Quote:Michael Holding called him the "best batsman he ever saw." As a young batting prodigy, Viv Richards, so idolized him that he painted his nickname on the fence that enclosed his yard in Antigua.

For a long time he was worshiped by Jamaican cricket fans who raucously cheered every attacking shot he hit, while defensive shots were greeted with loud shouts of "NO."

His bat was, in all likelihood, the straightest there has ever been. And he played every stroke - there was none he could not play, he said - with clinical precision and unmatched orthodoxy.

Tony Becca, leading Jamaican cricket writer and historian, wrote a book on him titled "A Touch of Class." He had more than a touch. Everything he did on a cricket field was fraught with boatloads of class.