away and leaving a mystery behind at times that doesn’t lift for years. A lot of years. Four days after Buck’s passing, Darryl Kile died in his sleep in a hotel room in Chicago. Right before a series with the Cubs, the Cardinals lost their ace starter, and one of the biggest sticks of glue located down below at the team’s core.
The first thing I remember about June 22, 2002 is hearing about his death on the radio with my mom driving down I-170 southbound. We were still reeling from Buck’s death, but this one hit differently. Kile was 33 years old and in holding firm in a career resurgence in St. Louis. Armed with a knee-buckling curve and a steady fastball, Kile pitched the team into first place mere days before his death.
I watched it, live from behind the Manual Scoreboard at Old Busch, or Busch Stadium 2.0 as they call it. It was a masterful 7.2 innings of work against the Angels, culminating in a 7-2 victory. It was the last time he would ever pitch in a baseball game.
Kile had been married ten years, and had kids. That was him laying out on the field during a Father’s Day pregame run-around with player families. He looked robust and full of life, someone who could have easily finished his career in St. Louis. All of that got snatched away with the coronary artery disease. While there was some rumored drug usage in his history, a coroner ruled it out of affecting his demise, citing his death as “natural.”
But it’s not the cause of death that rattles sports fans when a player dies young, and during the regular season. Oscar Taveras passed after the team was eliminated from the playoffs, but it still felt like a right cross no one saw coming. Same goes for lesser known relief pitcher Josh Hancock, who was undone by drug usage. Coming in April of 2007 following a World Series, fans weren’t ready for it.
An attachment formed over many years or only a few; in baseball, it doesn’t really matter. Individual seasons come off as extended visits and/or endurance tests, so certain players just catch on. That’s what Kile did in St. Louis. One of the top graduates of the Dave Duncan reloaded station, he bolstered a rotation that needed first aid.
In three seasons and 82 starts, Kile’s deft 3.54 ERA gave the team late season legs during big playoff pushes. The pitcher win stat may be bloated, but Kile won 20 games in 2000 and 16 the following season. In less than three seasons, he formed a bond with the city and all the people around it.
Twenty years later, his death still stings in unexpected ways. As the team engages their new rival, Milwaukee, in a four-game series near Kile’s last sleep, it’s hard to dismiss the emotions in something that goes so much deeper than the game he played. Nobody on the current team would have a direct tie to him, but the ownership knows the weight.
Think of Bill DeWitt Jr. for a second. As the owner of a baseball team your family has adored for over a century, can you imagine ever experiencing the loss of a player on your payroll? What’s that hit like? BDW Jr. may be rich, but that doesn’t delay or safeguard an emotional toll like Kile’s passing. I bet it’s something that doesn’t drift too far from his mind in late June.
In short, it kicked the shit out of all of us. He was only here for a little less than two and a half years, but DK 57 remains unforgettable in Cardinal Nation. It’s sad but true glue on a baseball fan’s shoe, reminding them that like any single game, life can also end.
Thanks for reading and good morning.