EH: Well, I think they might tweak it, but I think one of the strengths of the Baseball Hall of Fame is that it?s more difficult to get into than most other halls of fame in sports. And I?d like to keep it that way. I don?t think it?s really bad that you don?t elect anybody. But I also think that probably, in the long run, that the Veteran?s Committee is something that time has bypassed. I think most of the people that really belong in there, with a few exceptions, have been selected by the writers. I don?t like the idea of the second chance that is symbolized by the Veteran?s Committee. I know a lot of people disagree with that because there are some players that are on the cusp, on the margin there that I?d like to see in. But I like that it?s tough to get in.

EH: I don?t think so. I think the voting that we?ve seen indicates that he wouldn?t have much of a chance. He?s very deserving if you look at the stats, and compare him with second basemen who are in there. He ranks right near the top I?d say, but there are a lot of things that factor in. One of them is exposure in the World Series. One of them is the media center in New York. I think a lot of things get factored in and he doesn?t have much of a chance.

EH: I think I?d vote in favor of those two guys.

I really think the steroid situation will die down in a little while. It was brought to the attention of Congress and I think it?s a good that it?s out in the open. And I also felt that baseball could have avoided that if commissioner and players union had gotten together earlier and had nipped it in the bud, and issued a strong policy against steroids which they didn?t do. And they still haven?t done.

Although it was a great embarrassment to baseball, I think it?s good that it came out and maybe something will happen now to strengthen the ruling about using steroids.

The way I feel about records is that you have to take them as they come. I don?t believe anybody would be able to figure it out. Let?s take say Barry Bonds, and you were to make some asterisk to his home run total. I don?t know how you?d figure out when he started taking steroids, or if he did. It?s such a murky situation. I think we sort of have to just accept it, and as we talk about it just say ?well, he probably took steroids while he was playing.?

EH: Yeah, I think so. I think you?ve got to say back in 1909 guys were hitting less than 10 home runs and leading the league ?that was one era, just like you said. Then the spitball came in and went out and that was another era. Then you had the so-called lively ball coming in. Way back you had moving the pitching mound back to 60 feet, 6 inches. And you have more changes like that. You have smaller ball parks, bigger guys, and there are so many variations that come and go in baseball. I think this just has to be another one.

EH: I sort of would have liked to have been around during the dead ball era. I think that was pretty interesting. First the ballparks were primitive. The equipment wasn?t very good. But, maybe things were a little purer then, about the game than they are now. Though they had a lot of rascals, and a lot of things happened that they?d [laughing] put an evil eye on now. But from a standpoint of what we knew how people followed the game at that time, it was really more just a game. The only way people followed the games those days was through the newspapers. You didn?t have the investigation, and all the pressure and media attention that you have now that puts the spotlight on everything and digs in the dirt and brings out somethings we don?t want to know.

EH: Well, I?ve gotten rid of most of them because I gave them to the library. The Detroit Public Library has most of my stuff. And when we moved in 2003, I just couldn?t bring the stuff with me so we had an auction. An auction house in Chicago auctioned off what was left that I didn?t give to the library. So I really don?t have anything anymore. I had a Babe Ruth check at one time. I had my World Series rings, a replica of the 1968 World Series trophy. I had signed pictures from guys. I was proud of all those things, but you?ve got to move on.

EH: Well, I think that it is probably 1968 or 1984. They were pretty equal. 1968 a little bit more maybe because it followed the riots and it was a longer interim between championships between ?45 and ?68 than ?68 and ?84. So I think that one would probably be my favorite.

Ebbetts field in Brooklyn was really great for me because it was my first job, and I really liked the people. The Dodgers had a contending team, a pennant winner my second year there.

There?s so many things. You know the Giants won in ?51 and that was a great thrill. Just going to Baltimore and being the first announcer there was a great break for me as well.

So it?s hard to put your finger on, but I?d probably say it?s the ?68 Tigers.

EH: I?ve got a lot of them. The guy I like the best out of all the managers I worked with was probably Sparky. I think he was probably the best manager that I saw. I liked Durocher, he was a good sharp one. Bob Scheffing was one of my personal favorites. Although he didn?t last too long, we were real close friends. Paul Richards was another one that I had a lot of admiration for. He taught me more about baseball than any of the other guys.

EH: [laughing] I guess Nestor Shylack. I liked his attitude. I liked his enthusiasm. I liked the way he approached the game. I liked the way he was fairly liberal with not tossing guys out. And he was an excellent umpire. There were a lot of great ones, but I think probably he was my favorite.

EH: I tell you we could make a list of a hundred of those. Norman Cash probably. Clint Courtney was another one. A fellow named Ray Murray in Baltimore, a sort of a journey man catcher was another one. Mark Fydrich. And Ted Williams was always an interesting personality I thought.

EH: Well you know, everybody has a different reaction I guess. One of them that I liked a lot was the rookie in the Southern League. Joe Engel was sort of the Barnum of Baseball in the minor leagues, sort of an early Bill Veeck. He had a shortstop that was holding out. In those days a telegram was a big deal. You negotiated by Western Union. He got a telegram from this guy who said ?Pay me $5000 or count me out.? So Joe Engel sent back a telegram that said, ?One, Two, Three, Four, Five, Six, Seven, Eight, Nine, Ten.?

Another one I like is Gene Mauch, when he retired as a player he actually got a hammer and nails and nailed his shoes up against his locker.

Those things, there?s millions of them and it is sort of hard to put your finger on one. I sort of like the one about the two-tone bat. It started when Dixie Walker went to Louisville and he found a bat in a bucket of paint. About half way up the bat was one color, and the rest of the way up the bat was another color. That started the two-tone bat.

