BOSTON (AP) — Red Sox knuckleballer Tim Wakefield didn’t get the chance to ride in the Pan-Mass Challenge, so former teammate Mike Timlin will do it for him.
Timlin, who won two World Series titles alongside Wakefield, said he and his wife will ride in the cross-state fundraiser this summer in the memory of the friend and teammate who died in 2023 of brain cancer. The Pan-Mass Challenge is the largest single-event athletic fundraiser in the country, raising more than $1 billion for cancer treatment and research since 1980, with many of the riders dedicating their effort to friends and family who have died of the disease.
“PMC is good therapy,” event founder Billy Starr said in a video call with The Associated Press. “It’s one of our great sales tools.”
Conceived in 1980 by Starr after his mother died of cancer, the PMC is a one- and two-day bike ride of up to 186 miles that has grown to include 15 different routes across the state, with many riders ending in Provincetown on the tip of Cape Cod. This August, nearly 7,000 riders will mount up with the goal of raising $76 million for the Dana-Farber Cancer Institute, one of the nation’s leading cancer treatment and research hospitals.
Timlin and Wakefield shared a clubhouse when the Red Sox collapsed in the 2003 AL Championship Series against the Yankees, then came back the following season to win it all and ending the franchise's 86-year championship drought. Both pitched into their 40s, with Wakefield riding his old-timey knuckleball into the Red Sox record books as the third-winningest pitcher in team history, trailing Cy Young and Roger Clemens; only Carl Yastrzemski, Dwight Evans and Ted Williams played more seasons for the Red Sox.
More importantly, Wakefield was a charitable workhouse, winning baseball's Roberto Clemente Award for sportsmanship and community involvement in 2010 and serving as the Red Sox nominee seven other times. He was the team’s first Jimmy Fund captain, visiting with patients and raising funds for the childhood cancer charity, and the honorary chairman of the Red Sox Foundation.
Wakefield worked on the team's broadcasts after retiring in 2012, and it was in the booth during PMC Day at Fenway Park in 2023 when he approached Starr. The ballplayer had not yet gone public with his diagnosis.
“He said, ‘I’m riding next year.’ I said, ‘We’ll still be here, and you will be welcome, of course,’” Starr said. “And then: Whoa. (He went) so quickly downhill.”
Less than three months later, Wakefield died. Later that offseason, his wife, Stacy, also died of cancer.
“We’ve all seen it. We’ve all been touched by it ... it’s awful. And knowing that one of my buddies had had to go through that, and his wife had to go through it ... it kind of drives me to do this,” Timlin said this week. “You don’t want to see someone else’s family go through the tragedy. And if you can prevent that, even in a small way, then do so.”
Wakefield's death was mourned across baseball, and beyond.
“Wake has always been inspirational, and doing stuff around the community,” Timlin said. “He was very high on kids charities, and leading by example. We try to just emulate what he could do.”
Now empty-nesters living in Colorado, Timlin and his wife, Dawn, have participated in 60-mile trail rides and other off-road events to take advantage of the outdoors. Dawn Timlin rode in the PMC four times when Mike spent the last six seasons of an 18-year major league career in Boston.
“She told me my butt’s going to be really sore,” Mike Timlin said. “You get back on your bike the second day, you’re probably not going to want to see that bike ever again.
“But she said the best part about it is you meet so many new people and ... it is kind of amazing how you form a camaraderie with people you don’t even know,” he said. “That’s the whole part about it. Just doing something as a community and getting to know new people.”
And that was enough to get Timlin, who thought he might have been done with Boston drivers when his career with the Red Sox was over, back on the road.
“I mean, there are some tight roads that you have to ride on. So, yes, it’s quite the challenge,” he said. “You’ve got to be real careful all the time.”
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FILE - Cyclists are seen at the start of an annual Pan-Massachusetts Challenge bike-a-thon to raise money for cancer research and treatment, Aug. 5, 2006, in Sturbridge, Mass. (AP Photo/Lisa Poole, file)
FILE - Boston Red Sox pitchers Tim Wakefield, left, and Mike Timlin walk back to the clubhouse following workouts at the team's baseball spring training facility in Fort Myers, Fla., Feb. 15, 2008. (AP Photo/Brita Meng Outzen, file)
