I first saw it in an onimous tweet from Brandon McCarthy simply saying 'Please don't be Roy'. Immediately I knew something bad happened. Very quickly I learned what did happen. Roy Halladay died piloting a single-passenger aircraft in the Gulf of Mexico. While his playing career ended four years ago, his personal life had many great years left. Years to be a husband, a father, eventually a grandfather, and other titles. Years to speak at the Hall of Fame, years to be around the game. Years to experience his joy of flying even more. All that was taken away.
The general reaction across baseball, both from in-the-game players/managers/coaches/front office types, and outside-the-game journalists and fans tends to all agree. He was a fantastic pitcher, but a better person. Forget no one having a single negative thing to say, everyone has loads of positive things to say. This is a baseball tradegy, not only because Roy Halladay was the best pitcher for a decade, and the last pitcher of his kind, maybe ever.
Roy Halladay threw 266 innings in 2003, when he won the Cy Young at 26 with Toronto. That was not a surprise. He was a top prospect. He was a stud. He was on a mediocre team where their main joy was watching this young brilliant pitcher pitch. But at that time many other pitchers approached that level of innings. When Halladay threw 250 innings in 2010, winning his 2nd Cy Young at 33 with Philadelphia, that was unheard of. Roy Halladay was the last pitcher we could trust to throw 7+ innings each time out, to not tire, to not need to pulled 3rd time through the order. Baseball pitching now has a standard operating procedure. Halladay broke that.
Roy Halladay the pitcher had such an interesting career arc. He was a top prospect that had a laughably awful 2001 season, with a 10.64 ERA in 67 innings. He was sent all the way down to Single-A in early 2002, rebuilding his mechanics, rebuilding his baseball mind. He emerged late in 2002, had a great 2nd half, won a Cy Young and it was all set.
Then he had a very interesting stretch in the middle of his career. Great results, but weird process. Halladay started throwing tons of innings (aside from injury riddled season in 2004, and a broken leg that ended a likely Cy Young season in 2005), but not striking out many players. In 2006-2007, Halladay went 32-12, 3.46 ERA (131 ERA+), with 445 innings, but struck out just 271 batters.
Then, all of a sudden, Halladay decided to start striking out batters against. In his last two seasons in Toronto (2008-09), he went 37-21, 2.78 ERA (155 ERA+), with 414 Ks in 485 innings. In his final two healthy seasons, his first two with Philadelphia, he went 40-16, 240 ERA (165 ERA+), with 439 Ks in 484 innings. Halladay was peerlessly good during that 2007-2011 stretch.
Beyond just the strange K/9 trends, or the high inning counts, what stood out was his ability to go deep into games. Halladay threw 67 complete games in his career. No one that started around his time has thrown anything close to that. Justin Verlander, probably the only other player that could come close to Halladay's innings counts has thrown 23. We threw hosanna's when he threw a complete game in Game 2 of the ALCS. Halladay threw two 10-inning complete games in his career. Clayton Kershaw has thrown 25. CC Sabathia has thrown 38. Halladay crushes them.
When looking back at his career, I will remember Halladay the Blue Jay. I really liked his pitching style, his exacting delivery (something multiple players, including Game 7 hero Charlie Morton tried to copy), the way his sinking fastball moved, the way his cutter darted. And the way he gave so much hope to that franchise that was trapped behind Boston and New York for the decade. In that division, facing those two teams who regularly put up 900+ runs, Halladay shut them down time and time again. He gave Toronto hope.
I feel bad concentrating on Halladay's playing career so much, despite how brilliant it was, given how great a person he seemed to be as well. Multiple players/journalists have used the great line that he was 'your favorite player's favorite player.' Everyone who came in contact with Halladay seemed to be enamored with his work ethic, his approach to pitching. Everyone also seemed so taken away by Roy the person, the niceness that hid behind a gruff, serious demeanor that gripped his face, though a face that was photographed with a giant smile quite often. Halladay seemed to have left a perfect reputation within and outside the game. Even when the Phillies held an LGBTQ-support forum in 2011, Halladay was one of the Phillies to attend and speak. There's no holes in that resume.
Seeing any athlete whose entire career you followed die is always a shock. I'm still young enough that those who have died normally did in a tragic way. Halladay's sudden tragic death impacted me more than I imagined. I was a fan of his, loved watching him pitch, but he wasn't even my favorite 'Roy' who pitched during that era. But I really wanted to see him get into the Hall of Fame - something that seems very likely to happen now. He will re-set the expectations for starting pitchers to get into the Hall of Fame, a lasting gift to 21st Century Pitchers for the last of the 20th Century ones.
Every player should want to have Halladay's career, leave a lasting positive impact on every team, every fanbase, every player, every journalist, every person he interacted with. Roy Halladay didn't live nearly as long enough as anyone who lived as good a life as him deserved to.
