Oh, My! Five Years Already?

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When I was a child in Arkansas, I did as most people in Arkansas did on Saturdays in the fall. I listened to Arkansas Razorback football games on the radio.

When I began to follow Razorback football, the fellow who provided the radio play–by–play was a man named Claude Campbell — but he went by the nickname "Bud." In fact, I don't think I ever heard him called by his given name until I read it in his obituary.

I don't know how long he was the Voice of the Razorbacks — maybe 10 years or so — but Bud Campbell was an Arkansas institution, and I remember hearing one October morning — on the radio, appropriately — that he had died in an automobile accident the night before, two weeks before his 51st birthday.

I was shocked. Bud Campbell was only a voice to me. I never met the man. But, through that voice, he had become a friend of mine, just as he had become a friend to the hundreds of thousands who listened to him every week. The Voice of the Razorbacks had been silenced. Who would pick up the torch?

That was many years ago, and I don't remember now how Campbell's role in Razorback radio was filled immediately. I guess it was a collaborative effort. Everyone knew it would be difficult to fill Bud Campbell's shoes.

In the years ahead, though, a new Voice of the Razorbacks emerged, one that would be around for decades.

His name was Paul Eells, and he replaced Campbell — even surpassed him — in the hearts and minds of Razorback fans — in many ways. He took over the role of radio announcer for Arkansas games, and he served as sports director for the same TV station (KATV in Little Rock) where Campbell worked as a sportscaster.

By the time I left Arkansas, Eells was well established with Razorback fans. Since Eells came along, generations have been born who have no memory of Bud Campbell.

I find that remarkable — but not surprising. In fact, it is to be expected, isn't it? The passage of time.

Eells was one of those radio announcers who became known for his signature phrases — sort of like Harry Caray's "Holy cow!"

They were pretty basic — "Oh, my!" and "Touchdown, Arkansas!" — but, delivered in his distinctive voice, they had a unique quality to them.

Eells' voice was made for radio, I heard more than one person say. And, in hindsight, I would have to agree. Campbell's voice was my original standard for radio play–by–play because it was the one I knew first, but it didn't take long for me to accept Eells' voice.

Five years ago today, Eells died. For those who remembered Campbell's death in the mid–1970s, there were some obvious similarities.

Eells also perished in an automobile accident — about eight weeks before his birthday.

I never heard the causes of the accidents, but I did hear talk.

Campbell, folks said, had a problem with alcohol and may have lost control of his vehicle after a bender. I don't remember if any other vehicles were involved.

I had been away from Arkansas for many years when Eells died, but I still heard talk (albeit remotely). Eells was about 70. Could have had a heart attack or a stroke while he was operating his vehicle.

Unfortunately, Eells' vehicle did collide with another, and the driver of that vehicle died as well. I believe the occupant of the other vehicle was in his 30s.

Well, that was five years ago. I don't know who does the Arkansas play–by–play these days.

Whoever it is, he's got some big shoes to fill.

The Bombing in Olympic Park

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If it had happened a few years later, someone might have noticed something in time to make a difference. Lives might have been saved. Dozens of injuries might have been prevented.

But no one noticed. Well, one person apparently noticed — but I'll get back to that shortly.

Sometime in the earliest minutes of July 27, 1996, a 29–year–old man named Eric Rudolph placed a knapsack containing three pipe bombs beneath a bench in Atlanta's Centennial Olympic Park, which was designed to serve as a kind of town square, a friendly gathering place, for the Summer Games.

Fifteen years ago tonight, several hundred people were in Centennial Olympic Park for a late–night concert. The atmosphere, as far as I can tell, was light and jovial — as it should have been. The '96 Games were already being hailed as a rousing success. American gymnast Kerri Strug had demonstrated the true spirit of Olympic competition only a few days earlier with her gutsy vault in the team all–around.

Then the bomb went off around 1:20 a.m. It killed a Georgia woman. A cameraman from Turkey suffered a fatal heart attack while running to cover the event. Hundreds were injured.

Meanwhile, Rudolph had disappeared into the Georgia night.

Rudolph spent many years on the FBI's notorious Most Wanted list, in part for the Centennial Olympic Park bombing but also for bombings he carried out at abortion clinics and a gay bar in the years after Olympic Park.

He was a fugitive from justice for several years — until he was finally taken into custody in 2003 and, per the conditions of a plea agreement, sentenced to four consecutive life terms in prison.

But it was more than two years after the Olympic Park bombing before the Department of Justice connected Rudolph, by that time a suspect in the other incidents, to that crime.

Initially, the focus of Olympic officials was on heightening security, and precautions were taken that were regarded by some as intrusive at the time — but would hardly raise an eyebrow today. Metal detectors were put in place at every entrance, and bags were searched. At a time when airport scans have been criticized for being too revealing, it all seems tame in hindsight.

But it wasn't enough. Investigators were eager to blame someone — anyone — and put to rest public fears. They settled on a scapegoat — with the help of the media.

The scapegoat was a fellow named Richard Jewell, a security guard. He discovered Rudolph's bomb before it went off, alerted authorities and helped evacuate the area. Because of his actions, many people undoubtedly avoided injury or death, and he was hailed as a hero.

But that quickly changed to what has been called a "trial by media." The Atlanta Journal–Constitution reported that the FBI was treating Jewell as a suspect. That was based primarily on the FBI's "lone bomber" profile of the probable culprit.

Whether that was largely correct or not is open to interpretation, but this much is certain — it focused the glare of the media spotlight on the wrong man.

It was suggested that Jewell was a failed law enforcement officer who planned the bombing precisely so he could find the bomb and be proclaimed a hero. He would be in demand as a security provider, the kind of on–the–ball guy that any company would like to have on its security detail.

He was never formally accused of anything, but his home was searched, his friends and co–workers were interrogated, and lawsuits were filed against him by victims of the Olympic Park bombing.

Personally, I was quite surprised by all that. I would have thought that people had learned their lesson about jumping to conclusions in the spring of 1995, when authorities initially suspected a Muslim man of blowing up the federal building in Oklahoma City — only to discover that the evidence pointed to a more likely suspect, a homegrown Christian boy named Timothy McVeigh.

But some people have never needed much encouragement to jump to conclusions. Sometimes all it takes is a clever summation from a crafty prosecutor. At other times, even less credible means have been sufficient to persuade the gullible.

Ironically, the only way Jewell was able to ease the pressure was to take — and pass with flying colors — a polygraph, which would not be admissible in a court of law because of its unreliability.

Nevertheless, the public bought it.

After he had been cleared, Jewell filed a series of lawsuits against those who had perpetuated the negative stories about him — especially NBC and the Journal–Constitution.

Among other things, he demanded apologies. That was for him. There was little, if any, financial gain; most of the money would be used to pay attorneys and the IRS. Jewell simply wanted his good name restored.

It was a costly lesson for the media outlets. NBC agreed to pay Jewell $500,000. CNN settled for an undisclosed amount.

