DOWNTOWN — When Joe Torre arrived in St. Louis as a new Cardinal and rising star, he’d get a phone call late in the afternoon asking if he and his wife would like to grab dinner with a teammate. Torre never said no.

You just don’t turn down The Man.

Torre arrived in the majors just as Stan Musial was finishing his Hall of Fame career, though the two became friends when Torre became a Cardinal, and have remained so throughout the years. Musial often visited Torre during spring training, even darting down to Florida for one day a couple years ago — just to nosh with Torre when he was manager of the New York Yankees. In the first edition of Wednesday’s Post-Dispatch, there was a note about Torre recounting his lunch with Musial on Tuesday. (News trimmed the note from later editions, so I’ll paste it here.)

The Man wouldn’t let the manager pick up the check:

IT’S ON ‘THE MAN’

Dodgers manager Joe Torre said he tried to pick up the check for his meal in St. Louis on Tuesday, but some man wouldn’t let him. That man was “The Man,” Stan Musial. Torre lunched with Musial and talked about many things, including Brooklyn. “He asked me, ‘You were born in Brooklyn, right?’” Torre said. ” ‘I used to like to hit in Brooklyn.’”

Torre said the Musials would often bring the Torres out for dinner when Torre was a player for the Cardinals. “What a lovely, lovely, lovely man,” Torre said.

That wasn’t the only story Torre told about Musial. As he often does entertaining the media with stories from his time with and against Bob Gibson, Torre had his Musial stories all lined up and ready to go for the visit to St. Louis. When Musial was an older player, he used a lighter, thinner bat, but, as Torre said, “still had this small hitting area right along the barrel.”

So deft with the bat, the bruises from contact with the ball would all be clustered right along the sweet spot of the bat. Never too close to the handle. Never ever too close to the top of the bat. It was with a swift crack of his bat that Musial delivered another, um, swift crack that Torre recalled Wednesday. Post-Dispatch writer Drew Schmenner, our Hummel Intern for the summer, takes over from here:

***

By Drew Schmenner

Playing the role of bard, Dodgers manager Joe Torre regaled the media before Wednesday’s game.

Torre was asked to retell a tale from a game between the Milwaukee Braves and Cardinals in St. Louis in the early 1960s.

Torre was catching for Braves pitcher Warren Spahn. Stan Musial was persistent at the plate for the Cardinals.

“Spahnie had some trouble getting out Stan like a lot of pitchers did,” Torre recalled.

Torre called for a breaking ball. Spahn nodded but decided to drop down and throw it sidearmed.

“Stan never budged,” Torre said, “which means that’s not a good sign for the pitcher. He it a line drive back, and it hit Warren in a very vulnerable spot.”

(DG Note: Spahn, Torre told us Tuesday, never wore a cup because his high leg kick made one so uncomfortable and difficult to, well, keep in place.)

Spahn lay down, got up, threw Musial out at first and lay down again. Musial checked on Spahn after the play.

“(Stan) went by and said, ‘Are you all right, old folks?’ and just continued on running back to the dugout,” Torre said.

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