High among the great changes in my business, which is journalism, in the going-on 60 years since I entered upon this improbable stage has been a none-too-subtle alteration of its most basic dictum.
When I came along, about the time Jack Kennedy... Read more
The list is long and filled with illustrious names of those for whom the bell tolled in 2015 after making their fame or devoting their lives to the culture of sport. Along the way they enriched our times:
It was a splendid irony that claimed both... Read more
It’s time for the clearing of the deck as another vintage year comes lumbering fitfully to an end, and they are all “vintage,” matey, as long as you remain on the right side of the grass. And again there is the metaphysical marvel to be pondered as the... Read more
In the near perpetual convolution that major league baseball has become, one month can make an astounding difference.
When the World Series ended the first week of November, the conventional wisdom boiled over in its admiration of the small-... Read more
It’s that time again, much treasured in this precinct. Baseball gets to harvest its annual crop of fresh new immortals for us to either celebrate or bicker about, although all signs point to at best a thin crop this time. Observations are in order.... Read more
Earlier this month the irrepressible Don Cherry, decked out in a costume he could only have found at a Gilbert & Sullivan fire sale, was emoting with his customarily delightful bombast on the usual grist of his CBC Hockey Night in Canada gig when... Read more
Intensely observing the Patriots’ high-wire act unravel over some three hours, with them tip-toeing as if emulating the Perils of Pauline through a maze of veritable minefields to escape the New York Football Giants, thus remaining undefeated, suggests... Read more
Stray thoughts, wise cracks, and otherwise amiable musings while striving to get through the transition from baseball to football by way of hockey with a passing nod at basketball, with all four clanging hammer and tong simultaneously, however briefly... Read more
And so it ends in November, with a half moon rising out beyond center field and the winds of winter building from the west. Baseball’s long, unforgiving, and grueling forced march of a campaign, the 111th of the modern era, ends with the Kansas City... Read more
Random thoughts while awaiting a team that has not won in three decades to emerge as champion of the entire baseball world. That much alone is a given in this classic toss-up of a finale between the Mets and Royals, two teams that like to play old-... Read more
Increasingly, baseball’s playoff rounds significantly upstage the opus they’ve been designed to serve, promote, and produce: the almighty World Series. Is this good, bad, or just remarkable? Hard to say! But it’s a fact.
Pretty much from the... Read more
Hockey is back! So God’s in his heaven, all’s right with the world, eh?
Well, not quite my dear Pippa. The Boston Bruins are already in last place and looking not likely to stray too far therefrom over the next six months.
Hold on Bucko,... Read more
In one’s puckishly misspent youth, the last day of the regular baseball season was special in a rather quaint way. Invariably, it would be a lovely early fall day touched with autumn’s wistful sweetness, a perfect contrast with the melancholy of the... Read more
He was blessed, by any measure, with a wonderful run, a very long one, too, fully four score and ten. It was thereby a sweet sadness that touched the end of the life and times of Lawrence Peter “Yogi” Berra. Would that more folks – many, many more,... Read more
Have stray thoughts and idle musings on a couple of issues to kick around while awaiting the wild and crazy realizations of the garrison finish we may get in baseball’s regular season:
With a fortnight left, the Astros appear the first victims.... Read more