The Journal–Constitution wound up not paying Jewell anything. The case against the paper lingered in the courts over the issue of whether newspapers can be compelled to reveal their sources. Ultimately, the case was dismissed in December 2007, four months after Jewell died at the age of 44.

Well, as I say, anti–terrorism security was still rather primitive in the mid–1990s. In spite of a lot of talk, I suspect that most Americans still believed what they had believed half a century earlier — before the Japanese attack on Pearl Harbor — that the vast Atlantic and Pacific Oceans protected them from anyone who might wish to do them harm.

The Oklahoma City bombing clearly received a lot of attention. So, too, did the first (but not nearly as dramatic) attack on the World Trade Center in 1993.

But, for whatever reason, Americans continued to believe that such events were isolated, that they didn't indicate an ongoing, even escalating, effort by extremists to harm Americans and disrupt American life.

And it would be more than five years — until September 11 — before Americans began to get serious about national security in a non–military sense.

If they had been as serious about security on this night 15 years ago as they became after September 11, a lot of things that happened might not have happened — the terrorist attacks in Africa, the attack on the USS Cole, not to mention the September 11 hijackings themselves.

And the bombing in Olympic Park.

I'm Ready For Some Football

For me, writing has always been my passion.

Sometimes, I have been paid to write. Other times, I have been paid to help others write better. Most of the time, I guess, my writing has been for my personal benefit.

It's my passion, though. It is what has always given meaning to my existence — whether I have been paid for it or not — and it is why I have gravitated to blogging. In blogs, I can devote my passion for writing to my passion for other things.

My readers know that I also write blogs on other subjects — but, even with three blogs, I don't always write of the things about which I am truly passionate.

For instance ...

I am a football fan, and I have been a Green Bay Packers fan since I was a child. You would have thought that I would write post after post about the Packers last season. They did win the Super Bowl, after all, and it was played about 25 miles from where I sit writing this.

But if you go back and look at my posts in this blog, you won't see an excess of Packer postings.

I'm also a graduate of the University of Arkansas — but I was a Razorback fan long before I walked into my first class in Fayetteville. I didn't need to enroll in college there to be a Razorback fan. When you're brought up in Arkansas, it goes with the territory.

Sure, there have been times when I have written about the Razorbacks or the Packers, but I never wanted this blog to be solely about the Razorbacks or the Packers. I wanted it to be a little more open than that.

It's kind of the same way with my entertainment blog, although I freely admit that I do tend to use that one to write about the music, the movies, the books that have meant something to me. For example, I'm a Beatles fan, and I have been known to write about the Beatles — as a group or as individuals — from time to time.

But I do strive for some variety.

However ...

I am a football fan. And, by late July, I'm really anticipating the start of the football season. I don't think it would matter what else was happening in the world of sports — but that's sort of like trying to prove a negative, isn't it?

Let's just say that nothing so far — not the Summer Olympics nor anything else — has stolen my attention from the approach of the football season.

Right now, I suppose, it is still up for grabs whether the NFL season will be played or if it will be delayed — the team owners unanimously approved an agreement and, if the players don't do so as well, they will be seen as the obstructionists by the fans.

Never fear. Sources apparently are telling ESPN that a deal has been reached.

Now, as a Packer fan, I will always be interested in what happens to Brett Favre, and I'll always be grateful to him for what he did for the Packers. It sure was a lot more fun to watch Packer games after he came along than it was before.

But Favre is 41 now, and the most recent word from him, after an injury–plagued 2010 season in Minnesota, was that he was retiring from pro football. Now, however, comes word from The Sporting News that he might sign with Philadelphia to serve as Michael Vick's backup.

Will the drama never end?

With the season approaching, I much prefer the drama coming from the keyboard of Kevin Scarbinsky of the Birmingham (Ala.) News, who suggests that Arkansas (currently picked to finish third in the SEC West) could well be "the next Auburn."

The Razorbacks, he writes, are "a team that can leap from something like 8–5 to something like 14–0 in a single bound." That is definitely the kind of thing I like to hear.

Yep, I'm ready for some football.

True Grit

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The United States has hosted only two Summer Olympic Games since World War II.

The Olympic Games often produce great moments for the host country, and the Summer Games in America were no exceptions to that rule. Both were noteworthy in several sports — but they were especially so for America's female gymnasts.

In 1984, the Games came to Los Angeles, where Mary Lou Retton became the first American gymnast to earn a perfect score in Olympic competition. The fact that the gymnasts from Russia and the Eastern European nations, who had dominated the sport for many years, were not there did not seem to dampen American spirits at all.

And, in fact, Retton's perfect score was a significant individual achievement — even though it is lampooned a bit in a recent Dairy Queen commercial.

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But I'm inclined to think that what happened 15 years ago today in Atlanta was even more significant.

And I believe I would think that even if the United States had not won the team all–around competition for the first time.

On this day, the United States was on the brink of that achievement. Going into the final rotation, either the Russians or the Americans (also known as the "Magnificent Seven") could win. The Americans were on the vault and held the lead, but if they stumbled, the Russians were positioned to capture the gold.

And stumble certainly seemed to sum up what was happening to the Americans that evening.

Most of the other Americans landed their vaults but did not do so cleanly. One of Strug's teammates didn't even land one of her two attempts cleanly — and was awarded a poor score by Olympic standards.

Then it was Strug's turn — and the misfortune continued. She fell on her landing and was clearly in pain as she limped back to the start of the runway.

I've heard that Strug asked her coach, Bela Karolyi, if it was necessary for her to make a second attempt, and he told her that they needed her to do so — although, in fact, they really didn't. The Russians were competing in the floor exercise, and their last competitor turned in a poor performance.

It was so poor that, even with the scores that were awarded to Strug's teammate who failed to land both of her vaults and to Strug following her first attempt, the Americans would have won the competition.

But they couldn't have known that at the time because the final Russian gymnast had not started her floor exercise when Strug made her vaults.

So Strug, who had damaged her ankle on the first vault, persevered despite the pain.

It wasn't so obvious that she was hurt when she ran down the runway, but when she landed — practically on one foot although she did hold a two–footed landing just long enough to receive credit for it from the judges — it was clear to all who could see.

She collapsed on the mat as announcer John Tesh exclaimed, "Kerri Strug is hurt! She's hurt badly!"

But Strug had accomplished her goal. Her score mathematically secured the team gold medal.

However, her unselfishness cost her. Because of her injury, she was unable to compete in the individual all–around, for which she had qualified.

But, on this evening 15 years ago, a night that will always be remembered for the drama and true grit of one Olympian, that didn't matter.

There are several enduring images of that evening. One remembers, of course, the sight of Strug standing on one foot after her second vault, then taking a step or two and collapsing on the mat.

And then there was the sight of Karolyi carrying Strug, her left ankle wrapped in tape, to the podium to receive her medal with her teammates.

After the medals presentation, Strug was taken to a hospital, where it was determined that she had suffered a third–degree lateral sprain and tendon damage.

And, as I say, Strug was unable to compete in the individual all–around because of her injury — so she was replaced by Shannon Miller.

