Friends say Steve O'Grady was too good to be true
By Bill Kopouras
News staff

Billy Mignault, the Salem High baseball coach, and his wife Sandy spent the morning with Rosie Cross at the Cross home in Salem and visited her husband Wayne in the afternoon at the Boston Medical Center, where he's recovering from injuries in the tragic accident that claimed the life of the beloved Steve O'Grady. "Physically, Wayne is going to be OK," Mignault said, "and he could be released possibly Tuesday or Wednesday. Steve was like a son to them, and my heart goes out to them. Can you imagine how difficult it is for them? The mental anguish?"
As one of Steve's Little League associates, Mike Stellato, said, there wasn't a dry eye in the city after the shocking news spread and numbed all of Salem, leaving it distraught and wondering why. We considered O'Grady one of Salem's great assets. He was Mr. Salem Little League. He was a great role model for the kids. Nobody was respected more, more popular, or more organized. Steve O'Grady and Salem represented a great marriage. The youth absolutely loved this guy. He was a class act. "I always told him he'd be the mayor of Salem some day, he was that popular," Stellato said. When a new Boys & Girls Club is built, it should bare O'Grady's name, and it would be a wonderful gesture to name the Little League field at Forest River after him, but, really, it's not that necessary to perpetuate his name with any memorial because Steve O'Grady will be remembered eternally for all the good he did in his 30 years. "What he did for the Boys & Girls Club (as executive director) spoke volumes for Steve. The place was in deep debt and barely alive. The doors were shut and they had given up down there," Mignault said, "but in a short period of time he made it one of the best operations in the region. Attendance-wise, the club skyrocketed, and that was a tribute to him."
It was tough to determine O'Grady's best quality because on a scale of 1-to-10 he was a 12. A great warm smile, endless enthusiasm, a winning personality, the ability to say the right thing at the right time, and above all his extraordinary communicative skills, a trait that endeared him to the kids he coached. He exemplified what it means to be a youth baseball coach. "Steve was the ideal youth administrator/coach," Tom Roundy, of Marblehead, and noted Little League umpire said. Roundy was too emotional to say much else. To know Steve O'Grady was to love him, his friends said. "He was invaluable as my freshman coach," Mignault said. "I met with the team today and there were a lot of tears shed, coaches included. His name will live on on its own, whether something is named after him or not, but if anyone deserved a memorial it's Steve. He did as much for the city's youth as anybody I've seen in my lifetime. There are a lot of good people around, but he's at the top of the list."
Mignault said there were times he'd be in a state of depression after some struggling loss for the high school baseball team, O'Grady would walk in the office with his upbeat approach and in five minutes time O'Grady would lift Mignault's spirits. O'Grady knew how to put things in perspective. "He had the Midas touch. Everything he touched turned golden," Mignault said. "He was a guy you wanted to be around. The next few days are going to be hard.
It's the same gut feeling I had when Andrew Viglas (from the 1989 state baseball title team) died in that car accident. It's a terrible feeling. It's awful." O'Grady loved baseball. He had a ton of offers for his All-Star Game tickets and could have unloaded them for mucho dollars, but as he said, "I wouldn't miss it for the world." You'd better believe he saved some of his vacation time to attend the Little League World Series in Williamsport, Pa., with Steve Marsella and Joey Cross and said he couldn't wait to get back. "Steve was top notch," Beverly's Jack Dean said. "He was as good as it gets with the kids. He was great at relating to the kids and parents. He was like a big brother to everybody; always there for people when they needed something done. He was incredible when he set out to do something. He'd get it done, period. He was just tremendous at whatever he did." Salem has fall baseball for 9-10-11-year-olds for the first time. Guess who implemented that program? Steve O'Grady. "There are a lot of people around who work hard, but Steve was at the head of the class," Dean said. "I enjoyed watching his Reds team play. You could see the love he had for those kids and the feeling was mutual. He could have coached at any level. He was honest, he was caring and he respected those kids. In turn, they respected him." Steve O'Grady was a gentleman, a product of an obvious great upbringing. You never heard him rant and rave when he was coaching his team. You never saw him when he was down. He must have been consulted when the book on positive thinking was written.
"Steve O'Grady was too good to be true," Dean said. Truer words were never spoken. "I called him almost every day at the Boys & Girls Club, and we'd talk about Little League stuff," coaching colleague Sal Orlando said. "I can't believe I won't be able to do that anymore. I never saw anyone who was for the kids like Steve. Just a great guy. I don't think there's anybody in the city like him." Which is why a whole city was grieving yesterday. "We can talk about how much he meant to the community, and how valuable he was," Mignault said, "but I think we'll have to go through a 12-month cycle of events that normally included Steve before we realize the impact of this, and how much it hurts not to have him around. "He loved life and lived it to its fullest. He got the most out of every day. There is a lesson to be learned here, but his loss seems so senseless." Senseless indeed.

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