As has been reported earlier, the wife of Rochester Red Wings manager Phil Roof has cancer. This week, Roof bid good-bye to baseball to take care of her.
Here's the article:
It seemed that Phil Roof should have been anywhere but standing on the mound Tuesday afternoon at Raley Field, throwing batting practice to men more than half his age. The sun over northern California was high and hot and if anyone was looking for a respite from a cloud or two, it was not to be found as temperatures pushed their way toward 100 degrees. And, despite the buckets of perspiration that had Roof drenched from head to toe, he never let up, lobbing pitch after pitch to the International League squad in preparation for Wednesday's Triple-A All-Star Game.Most 64-year-olds wouldn't want to be in Roof's position, either on the mound or facing what he has waiting for him when he returns to Kentucky this week after the All-Star festivities have ended. Roof, a baseball lifer, will peel off his uniform for the final time after Wednesday's contest, retiring from the game that he has served so well for more than four decades.