Dave Garcia pretty much knew everybody in baseball.

“I remember one day, when he was managing the Indians and I was playing for him,” Duane Kuiper, now a broadcaster with the Giants, explained one day, “I knew I had him. I told him there was somebody in the ballpark that he wouldn’t know.”

Garcia smiled.

As Garcia and Kuiper walked out of the Indians dugout onto the field, Dave did a double take, shouted out to Pat Daugherty, who at the time was working for the Expos, and said to Kuiper, “Do you know Pat. He’s a good kid.”

Know Pat? Sure Kuiper did. Daugherty had been his head coach at Indians Hills Junior College in Iowa, a small school removed from the American mainstream. He was that “somebody” he figured Garcia wouldn’t know.

“I gave up after that,” said Kuiper.

That was Garcia, one of the National Pastime's greatest ambassadors of goodwill, and a special assignment coach for the Rockies during Buddy Bell's managerial tenure from 2000-2002.

Garcia passed away on Tuesday at the age of 97 following  a lengthy illness. His lost his vision several years ago, but his mind was always sharp, and he never lost his love for the game that he was a part of for 70 years. He shared the distinction with Vinny Scully, Tommy Lasorda and Don Zimmer in the four-man fraternity of spending parts of eight decades in pro ball as a player, coach or broadcaster. 

"Mr. Garcia was a special person," said Dusty Baker. "When I was a young player in the minor leagues, dealing with the challenges (of the slow pace of integration in the South), Dave was managing in the Giants system, and he would always reach out. He was always there to provide counsel."

Garcia’s heritage lives on with his son, David, Jr., who was the first-round draft choice of the Yankees, the 11th player taken overall, in the secondary phase of the January 1978 draft, and grandsons Drew, a 21st-round pick of the White Sox in 2008, and Greg, a seventh-round draft choice of the Cardinals in 2010, who on April 28, 2014 became the first member of the family to play at the big-league level.

The elder Garcia would sit behind home plate at Petco Park in his later years during batting practice, his vision having betrayed him, and would occasionally offer an opinion.

“That kid can hit,” he would say. “Nice swing.”

The listener would laugh and remind Garcia he said he couldn’t really see home plate.

“But I can hear,” he would explain. “Did you hear the sound of the contact he made? That’s a hitter’s contact.”

Growing up in East St. Louis, Garcia would proudly talk about his days in the knothole gang, and praise the long-time Cardinals shortstop Marty Marion, who he felt was the best defensive shortstop he ever saw play the game.

His playing career started in 1939 with Lake Charles in the Class D Evangeline League, and ended in 1959 with Danville in the Class B Carolina League, having spent the last 10 years as a player-manager. He would spend 50 years in the minor leagues as a player/manager/coach/scout before becoming the third base coach for the Padres in 1970.

“When Bucky Harris was hired to manage the Senators in 1950, he offered me a coaching job, but (Giants farm director) Jack Schwartz told me I’d have my job longer than Bucky would have his,” said Garcia. “Bucky was fired at the end of the 1954 season, and I was with the Giants until 1969.”

Once Garcia got to the big leagues, he stuck, first as a coach with the Padres, Indians and Angels, and then as manager of the Angels (July 11, 1977-June 1, 1978), and then, after initially returning to the Indians as a coach, taking over as the Indians manager when Frank Robinson was fired in late July 1979.

“I wasn’t going to take it,” he said. “Frank brought me there. I wasn’t going to take his job, but Frank said, `David, someone is going to be hired. I’d rather you had the job than anybody else.'”

Garcia would manage the Indians through the 1982 season, and then coached the Brewers in 1983-84 before becoming a special assistant with the Brewers, Royals, Rockies, and Mariners, becoming a fixture at Petco Field in his later years, hired as a special assistant to Seattle general manager Billy Bavasi. Bavasi’s father, Buzzie, was the general manager of the Padres who hired Garcia for his first big-league job as a coach in 1970, and was the general manager of the Angels who promoted Garcia from third base coach to manager in 1978.

“I have been blessed,” Garcia said in a recent conversation. “I never had to work. I spent my whole life in baseball. I was fortunate.”

Not as fortunate as the professional baseball was to have had Garcia a part of its fraternity for more than seven decades.