There is a certain irony to this. Miller, a five–time medalist in the 1992 Games, was considered the leader of the '96 team, and Dominique Moceanu, the girl who stumbled twice in the team vault, was regarded as one of the team's stars.

But Strug, who was probably seen more as a utility player before the Atlanta Games, is the one who is remembered. If she had not been hurt, she would have qualified over both Miller and Moceanu for the all–around competition because of their performances in the vault.

Miller is often said to be the United States' greatest gymnast, and that may well be true. She won more medals than anyone else, which is a convincing argument for the title of greatest individual gymnast.

But I'm not entirely sure that Miller was a team player.

Make no mistake about it. Miller did make her contribution to the team's all–around triumph. She was second in individual scoring when the team competition ended, but she struggled at times with a pulled hamstring and tendinitis in her left wrist when the individual competition got under way. She finished eighth.

Strug, on the other hand, was a team player who sacrificed her shot at individual Olympic glory and clinched Miller's final Olympic gold medal with her iconic vault.

Strug isn't in the news much anymore. She got married in 2010. For the most part, I think she has remained out of the public eye.

I don't know if Strug would have fared better than Miller if she had been able to compete in the individual all–around competition.

And, thanks to hindsight, I do know that it wasn't necessary for Strug to make that second vault.

But she demonstrated — in a way nothing else could — what the true Olympic spirit has always been about.

The Birth of a Tradition

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The year after Randy and I made our pilgrimage,
he was married and living in St. Louis. I returned
to go to a game with him and his wife, Tammy.

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It was 25 years ago today that my longtime friend Randy and I embarked on a weekend adventure that, in hindsight, is the kind of thing that can only be done when one is really young — and really stupid.

It simply cannot be done under any other circumstances.

But what can I say? We were really young and really stupid.

And that weekend was the start of a tradition that was repeated annually for five years. Maybe someday it will be revived. But I'll get back to that.

(Some folks might tell you that the only thing that has changed is that we're both 25 years older. But I digress.)

Randy and I went to school together, worked together in the summers when we were in high school. He was originally from St. Louis, but his parents moved to central Arkansas when he was a little boy and settled in my hometown.

My hometown was very small in those days, and most municipal business was handled rather simply — or maybe that's just how it seemed to me. There were three elementary schools in town, and which one you attended depended upon where you lived. Everyone attended the same middle school, junior high and high school.

I guess Randy and I must have gone to different elementary schools because I don't recall seeing him or being in a schoolroom with him until we were in middle school.

Even so, we didn't become the friends that we eventually became until we were in high school — and then we did everything together.

As close friends do, we learned just about everything there was to know about each other. One of the things I learned early on about Randy was that he desperately wanted to move back to St. Louis — and, as a matter of fact, he did — 25 years ago next month. He's still there.

But, in July 1986, he was still in Arkansas. He had gotten married a few years earlier, and he and his budding family moved around some, but, by this date 25 years ago, they were all back in central Arkansas. His marriage had ended, though, so I saw him more frequently than I had since high school, and I really thought our friendship was the same as it had always been. On the surface, I guess it was, but, while I didn't know it, he was thinking again about returning to St. Louis.

In 1985, Randy and I watched the TV coverage of the dramatic National League playoff series between his favorite team, the Cardinals, and my favorite team, the Los Angeles Dodgers. Inspired by that, we resolved to drive to St. Louis to see a couple of games between our favorite teams in person the next year.

The major leagues were structured differently 25 years ago. There were two divisions in each league, not three as there are today, and teams generally hosted the teams from the opposing division twice a year. That meant there was a pretty narrow window of opportunity for us.

In those days I was working on the sports copy desk of a metropolitan daily newspaper. One of the perks of the job was that we usually got information about schedules before just about everyone else, and I remember eagerly waiting for the release of the Cardinals' 1986 schedule.

For a time, Randy and I would begin every phone conversation the same way: "Did it come in yet?" (There was no reason to be more specific than "it.") "No."

Then, one day, the schedule arrived at the office.

In 1986, the two series in Busch Stadium were scheduled for mid–May and mid–July. I don't know why May didn't work out for us — maybe because the games were scheduled for the middle of the week.

The teams were scheduled to face each other in a four–game series between July 17 and 20. That was a Thursday–Sunday series, and, even though it was mostly on a weekend, it created some hurdles for us to clear, too. Still, it was our best option.

Randy, as I recall, couldn't get off work on a weekday. He hadn't been working at his job long enough to qualify for vacation time.

I was working nights at a morning newspaper, and my regular days off were Monday and Tuesday. I did qualify for vacation time at my job, and I must have used some. Or perhaps I used a compensatory day or two that I had on reserve for working on what should have been paid days off. As I recall, that was a somewhat common practice in those days. I don't remember the specifics.

Somehow, though, I managed to get that weekend off, and Randy and I decided to make a whirlwind trip to St. Louis to see the games on Saturday and Sunday afternoons, then we would drive back to central Arkansas, arriving sometime around midnight on Sunday.

I still had to work my usual shift on Friday night so Randy agreed to meet me at my apartment around the time I normally got home (which was roughly 1 a.m.), and we would try to get a few hours of sleep. We would get up at something like 4:30 or 5, throw on some clothes, throw our stuff in my car and hit the road.

We had it planned out so that we would arrive at the stadium in time for the first pitch on Saturday afternoon. The game was supposed to begin at 12:30, I believe. It was roughly a seven–hour drive.

It's astonishing to me when I think of it now, but it never occurred to me that something might happen along the way (it should have because, back when Randy and I were in high school, we drove to St. Louis to visit his brother and sister–in–law for Thanksgiving — and we had a flat tire on the way). I just assumed we would arrive on schedule.

Oddly enough, we nearly did. Sheer blind luck, I suppose.

We didn't quite get to our seats in time for the first pitch. In fact, it was around the second inning before we got to our seats. We might have been on schedule, though, if we hadn't stopped to pick up some beer and hot dogs.

The thing I remember vividly about that day is how unbelievably hot it was. It was every bit as hot as it has been lately. The air temperature was about 105° — and I read, in the St. Louis Post–Dispatch the next day, that the temperature of the artificial surface was over 130°.

I kid you not.

Here's something else: I seldom drink beer anymore, but that's the only time in my life that I haven't been able to finish a beer before it got too warm for me to drink it.

That Post–Dispatch article explained why I saw players for both teams sprinting off the field when it was their turn to bat — and dragging their feet when it was time to take the field. Talk about getting a hotfoot.

It also explained why the game was played so quickly. The teams combined for only three runs in a full nine–inning game that took only 2½ hours to play. (I remember that a columnist for the Post–Dispatch observed that the players played ball that day "like they were double parked.")

Tired and drained, we made our way back to my car after the game and proceeded to drive some 40 miles or so west of St. Louis — to his brother's home, where we spent the night.

