So the mighty Frank Robinson is dead at 83.

As a young kid, I was struck by the man, tall, strong, so coolly menacing at the plate, and the statistics and awards that underlined all that the eye took in: those 586 pre-steroidal home runs and the only man who won the Most Valuable Player Award in both leagues.

And there were all those times he was knocked down and dusted himself off and hit a home run on the next pitch. He practically sneered as he trotted around the bases.

As Sports Illustrated wrote in the 1960s, pitchers figured “the only way to deal with Robinson is to hit him before he hits you.”

He was also the first black manager in baseball. He was given a crappy team, of course, an old Buick station wagon of a Cleveland Indians squad. You thought white owners would give the first black manager the keys to a Mercedes? He played designated hitter on that team and at age 39 hit nine home runs with a .508 slugging percentage in 118 at-bats.