Bostock was shot and killed as a passenger in a vehicle in his hometown of Gary, Indiana on September 23, 1978, hours after playing against the Chicago White Sox earlier in the day. His shooter was sentenced to a psychiatric hospital and released after seven months.\n', '

Born in Birmingham, Alabama, Bostock was the son of Annie Pearl Bostock and Lyman Bostock Sr. (1918–2005), a Negro Leagues professional baseball star from 1938 to 1954 as a first baseman. Pearl and Bostock Sr. split when Bostock Jr. was a young child, with Pearl relocating with her son first to Gary, Indiana, in 1954. In 1958, the two again relocated, this time to Los Angeles. The younger Bostock remained estranged from his father for the remainder of his life, feeling that his father had abandoned him.\n', '

At one point during his youth, Bostock\'s baseball glove was stolen. With his mother unable to afford to purchase another, he had to use a glove given to him by a friend of the family. However, the donated glove was for left-handed fielders. Bostock\'s discomfort in catching fly balls with the hand he was unaccustomed to using led him to begin making basket catches at that time. The habit stayed with him and he frequently made basket catches of fly balls for the remainder of his life.\n', '"When I was 8 years old, my mother bought me my first glove," Bostock had recalled. "But someone stole it the next day. My mother wasn\'t about to buy me another one. But a friend of hers at work gave her a replacement. Unfortunately, it was a left-hander\'s model and I\'m right-handed. Since it was the only glove I had, I had to use it. It was the only way I could catch the ball. It became a habit, and I still have it."\n', '

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