I remember how blissfully cool his brother's home seemed to me, how refreshing it was to take a shower there and rid myself of the grime of the day and how grateful I was just to lie down on the cot on which I spent that Saturday night. We ate what was probably a basic summer meal that night (I don't recall what was on the menu — probably sandwiches and chips, maybe some ice cream), and I remember feeling full and satisfied as I relaxed in front of the TV with a cold drink in my hand.

We got a full night's sleep, awoke refreshed the next morning, packed my car, said goodbye to Randy's brother and sister–in–law and returned to Busch Stadium.

Temperatures at the ballpark were at least 10 degrees cooler that day. It almost felt cold by comparison — although, of course, it wasn't. This time, however, my beer was still somewhat cold when I finished it. (It might have helped that our seats were in the shade on Sunday.)

The less–brutal temperatures seemed to make the players more attentive to their work — at least the offensive part — and the teams combined for nine runs. Los Angeles scored most of them, though, so Randy and I decided to leave before the game was over and get a jump on the trip back home.

Once again, everything went according to schedule. No flat tires. No car trouble of any kind, actually. Since he had to work the next morning, Randy was supposed to get a little sleep on the drive back, but my memory is that he didn't. We talked some and listened to cassette tapes, and we pulled in to my apartment shortly before midnight. We transferred his things to his car, and he left for home.

And I went to bed.

I presume he made it to work the next day. Monday, as I said, was my usual day off so I'm sure I slept late. The only thing I remember doing the next day was my laundry.

The trip was a blast — in fact, I enjoyed it enough to repeat it four straight years after Randy moved to St. Louis. It's a great memory for me now, and sometimes I wish I could do it all again.

But so much is different now. In fact, when I think how much can change in a quarter of a century — a mere blink of an eye in the lifetime of this planet — it makes me appreciate how much there is just beneath our feet from which archaeologists can learn.

Future archaeologists won't find what is left of Busch Stadium, though, for it is gone. It has been demolished, replaced by another stadium that bears its name, but it isn't the same place.

I guess it is the place where the next generation will make its memories. I hope they have as much fun as I did.

A Perfect 10

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On this day in 1976, something happened that had never before happened in Olympic gymnastic competition.

A perfect score — 10.00 — was recorded.

Thirty–five years ago, these were uncharted waters. The scoreboards in Montreal (where the Summer Games were being played) weren't set up to display a four–digit score so they showed 1.00 instead.

Who achieved this milestone? Nadia Comaneci of Romania, a 14–year–old dynamo of a pixie who instantly replaced Olga Korbut, the star of the 1972 Games, as the world's favorite gymnast.

Korbut was back in 1976, but she was almost an afterthought. She wasn't even the best Russian gymnast, let alone the best in the world. For that matter, she wasn't even the second–best Russian gymnast.

In Montreal, Korbut was treated more like a celebrity who was recognized for past achievements than a serious competitor. There was a vacuum in women's gymnastics, at least as far as ordinary viewers of the Olympics (such as myself) were concerned. There was no clear star.

And then Comaneci shot across the gymnastics firmament.

Maybe the folks who followed gymnastics closely in those days had heard about Comaneci before the Olympics, but my memory is that almost no one knew who she was. Certainly, I had never heard of her before.

In all, Comaneci recorded seven perfect scores in the Montreal Games. Mind you, that did not mean seven gold medals.

Some of those perfect scores were recorded in competition for the team all–around medals — as a team, the Romanians finished second — and the others propelled Comaneci to three individual gold medals.

No doubt about it. She was a sensation that summer, the new center of the international gymnastics universe. Whenever the female gymnasts were competing, TV ratings went through the roof. People were tuning in to see if Comaneci would record another perfect score — and, most of the time, they got what they wanted.

In a decade that saw three Triple Crown winners in horse racing, Jack Nicklaus flirt with golf's Grand Slam a couple of times, Hank Aaron replace Babe Ruth as baseball's home run king and swimmer Mark Spitz win seven gold medals at the '72 Olympics, individual accomplishments were practically expected — even in team sports.

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Perfect scores are somewhat commonplace in gymnastics today — at least when compared to 1976 and all that had come before. In fact, only eight years later, in 1984, 16–year–old Mary Lou Retton became the first American to do it.

That was pretty remarkable in many ways — but especially for Americans, who had been longing for a gymnastics champion of their own for many years. The sport had been the domain of Russian and Eastern European women for decades.

The fact that the Russians and Eastern Europeans did not participate in the '84 Games didn't seem to matter much to Americans — but it might have cheapened the achievement in the eyes of the rest of the world.

(Anyway, to show how far things had come technologically since Comaneci's day in Montreal, the scoreboards in Los Angeles were equipped to handle four–digit scores when Retton recorded her 10.)

Perfect scores were sort of regarded as impossible dreams when Nadia Comaneci burst onto the scene in 1976 — and her name was hardly a household word. Before the Olympics, most Americans probably had never heard of her.

The anchors of the Olympic TV coverage didn't know how to pronounce her last name when the Games began. They mispronounced it throughout the competition and only began pronouncing it correctly when the closing ceremonies were about to begin on August 1.

Initially, it was pronounced in an almost Italian sort of way, with the "i" spoken. But, in fact, it rhymes with "peach" — with a "ch" sound, not a "y" sound, at the end.

Someone from the Romanian Olympic team brought it to the announcers' attention. My memory is that they corrected themselves with little, if any, fanfare.

I'm told they were pronouncing it correctly four years later, when Comaneci participated in the 1980 Summer Games in Moscow. But I didn't see those Games. Because of the Soviet invasion of Afghanistan, President Carter ordered a boycott by American athletes and athletes representing countries that sympathized with the United States.

In that atmosphere, Comaneci won two more gold medals — but she had retired from competition when Retton scored her perfect 10 in Los Angeles. (And, because the Romanians didn't come to Los Angeles in 1984, it hardly mattered.)

The torch had been passed.

The Business of Safety

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It's been more than a week now since Shannon Stone of Brownwood, Texas, fell over the railing in Rangers Ballpark.

That was a shocking sight, to be sure, and it aroused all sorts of emotions in people. But even though, as I mentioned the other day, some people did suggest that Stone had been negligent (to a point), no one said he was reckless or stupid.

Not so Keith Carmickle, the fan who nearly fell to his death while trying to catch a ball at the Home Run Derby during the All–Star Game festivities earlier this week.

With concerns about stadium safety already elevated, Carmickle — by his own admission — used "bad judgment" ...

... which seems like a no–brainer, given that Carmickle risked his life for a baseball that was hit in an exhibition — and he already had two baseballs, as it was.

To make up for it, Carmickle says he is going to auction off the souvenir baseballs and give the proceeds to Stone's widow.

There is a certain symmetry to that, I guess.

But more needs to be done.

It is beyond Carmickle's power, no matter how many baseballs he sells. It is even beyond the admittedly powerful images of Stone's widow and their young son, who watched his father fall to his death.

Frankly, it's in the hands of baseball's powers that be. Well, mostly.

