Temple: Ringolsby brimming with professionalism

Published July 29, 2006 at midnight

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Baseball is a game of numbers. So maybe when talking about Tracy Ringolsby, it's best to start there.

Total bylines since he joined the paper in 1992, the year before the Colorado Rockies took the field: 11,621.

Most bylines in a single year: 1,038, in 1993, the Rockies' first season.

Bylines before this year's All Star break: 378.

In other words, the guy is out of the park. His typical performance would be like Ichiro Suzuki getting 500 hits in a season. Nobody I know even comes close to Tracy's level of productivity. He's a machine.

That alone, I believe, would have made him worthy for induction into the writers' wing of the National Baseball Hall of Fame on Sunday.

But his peers in the baseball writing fraternity had many more reasons to choose him as the recipient of the J.G. Taylor Spink Award in a secret ballot.

Let me list a few:

• He's trustworthy. His colleagues at the Rocky Mountain News and people he covers in baseball, from players to owners, know that he's a person of his word.

• He's tireless. Tracy is the Cal Ripken of baseball writers. He always shows up, for 30 years, and he's always working to improve his game. For years, after covering a game on Thursday evening he stayed up all night to write his baseball notes column.

• He's objective. Tracy is a reporter's reporter. He doesn't jump to conclusions. He works to understand the game in all its aspects. He's fair.

• Finally, he's knowledgeable. He's an expert. When the Rocky produced ads to tell the community about why they should follow Tracy a few years back, Nolan Ryan, Tommy Lasorda and Peter Gammons - all Hall of Famers - did the spots. The message: When insiders want to know what's really going on, they turn to Tracy.

I hope you get the picture. Tracy exemplifies the best of this profession. He's an unbelievable reporter.

He's so good that I think his writing sometimes doesn't get the credit it deserves.

Take the beginning of his story this week on Jeff Francis' two-hit shutout.

"Rockies left-hander Jeff Francis sat down before Monday's game against St. Louis, went through his plan for attacking the Cardinals lineup and made it sound easy.

"Then he took the mound and made it look easier."

His writing is deceptive. It's clear, unadorned, comfortable as a worn-in mitt. He gets to the point. He doesn't sit in the press box and just give you his spin. He does the work to find the thread of the story.

Don't get me wrong. This doesn't mean Tracy is always the easiest guy to deal with.

Just ask our circulation department. Tracy calls and e-mails me regularly with news about the state of our newspaper racks in Wyoming and anywhere else he finds them. He's not happy unless they're as well-tended as his scorebook. And never let there be a day when The Denver Post has any better position than the Rocky. He's a stickler for fair play. As difficult as it can be to live up to his standard, the folks in circulation know that he's on their case for the best of reasons: He cares.

Tracy sees what others don't.

The announcement that he had been recognized with the Pulitzer Prize of baseball writing said: "In addition to being a consummate beat writer, Ringolsby was one of the first baseball writers to concentrate on scouting and player development. His focus on those vital areas, which largely had been overlooked, enabled Tracy to provide more depth to his beat coverage."

The statement also credited Tracy for being "at the forefront of labor coverage, dating to December 1975 when he was in the federal courtroom in Kansas City for the opening day of testimony in the Andy Messersmith-Dave McNally case that resulted in players gaining free agency."

I looked into Tracy's personnel file before writing this column and found the resume he provided before he started working here. His list of references is fascinating. I've never seen one as long.

A certain George W. Bush, then managing general partner of the Texas Rangers, is listed. Tracy covered the Rangers for the Dallas Morning News before coming to the Rocky.

Let me share a story about that relationship that Gov. Bill Owens once told me.

One day when Owens got on Air Force One in Denver, he walked back to the president's cabin and found him hunched over a Rocky sports section reading Tracy.

"You're lucky you get to read Tracy every day," the president told him. "I just get to read him when I'm in Denver."

Now maybe that's something from the president's lips on which we can all agree.

Congratulations, Tracy. You earned this honor. I'm proud to work with you.

John Temple can be reached at editor@RockyMountainNews.com or by mail at 100 Gene Amole Way, Denver, CO 80204.

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