Tony Phillips was a ballplayer who never knew when to call it quits.
Every winter for the last decade or so I would get a call from the versatile infielder-outfielder who spent one full season and part of another with the White Sox. He always would tell me he was making a comeback, and to get ready to write "the greatest story of your career."
Phillips never lost his love for the game, but never got that opportunity to make it back to the majors as a 50-something third baseman.
And as spring training camps opened across the valley on Friday, news spread that Phillips, a Scottsdale resident, died of an apparent heart attack at 56.