Daughter of MLB Player Darryl Kile Recalls His 'Sudden' Death. Over 20 Years Later, She’s Ready to Carry His Legacy (Exclusive)

NEED TO KNOW

• Sierra Kile honors her late father Darryl Kile’s legacy through her work with the St. Louis Cardinals community
• She is part of the MLB’s Playing with Heart campaign to raise awareness about high cholesterol and heart disease risks
• Sierra shares her father’s story to educate others and continue his legacy of kindness and positivity beyond baseball

Sierra Kile was 5 years old when her father, Darryl Kile, who pitched for the St. Louis Cardinals, died unexpectedly.

On June 22, 2002, hours before the team was supposed to play the Chicago Cubs, Darryl died of a heart attack at the age of 33. 

"He was an active player in the MLB, which is crazy to think about because they have physicals and they're athletes, and you don't think that someone like that's going to all of a sudden die of a heart attack," Sierra, now 29, tells PEOPLE. "But it did happen."

In the decades since, she notes that her family has "learned to really take care of our health and get to a doctor and learn more about cholesterol and the risk of heart disease and heart attacks."

While she was an elementary schooler when she lost her father, she has learned more about him and his impact through her work with the St. Louis Cardinals community and the fans.

Sierra shares that she "doesn't have many" memories of her father, but she does "have some being in St. Louis, and my mom has been really good about sharing stories with my brothers and me."

"Last year, I was in St. Louis and I got to meet a lot of the players who were on the team with him back in the early 2000s," she says. "They all have different stories and memories to share. It's like hearing about someone and learning about his legacy and how amazing he was through other people."

Sierra, who is part of the MLB's Playing with Heart campaign, recalls one particularly special interaction with a fan at Busch Stadium.

"She'd been a season ticket holder since I think the '90s, and it is always cool in baseball to meet people who have been season ticket holders for decades," Sierra says. "She came up to me and said she had seen my dad at a game, where he was in the bullpen. She said he looked at my mom, and they just looked so in love, and it was really cool."

"That's what made me really excited about this program, being able to hear stories and hear things that involved my mom, who obviously has done a really good job of taking care of my brothers and me over the years," she adds.

Sierra is excited to continue raising awareness about her father and his legacy through her work with WomenHeart and Merck's new program, Playing with Heart, educating fans about high cholesterol risks.

"For me specifically and my family, it's really cool to be able to spread awareness and education through this program," she tells PEOPLE.

During the 2026 baseball season, the Playing with Heart program will feature a lineup of baseball legends, clubs and ambassadors who will share their personal stories about high cholesterol and how it may increase the risk of heart attack or stroke.

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Through the program, Sierra will participate in onsite events to help "spread awareness through my own story."

The biggest reason they're doing this, she says, is to "spread awareness about just bad cholesterol, getting to a doctor, learning about your own bad cholesterol and just about the risks of heart disease."

For her dad, she says, his heart attack was "very out of nowhere."

"He was 33, an active player in shape. You don't expect things like that to happen until it's too late," she says. "Through this program with Merck, Women Heart, we want to really spread awareness and encourage people to get to a doctor before it's too late, learn about their cholesterol and the risks of heart attacks and strokes." 

Sierra emphasizes that she is "happy to be able to build out my dad's legacy past just baseball."

"I think it's through just a few different attributes. His name has continued to carry on after 20 years, which is really cool to think about. His legacy is living every day with humility, kindness, and a positive outlook on life," she tells PEOPLE.

"It's something I try to carry with my family and me. Using this program to spread awareness, and it's something he would've been really proud of. Using his story is a really amazing way to do it because he was such an amazing person."

Read the original article on People