I met Bob O'Connor in his first year on City Council in 1992, when he was trying to get people to clean out their closets.

His little project can be seen now as a precursor to his "redd up the city" campaign. Councilman O'Connor's idea was to get people to donate old athletic equipment to kids whose families couldn't afford baseball gloves and tennis rackets and such.

He got Franco Harris to do a television commercial with him. They asked Pittsburghers to "Be a Sport," and some unknown number of folks who had hung up their spikes dropped off their bats and balls at fire stations, recreation centers, the City-County Building or Three Rivers Stadium.

It was a real loaves-and-fishes kind of idea. We ought to have enough stuff to go around if we just share a little, you know?

I thought about this as I attended the Mass and Interfaith Prayer Service for Mr. O'Connor on Friday afternoon at St. Mary of Mercy Church on Stanwix Street. At that point, his condition had deteriorated to the point of hour-to-hour rather than day-to-day. The prayers were no longer for his recovery, but for granting him the gift of eternal life after walking the way of the cross.

"Maybe his role was to start all this and for others to carry on after him," the Rev. Ron Lengwin said later, in the vestibule of the church.

Mr. O'Connor was never a man of grand vision, but then he never pretended to be. He was more like a character from one of those old Judy Garland-Mickey Rooney movies, a guy who figured he could do a little good if you just let him get in there and try.

It took him three shots to become mayor, and then he was stricken with brain cancer in his first summer at the helm. It seems now his role will be as inspiration for those who succeed him. That already seems to be happening.

Politicians weren't just going through the motions in St. Mary's. People genuinely like this man. After the Mass was over, I caught up with state Rep. Don Walko of the North Side on the street, but he was too choked up to get out much more than, "I can't express the sadness."

Father Lengwin reminded me that sometimes it takes a death to get even a stop sign or a traffic light put up. That doesn't make the death any less tragic, but when it leads to something positive "then we know God's love is still alive." Those who believe in the power of prayer don't necessarily know where the many thousands that were said for Mr. O'Connor in recent months will lead.

As I left St. Mary's, I thought how much the place suited this man. Not a cathedral, but no less a Pittsburgh fixture, the little church is known by thousands, even if not all those people know it well. There's nothing fancy about it, but that makes it less imposing to those seeking it out.

I called Citiparks on Friday to see if Mr. O'Connor's old "Be a Sport" campaign was still going 15 years on. A computer search seemed to indicate the program sputtered out a decade ago; there were no references to it after the spring of 1996.

Michelle Aul of Citiparks' Big League Sports program said donations of baseball, football, softball, soccer and hockey equipment are still received and welcomed at the recreation building in McKinley Park in Beltzhoover. But there is no formal campaign like the one that once used the city fire stations.

Somebody might want to pick up that ball. Somewhere in the city, someone who benefited from Mr. O'Connor's Be a Sport campaign in the early 1990s must now be man or woman enough to meet the challenge.

What is it they yell on the playground when the ball goes over the fence? "A little help."

Thousands have asked that for Mr. O'Connor in recent months. Now it's time to do the same for the city he loved.