Athletes know athletes and respect performance across sports

Athletes know athletes - Socially distanced Cape cheerleaders had their own section of home bleachers Jan. 25  for the Caravel at Cape wrestling match. Coach Courtney Brand is no joke and always has her squad prepared when the throwdown is about to go down. Somewhere between crucial matches, freshman Mia Pennypacker did a tumbling run, finishing with a series of back handsprings. I saw two Caravel wrestlers just look over and clap in “like wow” amazement. Cape had four-year cheerleading veteran Bryan Garcia in the starting lineup at 132 pounds. The question, “Is cheerleading a real sport?” has been over since the previous millennium. Cape’s Lineman for Life tackle Lucas Ruppert, 285, started the night off with a pin. And then he rocked his T-shirt, “Chicks dig the belly.” The athletes know what is up. I just stay out of their way.  

Misspelled and misidentified - Spend too much time at sea and you are tempting Poseidon and Neptune and the lesser waterlogged deities who may mess with you just for something to do. Spend a lifetime as a writer weaving real people that have actual names into stories and the words will occasionally bite back, and that’s before autocorrect gets you into trouble – “Who you calling Raghead? My name is Rasheed.” I actually calculated that over 39 years as a columnist I have written 3.5 million words, and counting all my other writings since fifth grade, I am the 15 million word guy, and that’s before I mislabel people in photos. In the last Cape Gazette edition, a sports photo labeled 800-meter runner David Wootten as David Callaway because he was being chased by Julian Callaway. Spelling correctly or identifying the proper person in a photo you took has nothing to do with intelligence, but a lot to do with insanity. I still want to host my own end-of-career retirement banquet where people wear multiple name tags from the real to the surreal. 

Rehearsals for retirement - I’m noticing media people who are retiring saying things like, “It is just time.” People like Bill Clement, ice hockey analyst, and Marty Baron, Washington Post editor. Both these guys are younger than I am and aren’t traveling around with a blue chair going to wrestling matches and outdoor track meets. Folk singer Phil Ochs wrote a retirement refrain, “The days grow longer for smaller prizes. I feel a stranger to all surprises.” You think that’s uplifting? Try this couplet: The lights are cold again, they dance below me. I turn to old friends, they do not know me.” Phil Ochs died in 1976 at age 35 by suicide brought on by years of heavy drinking. I don’t drink. I’m underworked and overfed, so I’ll keep cranking until someone says, “Leave the gym. You don’t have to go home, but you can’t stay here.” 

Remember me, coach? - A Facebook message from 48 years away: “Hey, coach, this is Gil O’Neal. Remember me?” I responded, “The same Gil, a Mitchell Prep split end, we ran end around pass on the two-point conversion and you have the option to run it or throw it? That Gil O’Neal?” And we were back together sharing memories. Gil went on to play at Bloomsburg. He is now an active football official in the Central and Ches-Mont leagues outside Philadelphia. We talked about three Temple coaches on the Tampa Bay staff. Social media is great for stuff like that. Come get these memories.

Hall of Fame - The Major League Baseball Hall of Fame writers selected no one to be inducted for the year 2021. I believe they have just succeeded in dissolving the entire process, and that is probably a good thing. There are now myriad baseball bloggers and broadcasters, but authentic writers who knew the nature of the game, who were educated, literate and understood history and nuance ... that is gone like a juiced home run ball launched by a steroid slugger. There is a rule in stand-up comedy: Don’t make fun of a group you don’t belong to. So why not extrapolate that to all sports halls of fame? If you never played beyond middle school, you don’t get a ballot. And who checks on the integrity of the voter? As an aside, the only juicer I’d vote for is named KitchenAid, but I don’t get a ballot and don’t want one either. 

Girls’ basketball - There are 20 results posted on websites4sports.com over the recent week of high school girls’ basketball. The average winning margin in eight of those games was 35 points. I’m not sure what that means, except I know it’s not good for the overall health of the sport. The Cape girls are 5-0 with an average margin of victory of 35 points. Conrad High School, an upstate power is 6-0 on the season with an average margin of victory of 46 points. 

Snippets - Susan and I own three cars totaling 48 years old, but no matter how many celebrities interrupt my sports programming, I am not purchasing Car Shield, so back off. And how about retiring Jake from State Farm? That theme is wearing me out. And what happened to the original doughy white boy Jake who was replaced by a Black bodybuilder? 20 million people in the U.S. have been vaccinated, so slap me silly, but I’m seeing that as a good thing. I’ll be happy when a cardboard cutout of a baby that is a paying customer in a major league stadium is called for what it is: just plain weird. Go on now, git!