They have his number

Colorado's late-season success might have been sparked in part by good luck from a dying teenager.

By Patrick Reusse, Star Tribune

Last update: October 23, 2007 - 11:03 PM

BOSTON

Joanna Blakeman called Colorado Rockies manager Clint Hurdle in late August and said he might want to visit the hospital to see her son, Kyle. "She thought her son was going to pass that night," Hurdle said Tuesday. "I ended up touching base with her and she said, 'I think we're going to be good tonight. Just get here when you can get here.' " Hurdle and his wife, Karla, went to the hospital early the next afternoon. The Rockies were coming off a couple of losses to Pittsburgh in Coors Field. They were 64-63, in fourth place and 7½ games out of first place in the National League West.

Kyle had met Hurdle a couple of years earlier. The teenager had a rare form of cancer. They stayed in contact. Now, Blakeman was in the hospital, near death at age 15, but it was Hurdle saying to him: "I need some help. I need something to change our luck. Do you have a number of something?"

Blakeman suggested No. 64, the number he had worn in youth football. When Hurdle went to the ballpark that afternoon of Aug. 24, he wrote 64 on the top of his lineup card for that night's game against Washington.

"We weren't really in the game but we weren't out of it, and we scored a handful of runs off Chad Cordero in the bottom of the ninth in a hurry ... and we won the game," Hurdle said. "Five runs in the ninth off Chad Cordero!"

Hurdle went back to the hospital after the 6-5 victory to present the lineup card to Kyle.

"I walked in the room, his family was there, and everybody was giggling," he said. "Everyone knew we were going to win but me."

Kyle Blakeman died a couple of days later. His sister, Macie, threw out the first ball before the Rockies' clinching fourth game of the National League Championship Series against Arizona.

Joanna Blakeman talked about the No. 64 that night and said, "They didn't win every game after that, but almost every game."

The Rockies are 33-10 -- including 21 out of 22 -- since that first night when Hurdle wrote "64" on his lineup card. The number will be there again as the National League longshots take on Boston in the first game of Colorado's first World Series.

It has been a surge that defies logic by a team that's largely a mystery to America's sporting public. Maybe it's just some magic attached to Kyle Blakeman's No. 64.

"It's not magic; it's meaningful is what it is for me," Hurdle said. "It's very meaningful."

Who are these guys? A look at five Rockies players who could make a difference against the Red Sox. C3

Patrick Reusse • preusse@startribune.com

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