Politicians, friends, and admirers of Rodger Brulotte came to say one last “bonsoir!” to him on Thursday, while he lay in state at the old Jarry Stadium.
The location is highly symbolic, since it is where it all began for the Montreal Expos, who were the love of his life, besides his wife, Pascale Vallée.
In one of his last public appearances as premier, François Legault summed up all the remarks made by the dignitaries by declaring that “everyone loved Rodger.” And it was clearly mutual. Several people present described him as “a man of the people.”
Legault first knew Brulotte as a PQ MNA for the riding of Rousseau, in Lanaudière. “Rodger was president of a foundation for academic success that was associated with the Commission scolaire des Affluents. He raised about $100,000 a year and gave it to the most disadvantaged schools to motivate young people to stay in school. It was a very positive first contact with Rodger.”
The two sports enthusiasts have grown closer over the years. Legault’s wife, Isabelle Brais, even invited the famous sports commentator to his birthday a few years ago. “It’s one of my best birthday presents,” the premier revealed in his speech, emphasizing how many anecdotes were flying from all sides that night. “He’s a former history teacher, so he was quite a storyteller.”
Like Legault, the leader of the Parti Québécois, Paul St-Pierre Plamondon, and the leader of the Bloc Québécois, Yves-François Blanchet, were lulled by Brulotte’s voice during their childhood.
“I can’t count the number of afternoons or car rides listening to Rodger on CKAC,” said St-Pierre Plamondon. “All kinds of memories come back to me today. Not only did he have the ability to popularize a sport that is quite complicated and to predict things, but also to create nicknames for players or to present them in a certain way that it sticks in your head. There was colour and emotion, so a guy like me loved baseball all his life.”
“When I was very young, I used to fall asleep listening to baseball from the great era with Rodger Brulotte’s voice on my little clock radio,” Blanchet recalled.
He could still be heard in the play-by-play of Major League Baseball games last summer on TVA Sports. He also wrote columns in Le Journal de Montréal until recently.
The iconic figure of baseball and the media succumbed to cancer on March 20 at the age of 79. Brulotte had undergone surgery last September to remove a cancerous tumor in his back, but the disease had returned in recent months.
Known for his famous phrase “Bonsoir, elle est partie!”, he began working for the Expos organization from the beginning in 1969. He participated in the creation of the mascot “Youppi!” during his time with the team.
Brulotte went on to have a long career in the media. He worked on the commentary of Expos and Major League Baseball games on the radio at CKAC, then on television at RDS and TVA Sports, in addition to writing various columns in Le Journal de Montréal and the Journal de Québec.
In 2015, he published a book entitled “Bonsoir…”, in which he tells his best anecdotes, in addition to testifying to the encounters that have shaped his extraordinary life.
Before joining TVA Sports in 2011 to help with the Toronto Blue Jays’ play-by-play program, Brulotte worked for nearly 20 years at RDS.
In addition to his involvement in the media, he was also at the heart of the project to bring the Expos back to Quebec. He worked alongside the former mayor of Montreal, Denis Coderre.
Brulotte was also the president of the Quebec Junior Elite Baseball League for more than 10 years and was inducted as a journalist into the Quebec Baseball Hall of Fame in 2014.
In 2024, he received the Jacques-Beauchamp Tribute Award from Sports Québec as a builder.
–This report by La Presse Canadienne was translated by CityNews