"The incidents, days apart, have committed and casual fans alike debating who's responsible for preventing ballpark accidents," opines the Fort Worth Star–Telegram. "The quick answer is everyone. The harder question is how."

There are those who decry the so–called "nanny state" — and, believe me, I understand their position. I, too, worry about unwarranted intrusion on individual liberty.

But there are some places and some situations in which those in charge must step in to make sure the environment remains manageable — and sports events are at the top of the list.

There was a time in my life when I went to sports events frequently — especially during (and even after) my college years. There is an undeniable excitement that comes with being there, and, most of the time, I think people are content simply to savor the moment.

We've all seen crowds that got out of control. It would be nice if we could always be sure that good sense will prevail, but we have seen too many Carmickles — they're usually the guys who are shirtless in sub–freezing weather.

Safety truly is everyone's business — but, until we can be 100% certain that fans will always behave maturely, management must shoulder most of the responsibility.

A Rivalry Like No Other

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It is much too early to label Maria Sharapova and Petra Kvitova the successors to Chris Evert and Martina Navratilova as the greatest rivals in women's tennis.

Sharapova and Kvitova have only played in one Grand Slam final. There may be several more clashes in their future — or there may be no more.

But, since we are only removed from their memorable Wimbledon final by a few weeks, I just thought I would reflect a little on that Evert–Navratilova rivalry.

Their last Grand Slam final was played 25 years ago. It was in the French Open, where they played for a Grand Slam title the first time, back in 1973. When they played for that French Open title in 1986, Evert was 31. Navratilova was not yet 30. The world had watched them grow from teenagers to their sport's elder stateswomen.

I don't know if we will ever witness another rivalry like it. In a 15–year span, they met 80 times. More than three–quarters of the time, they met in the final of a tournament — and nearly a quarter of those matches were Grand Slam finals.

I have compared them to the Lakers and the Celtics of the 1980s. That's a good comparison, I think, although it doesn't hold up 100%.

True, those teams didn't face each other in the NBA Finals as frequently in the 1980s as they did in the 1960s; nevertheless, in the 1980s it often seemed that, no matter how well any of the other teams had played, the early rounds of the playoffs merely served as warmups for the inevitable championship series between Boston and Los Angeles.

And that's what the women's singles were like in Grand Slams in the 1970s and 1980s. Yes, other women did win those titles from time to time — but the early rounds of tournaments often seemed like a waste of time in those days.

There was Chris Evert, and there was Martina Navratilova. And then there was everyone else.

A Starry Night

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If you have ever watched a major league baseball all–star game (including the one that was played last night), you are sure to have seen the clip of Pete Rose ripping into Ray Fosse like a chainsaw to score the winning run in the 12th inning of the 1970 All–Star Game.

I remember watching that game. I was heavily into baseball card collecting in those days, but, with the exception of Saturday afternoon baseball broadcasts and the playoffs, I seldom saw a major league game.

I remember listening to St. Louis Cardinals games on the radio when I was a child (and picturing in my mind the faraway stadiums in faraway cities), but nearly all of the pro ball games I saw in person before my teenage years were played by the minor league team that was based in Little Rock.

Cable began to change all that a decade or so later, but the All–Star Game was always a big deal to me when I was growing up. No matter how infrequently I saw major league games, I always knew that the guys playing in the All–Star Game were all but certain to wind up in the Hall of Fame.

The teams that met in Detroit's Tiger Stadium 40 years ago tonight were loaded with guys who were destined for Cooperstown. Eleven of the guys on the National League roster, and nine players on the American League roster have made it so far.

One of those players was Reggie Jackson, who was playing for the Oakland Athletics in those days. He didn't start that All–Star Game, but he came in after a few innings and, in the third inning, he hit a home run that propelled the American League to its only All–Star victory between 1962 and 1982.

Every run in the American League's 6–4 triumph scored on home runs that came from the bat of a future Hall of Famer. Other than that, there was nothing especially noteworthy about them — except for Jackson's. It was a towering shot that covered more than 500 feet — and might well have gone farther had it not hit some lights.

I was reminded of that home run several years later when I saw nearly the same thing (albeit with quite a bit more of a pyrotechnic effect) dramatized in the film "The Natural."

(The other future Hall of Famers who drilled homers in that game — setting an All–Star Game record for home runs by both teams that still stands, I believe — were Johnny Bench, Hank Aaron, Frank Robinson, Harmon Killebrew and Roberto Clemente.)

There were other things that made the '71 Midsummer Classic memorable.

For one thing, it was the last All–Star Game ever played at historic Tiger Stadium. When the All–Star Game returned to Detroit in 2005, the Tigers were playing in a different facility.

It was also the last time Clemente appeared in an All–Star Game. An All–Star selection 15 times in his magnificent career, Clemente actually was chosen again in 1972 but was injured at the time of the game and unable to play.

He died a few months later in a plane crash while taking relief supplies to earthquake victims in Nicaragua.

Clemente's solo home run in the top of the eighth was the last run scored in the 1971 All–Star Game — and Clemente's final All–Star at–bat.

I suppose it foreshadowed, in a way, the conclusion of his regular–season career a year later. On the last day of the 1972 season, in his last at–bat, Clemente got his 3,000th hit.

Death Be Not Proud

Tomorrow, major league baseball's stars will be gathering in Arizona to play the annual Midsummer Classic, the All–Star Game.

The first All–Star Game was played nearly 80 years ago; it was part of the 1933 Chicago World's Fair. Only once since that time has the game not been played — when World War II interfered in 1945.

Otherwise, however, it has been an annual baseball tradition. Barring a totally unexpected development, it will be renewed tomorrow night.

Today, friends and family — and even folks who never knew the man — gathered in central Texas to say goodbye to a fellow who probably would have been watching the All–Star Game with his young son, the way they apparently had watched many baseball games together in the past.

But that fellow, firefighter Shannon Stone, fell to his death at Rangers Ballpark last week, trying to catch a baseball for his son — who witnessed the whole thing.

I'm sure you know that story by now. One struggles to find some meaning in it. Death — or fate or whatever — is always doing this. It takes people in horribly random and cruel ways.

We've always known that life isn't fair. Turns out that death isn't, either.

The more religious among us always assure us when tragedy strikes that "God has a plan," and they speak of his incomprehensibly "mysterious ways."

That is intended to comfort those who grieve, even those who never knew the person who died. But sometimes there is little comfort to be found in those words.

For many of us, it is hard to see how this contributes to such a "plan." God's ways are a bit too mysterious for the mortal mind.

As a writer, my inclination on such an occasion is to put my thoughts on paper, but that isn't always easy. Sometimes I want to know what others are saying.

I've re–discovered — as if such a reminder was necessary — that the human mind also looks for someone to blame when terrible things happen. But that's the thing that has been so frustrating about this matter, I suppose. There is no one to blame. Everyone's intentions were good. No one meant for anything bad to happen.

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Should we blame Josh Hamilton because his toss was just a little short? He was only trying to accommodate the fans.

