"Yesterday's Boston Red Sox postponement due to weather deprived fans of the chance to see Hall of Famer Bill Russell throw out the first pitch.
Russell, asked about observances scheduled Sunday to honor Jackie Robinson 60 years after he broke baseball's color line, said: "You may or may not know that I was a pallbearer at Jackie Robinson's funeral.
"The day after he died, Rachel Robinson called me to ask if I would be a pallbearer," Russell recalled. "When Jackie broke into baseball, I was in junior high school. To all of us, he was our hero, and here she was asking me to be one of his pallbearers."
This puzzled Russell.
"I remember saying, 'Can I ask why?' And she said, 'You were his favorite athlete,' " Russell said. "How did I get to be Jackie Robinson's favorite? He was a hero to all of us.
"Whenever I hear his name now, I'm very touched by that," he added.
"When I was growing up in the projects, one of the reasons he was such a hero to us was because he was regarded as a scholar and an athlete."