But all those things I like to delve into them because they are a little bit different.

EH: Well, retirement is going beautifully. I just took another direction, I’m still as active as I was, I’m just not doing play by play. I’m the spokesman for Blue Cross Blue Shield. We signed a ten year contract with a ten year option so I’m going to have to live to be 106 to fulfill it. But I’m going to do it or die trying, one or the other. It keeps me busy. I do a lot of speaking, a lot of commercials. They use me on the billboards at Ford Field, Comerica Park and all over Michigan. It’s been pretty productive for us and it’s been a great association.

Also I’ll be writing my column for the Free Press. It starts next week and I’ve been doing it every summer for 15 years now.

And in addition to that I do about 27 vignettes on FSN Detroit that they use. Just sort of stand up and tell a story and reminisce a little bit.

And other than that I’m just sort of hanging around here. I don’t miss the play by play much. I did it for seven decades and 55 years, so I feel like that was enough. I did enough damage and I’m just going to let other guys do it now.

EH: Yes I do. I went down to spring training. I got to schmooze around with them a little bit. I had dinner with Alan Trammell and some of the other guys. I keep an eye on them, more as a fan now than as a worker. But, I don’t follow them quite as closely, naturally, because I don’t travel with them. But I go down to the ballpark now and then.

EH: I listen on the radio most of the time, but if there’s TV I might look a little bit at that.

EH: Well, I think everybody’s optimistic, but that’s part of it being spring time you know? I feel everything is going good. I think they’ll be better. I’m not quite as optimistic as some people. So much depends on that young pitching staff. We’ve got to wait and see if they continue to be promising and see how they establish themselves as major league starters.

EH: Well, I had been in Detroit for quite a while before that started. I’d say it was probably in the mid 70’s or early 80’s. I don’t have any idea that I can put my finger on it precisely. But I was reading that in the bible and it sort of struck me that this reminded me a lot of spring training and Opening Day, and I began to use it and people picked it up so I kept on using it.

EH: Detroit was always a favorite city of mine when I traveled in the American League when I went to Baltimore in 1954. The first two games the Orioles played in their new Major League situation were in Tiger Stadium. I used to come to Detroit with the Orioles and I really liked the town a lot, and made some friends here. Then when Van Patrick was out as the announcer after the 1959 season, the Tigers got in touch with me and wanted to know if I’d be interested in leaving Baltimore. I felt like I had a good job there, and I was very happy there but I’d be foolish not to listen to an offer. They made me a good offer and I decided I’d come.

The franchise at that time was a well established franchise. It was a great baseball town, Michigan had terrific support for the Tigers. All those things enticed me to come here.

EH: He’s had a tough time. I’ve called him several times. The last time I called him he couldn’t’ get to the phone, but I talked to his wife Carolyn. He has had a struggle.

When he was playing he got hurt in Baltimore, and he was up and around the press box so I said come on, get on the air with us. He did a few innings on the radio with us and seemed to like it. Then he got a job with CBS on the pregame show. He landed a job here [Detroit], and when an opening came up he called me in New York right at the end of the season in ’59. He told me the Tigers were interested in me and asked if I’d come. So there was a little payback there and we had a great association.

EH: I did that for a little while, but that was sort of a Red Barber thing. He did that in Brooklyn, and would give the score and then turnover the egg timer. But it took a little bit too long I think, to drain the sand out and I felt you ought to give the score a little more often than that. I really made that my number one priority. If you don’t do that the listener really can’t set himself or herself psychologically as to how to listen to the game. I believe that’s the first thing that an announcer has to do is to keep people informed about what the score is.

EH: I never did that. I just thought it would be more effective if you just react to whatever happens. You can never anticipate how it’s going to happen. Sometimes, like Aaron’s homer you can look forward to, but it’s too contrived to prepare what you’re going to say. So I always just let it go and react in the way that it hit me when the event happened.

EH: No, I’d prepared a little bit of a speech there as I remember it. I felt like I had to do that. It was uncharacteristic, you’re right about that. I can’t remember another time. I think in Baltimore we came back and did something after the game was over. And I think in Toronto [Ernie’s final game] we did it right at the end of the game.

EH: Ideally I think they should make some kind of a shrine out of it. Maybe keep it alive and have sandlot baseball or something like that. But it seems like it is such a large problem to get money to maintain it, I don’t think that’s going to happen. I think eventually it will either fall down or be the victim of the wrecking ball.

I know a lot of people in the years since the closing of the stadium had been imminent have had grandiose ideas about what to do but, nobody has come up with any money. They have a lot of neat things that they think should happen, but nobody comes up with the backing. I just don’t think it’s going anywhere.

EH: Well, I think so. It’s a matter of practicality. I think it would probably cost a lot more money to knock it down than have it fall down. Either way it is going to be a sad occasion, but I think the better way to do it would be to have the wrecking ball take over.

EH: Oh yeah, I’d bring it up to date. I’ve been tempted to do that. I think ESPN or CBS or somebody had a TV game opening the season and they asked me to change it a little bit and I did for that occasion. But I always felt that I should leave it as is. If I ever recite it I always say that times have changed and a lot of things have happened to the game, good and bad. But I really think the spirit of the game between the lines is pretty much the same as it was.

I’ve had people know it’s written in 1955 because you say things like Honus Wagner hit a triple 46 years ago [laughing], and there are a lot of great players that aren’t even mentioned in that. You have to be selective when you make it. For instance I didn’t mention Ted Williams although he was contemporary then. Then people that came later like Hank Aaron, and Roger Maris, and Barry Bonds aren’t even in there. That’s why I think it’s better to keep it the way it is and give a little preface.