This is an odd case, in professional sports. Nearly every professional athlete plays through pain. . When an injury is too severe to play on … he or she returns at the first moment. Often before they were expected to play — or perhaps should be playing. Then there is Derrick Rose.

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Production journalists are creatures of habit. They know what will fit where. How many words with how many pictures. How to assemble four blocks, or five or six, to make a page. Fitting together shapes to complete a puzzle. And coding it up becomes a synaptic exercise. Just put your fingers on the keys, and […]

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  The Volvo Ocean Race may not be well known in the U.S. It is worth knowing. It’s the greatest race in the world. Nothing else involves sailboats circling the planet as fast as they possibly can be driven. The sailors will touch every continent except Antarctica and Australia. They will sail over every ocean […]

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On the same night Landon Donovan bid adieu (check the video at the bottom of the link) to international soccer in an emotional evening in Hartford, we were Australia fans for a few hours in Abu Dhabi. The UAE was playing host to the Aussies (or Socceroos, as they sometimes are known, back in the […]

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I predicted this a couple of months ago. How Landon Donovan’s farewell match with the U.S. national team, now less than a week away, would be one of the most awkward moments in the history of U.S. soccer. The ramping up of what is going to be days and days of U.S. media and fans […]

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In a previous life, I often compiled a list of the “10 biggest local sports events of the year” and prepared it to run on the morning of December 31. That typically is a slow day in the sports world, and readers often like to have a year recapped for them. And journalists who have […]

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If I were not getting paid to give heed, I might suggest Jack Nicklaus was still the king of golf, with this Tiger Woods kid making some nosie. Never been a golf fan, that is. Never watch the game, if I can help it. Neither in person nor on television. So if I know more […]

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I am not a sabermetrician, the name given to those who spend lots of time and energy breaking down baseball statistics. Called sabermetrics, a back-formation from the acronym Society for Advanced Baseball Research. Or SABR. But I have noticed the decline in scoring in baseball, and I am waiting for someone in the journalism world […]

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An added benefit to working at a newspaper is the fascinating things you learn. Presumably golf fans already knew this, but I did not. The man who finished in a tie for second at the U.S. Open this year has had two heart transplants. Erik Compton is living with his third heart. But he has […]

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I love this sort of thing: When reporters interview crabby old reporters, Crabby old reporters are like crabby old people everywhere. Things were so much better in the old days; we were able to deal with athletes on a human level; things have gone to hell. This Crabby Old Reporter Story is a little unusual […]

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