The No. 1 Clip in Your Packet. . .

Mine will now be the NHL stories I'm covering....

But in my actual package right now is the story I wrote about a high school wrestler that took down a guy that was causing trouble on a plane.
This guy was freaking out and saying that he was going to take the plane down, and the wrestler just looked at the flight attendant and said, I kid you not, "Just give me the word, and I'll take him down."
Great story, he got football tickets from the airline company and a segment on something like Inside Edition or something.

 

I've always taken a lot of pride in writing the Grapes of Wrath. I think it was my best work.

Sincerely,

J. Blair

 

A column on a wrestling coach who died of cancer the day the story appeared...

 

Good thread here. Sadly to say, I'm still trying to write that story.

 

We've got wrestlers on a plane!

Sadly, the NCAA would probably say he committed a violation (if he went on to wrestle collegiately).

 

You probably right, but he went to play football at an NAIA school. Too bad, he was a state champion at 185 two or three years in a row, but he was a beast at defensive end.

 

This one time, I worked "big balls" into the paper. No joke.
D-I soccer coached said, "We were playing big balls." or something like that.
















I don't have anything good in my clip file.

 

My favorite so far was a feature on two brothers from a local town who played for the local NCAA D-III football team. Their rather large family (can't remember total number of siblings, but it's a lot) also lost two boys shortly after their births who were born around the same time as the football-playing brothers. So, the football players considered the lost brothers their respective guarding angels. Pretty good stuff.

The best part: I called that day to interview two kids and their parents for a story on two local brothers playing for the local D-III football team. I had no idea about the other stuff until the father told me about it.

 

My best stories are the ones I didn't write. As in, I look back now and realize just how good the pedestrian stories I turned in could have been if I had given them a little more thought and effort. I still have some good stories, including one on a former Royals relief pitcher. But if I went back today, I could do a much better job than I did 12 or 13 years ago. Sigh.

 

Indeed, But you're better now and you have the chance to get it right this time.

So do that.

 

Been too long on the desk. And I've found that I have a sharp little hate for most people, especially dumb-ass motherfuckers, so that kind of gets in the way.

 

In this business? You've got to be kidding.