Ted Williams

popular name: Del Crandall

date_of_death: May 5, 2021

age: 91

cause_of_death: Parkinson’s disease, heart disease, and suffered several strokes

claim_to_fame: Sports

best_know_for: Delmar Crandall was an American professional baseball player and manager. Crandall played as a catcher in Major League Baseball and spent most of his career with the Boston / Milwaukee Braves. He led the league in assists a record-tying six times, in fielding percentage four times and in putouts three times. Crandall appeared in 146 games for Boston in 1949-1950, before entering military service during the Korean War. When his two-year hitch was over in March 1953, the Braves departed Boston for Milwaukee, where they benefited from an offense featuring legendary players Hank Aaron, Eddie Mathews and Joe Adcock. Crandall seized the regular catcher's job from Walker Cooper in 1953 and held it for eight years, handling Braves pitchers such as left-hander Warren Spahn and right-handers Lew Burdette and Bob Buhl. From 1953 to 1959, the Braves' pitching staff finished either first or second in the National League in team earned run average every year except 1955. When he passed away at age 91, Del Crandall was the last surviving player to have played for the Boston Braves.

popular name: Arthur Ashe

date_of_death: February 6, 1993

age: 49

cause_of_death: AIDS-related pneumonia

claim_to_fame: Sports

best_know_for: Arthur Ashe was an American professional tennis player. He won three Grand Slam titles in singles and two in doubles and was the first Black player selected to the United States Davis Cup team, and the only Black man ever to win the singles titles at Wimbledon, the US Open, and the Australian Open. At the height of his career Ashe was ranked world No. 1 by Rex Bellamy, Bud Collins, Judith Elian, Lance Tingay, World Tennis and Tennis Magazine (U.S.) in 1975. That year, Ashe was awarded the 'Martini and Rossi' Award, voted for by a panel of journalists, and the ATP Player of the Year award. In the ATP computer rankings, he peaked at No. 2 in May 1976. He retired in 1980. In 1983 Ashe acquired HIV from a blood transfusion he received during heart bypass surgery. In 1993 Ashe died from AIDS-related pneumonia at age 49. His funeral was held at the Arthur Ashe Athletic Center in Richmond, Virginia. Governor Douglas Wilder, who was a friend of Ashe's, allowed his body to lie in state at the Governor's Mansion in Richmond as more than 5,000 people lined up to walk past the casket.

popular name: Buck Baker

date_of_death: April 14, 2002

age: 83

cause_of_death: Natural causes

claim_to_fame: Sports

best_know_for: Buck Baker was an American stock car racer who began his NASCAR career in 1949 and won his first race three years later at Columbia Speedway. During his NASCAR Cup Series career, Baker won two championships, 46 races and 45 pole positions, as well as recorded 372 top-tens. In 1957, he became the first driver to win two consecutive championships in the series. Between 1957 and 1959 Baker competed in the NASCAR Convertible Division. From 1972 to 1973, he competed in the Grand National East Series, where he recorded five top-tens in twelve races. Mr. Baker was a member of Six Racing Hall of Fames and voted one of the 50 greatest drivers in NASCAR history. After his retirement from active racing, Buck Baker opened and operated the "Buck Baker Racing School", where Jeff Gordon and Randy Newman among others, drove their first stock cars. He was inducted into the Motorsports Press Association's Hall of Fame in 1982 and in the International Motorsport's Hall of Fame in 1990. In February 2013 he was inducted into the NASCAR Hall of Fame. Upon his death he was interred at Magnolia Memorial Gardens Cemetery in Charlotte North Carolina.