Rare comes the showman in athletics wise enough just to enhance the show — not be the show. Arkansas had one of those rare gems. Now we’ve lost him. Larry Shank died Saturday at his Springdale home after a second bout with the cancer his friends thought he had beaten after it first manifested two years ago. Larry’s friends could fill a ballpark. They often did since 1990 when Larry became the public address announcer / genial singing emcee of Razorback baseball games, first at George Cole Field and then especially at Baum Stadium.

Always enhancing the game, but never upstaging it, that’s how Larry did his job.

It was appreciated en masse by his friends. That ranged from defining his truly close friends to those simply just hearing him singing “ Take Me Out to the Ballgame. ”

“ He’s been a friend of mine since we met, ” Ken Brock said. “ I think that’s the way it was with everybody he met. ”

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Brock is the baseball booster who, along with former pitching coach John Luedtke, brought Larry to Razorback coach Norm DeBriyn’s attention in 1990 when DeBriyn sought to liven up the baseball atmosphere.

Larry’s gift for betweeninnings patter came naturally. For all the jobs he did — and there were many ranging from selling insurance to for a while producing the television show of former Razorback football coach Ken Hatfield — his best always involved entertaining, speaking and public relations.

While attending the UA in the early 1970 s, Larry was “ Bud Shank, ” dishing out “ All the rock you can handle” as a DJ on Fayetteville radio station KKEG.

The KKEG Bud Shank was the bud for Larry becoming the “ Bud Man. ” Garbed in costume and armed with patter, the “ Bud Man ” would periodically accompany Budweiser personnel with giveaways at local bars.

Needless to say, he was a huge hit. Augmented by a strong, melodic voice that made him the lead in many locally produced musicals, a lot of Bud Man and Bud Shank morphed into Larry Shank, p. a. announcer, Swatter’s Club emcee and seventh-inning sing along master of “ Take Me Out to the Ballgame, ” punctuated by his “ This — is — BASEBALL !!!”

All that is irreplaceable said DeBriyn, the retired coach who laughingly recalled current coach Dave Van Horn gigging him a few years ago when Norm emceed for an absent Shank at Swatter’s Club.

“ I had gone, ” DeBriyn recalled, “‘ It’s 72 baseball degrees and this is baseball !, ’ and all that, and then I just said, ‘ I’m no Larry Shank. ’ Van Horn steps up to the podium and says, ‘ You’re right. You are no Larry Shank. ’”

Van Horn laughed at the memory. He marveled at Shank’s impact that not only encompassed the Baum Stadium experience but even recruiting.

“ We had a recruit in, ” Van Horn said earlier this week, “ and his dad made the comment, ‘ We were at a game in the spring and your p. a. guy is great ! ’ We’ve heard that a lot from recruits. Larry gives it such a big-league feel. Such a big-league sound. A great guy with a great personality. ”

While alter egos Bud Shank and Bud Man joined Larry in the p. a. booth, so did his faith, which made him a pillar of the First United Methodist Church he attended in Springdale and the civic pride he took as a Rotarian.

You never heard that directly over the p. a. of course. You subtly experienced it those wonderful Sundays when Larry, jacketed in a Razorback red blazer, sang the “ National Anthem. ”

Larry the Showman stepped back for Larry the man. He sung the “ National Anthem” with the strong emotion of belief yet sung it effortlessly.

With his strong belief, the Anthem’s words needed no embellishment — no soprano torturing of “ the Land of the Freeeeeeee” or turning the Anthem into jazz, country, soul, rock or any other genre.

Tom Pagnozzi, the former Razorback catcher and former Razorback assistant coach and former St. Louis Cardinals catcher for a dozen years, said Larry sang it better than anyone.

“ And I was averaging hearing 200 Anthems a year, ” Pagnozzi said of his playing days. “ I’ve heard a lot of different versions and his was one you always stood up proud to hear. ”

Long before Larry joined the Razorbacks, Arkansas athletics director Frank Broyles recalled appreciating Larry’s voice in musicals and hymns.

“ I heard him, ” Broyles said, “ sing hymns at a couple of funerals of mutual friends. I have never heard the equal of him. I was going to get him to be sure he would sing at my funeral. ”

At 81, Broyles didn’t think he would be attending Larry’s funeral.

Really none of us of any age did — even when he first got sick two years ago. It just seemed Larry’s ebullience always would live on.

And for those us of lucky enough to know him well, or even know him just from Baum Stadium, it always will.

Nate Allen covers University of Arkansas athletics for the Northwest Arkansas Times.