Should we blame Stone because he lost his balance? It's true that fans must bear a certain amount of responsibility for their own safety — and I've heard some people suggest that Stone was negligent, at least in part, because of the "recklessness" of his own behavior and because his footwear apparently provided him with little, if any, traction.

But, although there have been similar incidents at Rangers Ballpark in the past, falls were not epidemic. There was no reason for that possibility to dictate what he wore or anything else.

Should we blame the Ballpark management because the railings, even if they do exceed existing city requirements, are lower than they probably should be? The management couldn't foresee this, although I do think, as I have said, that making certain that stadiums are safe and family friendly, not merely that they meet city codes, should be their top concern now.

I guess I feel I am too close to this one — much as I did 16 years ago when I lived about a half hour's drive from where Timothy McVeigh blew up the federal building in Oklahoma City — and I need the perspectives of those who are farther removed.

In the aftermath of Thursday's tragedy, I have been thinking about something that I hadn't thought about in several years.

When I was teaching journalism at the University of Oklahoma, a student of mine died in a freak accident at his fraternity.

There was a ritual at this fraternity that involved the members going outside following a house meeting and shaking the flagpole. I don't know why. How does any tradition begin?

I don't know how long it had been done, but nothing had happened to anyone before. On this occasion, however, the upper one–third or so of the flagpole snapped and fell, striking my student and another boy. The other boy suffered minor injuries. My student, however, suffered far more serious injuries and died the following day.

There was no one and nothing to blame for that accident, either. The students who shook the flagpole had no reason to think it might snap. As far as I know, it had never snapped before. No one intended for anything bad to happen. Even so, a young man lost his life.

And, like the tragic case of Shannon Stone, we were left with lots of questions and precious few answers.

In my quest for understanding, I have found some fascinating observations from some folks who may never have been to Texas — but they understand things like childhood and fatherhood and the need to strike a better balance between fun and safety:

• Like Steve Solloway of the Portland (Maine) Press Herald, who wrote very movingly of the "purity of the moment" that should have ended in triumph but ended in tragedy instead.
  
  All that Stone sought, Solloway wrote, was "[a] baseball to forever remind him and his son of the July day they watched the Texas Rangers play a game. It can't be any simpler than that, which makes the sorrow that much harder to bear.
  
  "Until this week," concluded Solloway, "Shannon Stone was a stranger to most when in fact, he was always one of us."


• If there is something good to take away from this, it may be that "baseball fans across the country are discussing ballpark safety," reports Paul Blume of FOX9 News in Minnesota's Twin Cities.
  
  Of course, each ballpark is designed differently, and no facility can be prepared for the sizes of all the people who might buy tickets to events there, but if Stone's death leads to an across–the–board requirement of railings that are higher than most adults' centers of gravity, well ...

... as I say, if that is what ultimately comes from this tragedy, that will be a good thing.

• Rodger Jones of the Dallas Morning News says, in response to a survey on a blog on the News' website, that baseball players should not be banned from throwing balls to the fans.
  
  I agree. That would be a knee–jerk overreaction.
  
  However, he does believe railings should be raised — even if they make it difficult for some fans to see what is happening on the field.
  
  "Sightlines be damned," he writes. "If you disagree, wonder how you would feel if the next accident (and there will be one) involves someone you know."

Couldn't have said it better myself.

We Should Do What We Can

The deeper one goes into the tragic story of Shannon Stone, the firefighter who fell to his death during Thursday night's Ranger game, the more pointless his death seems to be.

But I believe it is a clarion call.

Stone, as just about everyone knows by now, tumbled over the railing trying to catch a baseball. What went through his mind, what motivated him can only be guessed — but the emerging story of a devoted father strongly suggests he was trying to catch it for his son.

Such selflessness only makes this story more tragic.

There was a time when most, if not all, ballparks had netting around elevated sections — but that practice was stopped, as I understand it, because fans went out on the netting to try to catch baseballs, making it unsafe.

Yes, there was a railing in front of Stone's seat — but if you have seen the video, you know that it wasn't sufficient to prevent even an average–sized man from losing his balance if he was leaning forward trying to catch a ball. (I haven't heard how tall Stone was, but, just from watching the video and knowing his profession, my guess is that he was taller than average.)

I was listening to a local sports talk radio show here in Dallas yesterday, and one of the hosts reminisced about when he moved to the area in the 1990s and there wasn't even a railing like the one that could not prevent Thursday's tragedy — as if the fact that the installation of a short railing since that time could somehow mitigate what happened.

It can't, of course, but it is a reminder that there are steps that baseball in general, not just the Rangers organization, needs to consider. Seriously.

Rangers President Nolan Ryan pointed out that players toss balls into the stands all the time now. He doesn't remember whether there was a policy that either encouraged or discouraged it when he was playing, but he speculated that it evolved from a desire on the part of baseball in general to be more accessible to fans.

That's a good objective, but it carries a certain amount of responsibility. What happened in Arlington can happen anywhere, and the co–objective must be to prevent tragedies like that from happening again.

Stadium management can't install a two–foot railing and honestly believe it can keep a six–foot man from falling. You can't take away netting that is supposed to keep people safe because inadequate security permits people to congregate on them.

Stone was doing something that has become increasingly difficult for people to do — take their children to ballgames. Gone are the days when a father could take his kids to a ballgame and buy them hot dogs and caps for a few bucks.

It's a major investment now, especially in this economy, but there are still folks who want to share the experience with their children.

Baseball should do whatever it can to encourage them to do that. To be sure, baseball does have special promotions, yes — Family Night or Ball Night or whatever — but that is really about the profit margin, not fan safety.

It may be more confining — and expensive — for fans to install more adequate barriers to keep them from being hurt. It may be more expensive to hire additional security people to make sure no one gets on the netting during games.

But isn't the good public relations of a safe, family–friendly environment worth it?

Drivers don't like being told to wear seatbelts, and motorcyclists don't like being compelled to wear helmets, but they are required to do so because they make the experience safer.

Really, I believe this should be a no–brainer.

I sort of feel the way the panels investigating the sinking of the Titanic must have felt when they heard that there were not enough lifeboats to accommodate everyone on board.

Why not?

The people who operated the Titanic justified their decision a couple of ways — (a) the Titanic was believed to be unsinkable, and (b) the lifeboats on board met specifications. As I recall from my studies of that disaster, the number of lifeboats actually exceeded what was required at the time. But still there weren't enough.

We know sports events aren't always safe — and there are certain things you really can't prevent — but it is incumbent upon stadium management to do whatever it can.

When Reality Intrudes

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I've heard this said in other ways — more eloquent ways — so please forgive my feeble and wholly inadequate paraphrase:

People watch sports in part to escape from reality.

They may wish to get away from any one of several kinds of realities, and sports events are diversions. They're almost like fiction, like a movie or a TV show, a drama that people watch for a few hours before returning to their lives and whatever it was they wished to escape.

Sports events are the way we wish our lives could be. Someone wins and someone loses. No one wins all the time. But athletes learn from their failures, and they know that tomorrow is another day — a new day. No mistake, no miscalculation is final. Redemption is always possible.

