I’m conflicted about Tommy Lasorda. He is arguably the most profane public person I ever have been around. (I wasn’t in the Oval Office when Richard Nixon got cranked up.) I’ve seen him bully reporters and players, and try to intimidate them. It’s not pretty. Tommy really, really likes Tommy, too. But then he goes […]

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My daughter sent me a link to an online novelty store. It sells silly stuff. The sort of things Pee-Wee Herman would have bought in his “Big Adventure.” Without having to cut and paste, the link to http://www.mcphee.com/ can be found here. Doesn’t everyone need bacon-flavored toothpicks and bacon-flavored breath mints? Or a Jesus bobblehead? […]

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I like Russell Crowe. If he is in a movie, I’m likely to see it. Or at least seriously consider it. His current release is “State of Play” in which he plays a not-quite-believable newspaper reporter behaving in not-quite-ethical ways in and around a metropolitan newspaper. As a thriller with the generic “military-industrial-complex-threatens-democracy” trappings, it’s […]

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Roy Rivenburg does a very amusing ongoing parody of the Los Angeles Times Web site, and he has just added another sports story. This one is about Navy SEALS taking out the Pirates … as in the Pittsburgh Pirates … with sniper fire. Like the Somali pirates, see? Man, the Pirate franchise is a rough […]

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I did a story this week on Danica Patrick, the perky little race driver. Her contract with Andretti Green, an Indy Racing League team, is up this year, and speculation is rife that she will jump to NASCAR, which is far more popular than the IRL … on the order of 10 to 50 times […]

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I live in downtown Long Beach. It’s a very convenient place. Lots of stuff within walking distance. One downside? Lots of homeless folks within a few blocks. Well, actually, like one block away. But I have noticed this weekend — the same weekend as the city’s biggest event of the year — that some of […]

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John Madden is giving up his NFL commentating gig after 30 seasons. (See the news story here.) He was quoted as saying, “It’s time.” And it is. Madden long ago had become a caricature of himself, with his sound effects, and wild scrawls on a telestrator and his nearly incoherent ramblings.

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It’s nice when baseball players take the time and effort — and it’s usually not all that much time and pretty much someone else’s effort — to lend their name to a community program. And I’m sure it made sense for the Dodgers to encourage Juan Pierre to be involved in this sort of thing, […]

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Oscar De La Hoya made official his retirement today. (See that story here.) Which triggers several thoughts. 1. Boxing is in trouble as a spectator sport. And now one of the last great public figures in the sport is done.  I suppose boxing can survive the end of DLH’s career, but it won’t be easy. […]

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Harry Kalas died today. He was found unconscious in the press box at Washington, and died at 73. The news story can be found here. Fans in Philadelphia are in some distress because Kalas had been the Phillies’ broadcaster since 1971. That’s a long time. And I’m sure they will miss their guy, perhaps better […]

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