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Murphy: Ruiz was as much a part of Phillies' glory days as anyone

THIS ONE might be the toughest. It's strange to think about. We've sat through how many of these already? The centerfielder, the shortstop, the second baseman, the World Series MVP. Could it really be that the eight-hole hitter was the one to burrow furthest into that part of your mind where the visceral memories go?

THIS ONE might be the toughest. It's strange to think about. We've sat through how many of these already? The centerfielder, the shortstop, the second baseman, the World Series MVP. Could it really be that the eight-hole hitter was the one to burrow furthest into that part of your mind where the visceral memories go?

The Phillies traded Carlos Ruiz to the Dodgers Thursday. They didn't receive much in return; nor were they expected to. Tommy Bergjans is the name. A 23-year-old righty whom the Dodgers drafted in the eighth round in June 2015. This season, he has a 4.98 ERA in the notoriously hitter-friendly California League, and good strike and walk rates. But he doesn't really matter right now. We're here to talk about Chooch.

I don't want to get too abstract with this. There are a lot of concrete reasons Ruiz will go down as one of the best catchers in Phillies history. He ranks among the top five catchers in virtually every significant category, including the one that matters more for catchers than for any other position: games played. Ruiz logged 1,069 of them after arriving for what easily could have been a short stay in the majors in 2006. More than half came during that magical five-year stretch when the Phillies reinvented what it meant to be a baseball fan in the city of Philadelphia. He became Senor Octubre with his valiant performances in the 2009 National League Championship Series and World Series, when he went 11-for-31 with six extra-base hits, 10 walks, six RBI and eight runs scored in 11 games. His success that postseason seemed to transform him at the plate: Over the next three years, he hit .303 with a .388 on-base percentage and .454 slugging percentage, while averaging 442 plate appearances per season.

None of this makes Ruiz any different from any of the other players who've left town over the past four summers. In fact, one can argue that each of those players owns a moment far more defining than any attributable to Ruiz. Sure, there was the walkoff single through a drawn-in infield in Game 3 of the 2008 World Series (a game in which he also homered). There were all of those embraces: Brad Lidge, Roy Halladay, Cole Hamels. But do any of those moments burn in your memory like Shane Victorino's game-tying homer against the Dodgers, or Jimmy Rollins' walkoff double against the Dodgers, or Chase Utley's home run barrage against the Yankees, or Hamels' hoist of the MVP trophy?

Maybe that's part of it, actually. Maybe Ruiz didn't need a moment. Maybe the whole thing was his moment. As much as that team needed him, maybe the rest of us needed him on that team. They weren't the most likable bunch. Great players, sure. But when you talk about teams that define cities, they weren't it. They were rock stars, in terms of talent, and temperament. Early on, they were underdogs. But, then, isn't everybody? By the time Chooch became Chooch, they were Yankees South, their homegrown core burnished with high-priced mercenaries, their payroll dwarfing the rest of the league. The guys who didn't seem too cool for school had all the charisma of Rain Man. There was Victorino. But he was the first of the bunch to go. After that, there was Chooch.

He was the saving grace. The Vince Papale. The Rocky Balboa. The guy who saw the thing the way we saw it. Fifty percent excitement, 50 percent disbelief. He was signed out of Panama for $8,000, a converted infielder who few people thought would ever amount to more than another kid chasing a dream. First, they thought he wouldn't field. Then, they thought he wouldn't hit. Now, he was knocking home the winning run in the World Series, wrapping the pitcher in his arms after the final out, listening to the sport's most dominant righthander sing his praises. The whole time, he was smiling, sweating, staring gravely from beneath his mask. Every frame, he was there. Maybe that's part of it, too. He was the constant. Through five postseasons, we didn't see anybody more than Carlos Ruiz, squatting behind the plate, flashing his fingers, gesturing to his pitchers like a trainer to his horse.

His pitchers. He referred to them as such. I don't think anybody cared more about the team than Carlos Ruiz. I don't think it pleased anybody more to be a part of their rise. And I don't think it hurt anybody more to watch it all fall apart.

These have not been an easy few years for Senor Octubre. Halladay left town, then Hamels and Cliff Lee. Soon, the guys who replaced them belonged to somebody else. It didn't look like his team anymore, and it didn't feel like it, either. Dressing quietly at his locker after games, Ruiz at times looked as if he'd climbed out of the final few pages of The Giving Tree. Now, he is free.

What is his legacy? You know that old piece of clothing, with that long-ago smell? Maybe that is Ruiz: comfortable, familiar, enduring, a vehicle for our memories.

@ByDavidMurphy

Blog:philly.com/Philliesblog