Sure, sometimes there are tears in the losing locker room after a particularly hard fought athletic contest. But deep down, most athletes know — even if they have just lost a championship — that they will have another opportunity. The sun will come up tomorrow. The slate will be wiped clean.

Perhaps one of my favorite journalists of all time, sportswriter Red Smith, once wrote that people go to athletic events to have fun — and then they pick up the newspaper the next day to read about it and have fun all over again.

And, nearly every time that people have gathered for sports events in human history, it has been fun.

But what happened last night at a Texas Rangers baseball game in Arlington, Texas, definitely was not fun, particularly for the folks sitting in an upper section of the Ballpark. A man was reaching over a railing, trying to catch a ball, and he fell head first to his death after he apparently lost his balance.

The Dallas Morning News quotes a witness as saying that "[i]t looked awful because you knew there was no way he was going to land on his feet."

The man's young son was with him and, presumably, saw the whole thing.

Since I heard about this tragic story, I've been thinking about the (admittedly few) times that I have gone to professional baseball games.

Most of the time, I've attended minor league games in small, intimate ballparks where virtually all the seats were on the ground level — so such a tragedy was not really possible.

But there have been times when I have attended major league games in their palatial stadiums, and I have sat in upper decks — although never on the front row behind a railing.

Nevertheless, from time to time, it did cross my mind, as I ascended each level, that the farther up we went, the greater the chance of something bad happening.

But something bad never did happen. It was just my imagination running away with me. The fantasy was safe.

That fantasy has been shattered now for a young boy — and countless others, too, although his loss is clearly the greatest.

I presume that his father, like most of the men who live in Texas, was a sports fan who would have wanted to pass on his love of sports to his son.

But, after watching his father die, I can only wonder if such a thing is possible for that young boy now.

Will he ever be able to watch a baseball game — or any sports event — without seeing his father tumbling over the railing in Rangers Ballpark?

Will he ever be able to erase the memory of seeing his father on the pavement below, his head apparently bleeding profusely?

I have loved sports since I was small. It was a passion my father passed along to me. Dad was never much for "having a catch," as Kevin Costner put it in "Field of Dreams," but he has always loved the drama of athletic competition and admired the skill it takes to excel.

And, if I outlive my father, one of the ways I will honor his memory is by watching and savoring athletic contests.

I hope that young boy will be able to do the same.

John Mackey Dies

If you go to the NFL Hall of Fame in Canton, Ohio, you will see more than 250 players, coaches and owners who are enshrined there.

But only eight of those individuals were tight ends.

In fact, it was a quarter of a century after the Hall of Fame opened its doors that the first tight end was inducted.

John Mackey, who died yesterday at the age of 69, was the second tight end to be inducted — in 1992, 30 years after the Hall of Fame's inaugural class.

His playing days were mostly in the 1960s — from 1963 to 1972 — and most of them were spent with the Colts, back when they were based in Baltimore.

Nearly half of the tight ends in the Hall of Fame never played in a Super Bowl, but Mackey did. He played in two of the first five Super Bowls, winning one and losing one.

The legendary Don Shula, who coached Mackey from 1963 to 1969, said he revolutionized the role of a tight end, and it is hard to argue with that. He played in five Pro Bowls, and he was named to the All–Decade team for the 1960s. Only two of his Baltimore teammates — quarterback Johnny Unitas and cornerback Bobby Boyd — were also named to the team.

There were many things that made John Mackey unique.

For one thing, in Super Bowl V, he set a record for the longest reception for anyone, not just tight ends, in a Super Bowl — his 75–yard TD reception.

(Unfortunately, that game is probably remembered more for other things — like the sloppy play [nearly a dozen turnovers by the two teams combined] and the, in hindsight, rather ordinary field goal that won the game in its closing seconds.)

For another, he missed only one game in a 10–year pro career. Few players at any position can say that.

Ironically, injuries probably forced him to retire earlier than he would have chosen — and injuries, perhaps unrecognized at the time, may have played a role in his death. Mackey suffered from dementia and was forced to move to an assisted–living facility four years ago.

An NFL Players Association president after his playing days were over, Mackey's most important contribution to pro football may well have been the one he made in his last years.

At first, the NFLPA wasn't going to pay disability income because a link between brain injury and pro football had not been proven, but, thanks to the efforts of Mackey and his wife, the policy was changed (emerging medical evidence probably played something of a role in that, too). The NFL and the NFLPA came up with the "88 plan," which provides up to $88,000 annually for nursing home care and $50,000 annually for adult day care.

The figure of 88 originated from the jersey number that Mackey wore. Hopefully, it will be a lasting tribute to a special man.

Breakfast at Wimbledon

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For me, it was like old times.

When I was a child, I remember that my mother always made a production of the women's singles final at Wimbledon. She would get up early on the designated Saturday, prepare bowls of fresh strawberries and cream, the traditional Wimbledon snack, and we would watch the final on TV together.

I guess my earliest such memory is of watching Billie Jean King win it all. I'm not sure which year that was — she won it six times.

Sometimes my younger brother would join us, but mostly it was just my mother and me.

Anyway, yesterday morning I got up early to watch Maria Sharapova take on Petra Kvitova. As I say, it was like old times — except no strawberries and cream. And no Mom.

It differed in another way, too. The person I was pulling for did not win.

I was rooting for Sharapova. I've been a fan of hers since she won Wimbledon seven years ago. Since that day, she struggled to get back to the final, eventually overcoming injuries and inconsistent play; I have found her persistence admirable, even inspiring, a metaphor for our times.

The world needs inspiring people today — and I thought folks could find inspiration in Sharapova's gritty push to re–claim the Wimbledon crown.

But — almost in spite of myself — I found Kvitova's dogged determination inspiring, too.

Even though she had been seeded eighth, Kvitova proved that she is a force with which the others must contend. She is only 21. They can expect her to be around for awhile.

In many ways, Kvitova is, as Mark Hodgkinson of The Telegraph writes, the anti–Maria. A lot of folks are put off by her much–publicized shrieking on the court. They just can't warm up to it.

I think one of the things that drew people to Sharapova when she won Wimbledon in 2004 was her youth and apparent innocence. There was talk at the time of how she would shriek on court, but lots of folks seemed to overlook it.

Perhaps they were willing to do so because she was so young, and people were inclined to think it was simply a youthful anomaly — something she would outgrow.

She was young, all right (17), but she might not have been as innocent as many folks may have wanted to believe. As at least one sports journalist observed recently, when Sharapova was something of a prodigy at the age of 13, she was asked if she would rather get multi–million–dollar endorsements or a Wimbledon championship.

She replied that she would prefer to win Wimbledon — because, if she did that, the rest would follow.

That suggests not the dreamy ambition that is typical of the young — but the cold, calculated conclusion of a much more mature person.

Kvitova comes to the spotlight older and, presumably, more mature than Sharapova was when she won Wimbledon, but their accomplishments were similar. Both upset established (and favored) foes.

