NEW YORK -- After Jose Fernandez died in a boating accident in late September, Miami Marlins players, coaches and manager Don Mattingly spent days in an almost catatonic state of grief. They dressed in silence, in a robotic haze, as they accepted the reality that a beloved teammate would never walk through the clubhouse door again.
Jeffrey Loria, the team's owner, typically avoids the clubhouse. He regards it as the players' sanctuary. But a voice within told him that mourning calls for a different set of rules. As one game of the homestand fed into the next, Loria went player to player, locker to locker, dispensing words of solace and big, grandfatherly hugs.