Now, we will see if it takes longer for Kvitova to return to the championship than it took Sharapova — or whether, for that matter, Kvitova will ever raise that plate in triumph again.

The Stuff That Dreams Are Made Of

I didn't grow up in a major–league town — or anywhere close to one, so I rarely saw major–league baseball in person.

But a couple of times, when I was about 11 or 12, my family took summer trips to St. Louis, where we went to see the Cardinals play in the old Busch Memorial Stadium.

To a young boy from Conway, Ark., it was like a trip to Mecca — even though I have been a Dodger fan most of my life.

On one of those occasions, we were privileged to see two of the best pitchers of my childhood, Tom Seaver and Bob Gibson, pitch against each other.

That game lived up to expectations. It was a low–scoring pitchers' duel, and it went into extra innings (both Seaver and Gibson had been relieved at that point). Unfortunately, we missed the ending. It was unseasonably cool in St. Louis that evening, and my parents decided to take my brother and me to the motel's courtesy van to listen to the finish and wait for the others to join us.

Consequently, we heard the dramatic finish on the radio — St. Louis' Ted Sizemore hit an inside–the–park home run.

Many years later, when I was working for a newspaper in north Texas, a co–worker of mine and I did a little projecting based on pitching rotations and determined that Nolan Ryan (who had just joined the Rangers) would be facing Boston's Roger Clemens in Arlington. We bought tickets ahead of time — and prayed that nothing (like rain or injury) would interfere.

Ryan and Clemens did face each other that day, as we expected, and that game also lived up to expectations. It was another low–scoring duel, and I later learned that Ryan, who was in his 40s by that time, had been throwing with back spasms since the second inning. He hung in there, though, until the Rangers took the lead with a two–run homer in the bottom of the eighth.

The Rangers went on to win the game.

Those are, without a doubt, the four best pitchers I have ever seen in person (although there was one time when I was visiting some friends in St. Louis and we went to see a Cardinal–Dodger game and we almost collided with Orel Hershiser as he was leaving the stadium and going across the street to his hotel and we were making our way back our car — but Hershiser didn't pitch that day and, besides, that's a story for another time), and those two pitchers' duels were extraordinarily entertaining.

But I will concede that Jim Kaplan just might be right when he writes about a game that was played 48 years ago today and calls it "the greatest game ever pitched."

Now, there have been many games that have been mentioned as the greatest game ever pitched, and Kaplan admits that in an article he wrote for Sports Illustrated.

"Opponents trot out the usual suspects," he writes, "like the 1–0 perfect game Cleveland's Addie Joss threw against the White Sox' Ed Walsh on October 2, 1908; the 26–inning, 1–1 tie pitched in 1920 by Joe Oeschger of the Boston Braves and Leon Cadore of the Brooklyn Dodgers; Harvey Haddix's unprecedented 12–inning, 1959 perfect game that he lost in the 13th; and Sandy Koufax's 1965 perfecto in which losing pitcher Bob Hendley of the Cubs allowed one hit and two base runners."

To use Kaplan's own word, those games — and others — were each "remarkable."

But the game played between the Milwaukee Braves and the San Francisco Giants on this day in 1963 was unique. "There was nothing to compare it to," Kaplan writes.

That's tough to dispute.

"On that day, a pair of future Hall of Famers, one with his best days behind him, the other with his career blossoming before him, engaged in a battle never seen before or since," Kaplan writes. "Spahn, already an icon, had debuted during World War II and was in the midst of his 13th and final 20–win season. Marichal, among the game's new breed of Latin stars who were changing the face of baseball, was en route to his first of six 20–win seasons."

That was similar, I guess, to the game I saw between Texas and Boston. Ryan was nearing the end of his career, Clemens was in the early stages of his.

But they didn't pitch against each other for 15 scoreless innings, as Marichal and Spahn did. A home run did decide the outcome of the Marichal–Spahn battle — but it came from the bat of one of the most prolific home run hitters in history, Willie Mays, who hit the 15th of what would be 38 home runs that season.

(Hank Aaron could have been the hero instead. He was in Milwaukee's lineup that day, but he went 0 for 6.)

I mean, what could possibly top that? Maybe Mickey Mantle bailing out Whitey Ford in a duel with Bob Lemon or something like that.

No such story exists in the annals of baseball, though, so I must conclude that Kaplan is right.

The Marichal–Spahn battle that was waged at Candlestick Park 48 years ago today is the greatest game ever pitched.

A Singular Sensation

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I have to admit, I really would have liked to see Maria Sharapova square off with Victoria Azarenka for the women's singles title at Wimbledon tomorrow.

A few months ago, I watched those two face each other in a spirited match for the Sony Ericsson Open title — and I'm sure a rematch in a Grand Slam final would have been even more entertaining.

Sharapova held up her end of the deal — but, as Oliver Brown writes in The Telegraph, her opponent played poorly.

That doesn't take anything away from Sharapova's performance — which was, I will admit, somewhat lackluster. She did what she had to do against Sabine Lisicki, and she'll be playing in tomorrow's final.

Mission accomplished ... so far.

Her opponent will be Petra Kvitova, the eighth seed who needed three sets to dispose of Azarenka. The 21–year–old southpaw will be making her first appearance in a Grand Slam final.

It's getting hard to remember when one could say that about Sharapova. It's been seven years since, as a 17–year–old, she defeated Serena Williams in straight sets in the Wimbledon final. She's kind of old news.

As Greg Couch writes for The Sporting News, the "casual sports fan" couldn't be blamed for looking at the other three names besides Sharapova's in Wimbledon's women's semifinals and say, "Who?"

Even Azarenka, who has enjoyed some success but is still looking for her first berth in a Grand Slam singles final, remains a virtual unknown in the sport.

But I watched her beat Sharapova three months ago, and I'm convinced the 21–year–old has a bright future in front of her.

It would have been fun, as I say, to watch the two of them go at it in tomorrow's final — especially considering that (a) Azarenka, like Sharapova, has a reputation for making loud grunting noises on the court and (b) Wimbledon has been trying to crack down on that sort of thing.

It would have been, as the Sydney Morning Herald speculated a few days ago, "[a] deafening Wimbledon final."

I know practically nothing about Kvitova. Does she make loud grunting noises, too — loud enough to match the so–called "queen of scream," Sharapova?

Or is she more quiet, like the legendary Martina Navratilova, who was very reserved en route to 18 career Grand Slam singles titles and doesn't think the grunting in today's game is necessary?

That would be a real contrast in styles, wouldn't it?

Today's players, Navratilova says, "are making sounds like they are lifting 300 pounds, and it's not the case. The ball is not that heavy."

Well, I guess that is a matter of perspective. It might feel like 300 pounds for either of these ladies — after all, Sharapova wants to prove she isn't over the hill and Kvitova wants to prove she belongs in the Wimbledon final. The weight of expectations for both must be enormous.

You can watch the final on NBC starting at 8 a.m. (Central) tomorrow.