Two memorable hockey players, the draft and some minor league baseball

ESPN did a great story on Derek Hines, the Army hockey player who was killed in Afghanistan. Here is a Globe story from his funeral.
Michael Rosenberg on what could be Steve Yzerman's final home game.

Richard Justice thinks the Texas are dumb for not taking Reggie Bush.

Furman Bisher had a nice look at a day in the minors.

Ivan Maisel and Steve Kelley look at the retirement of Keith Jackson.

Murray Chass looks at the troubled life of Steve Howe.

A good story

To nobody's surprise, I like the Dakota Dowd story. Mike Bianchi did a nice job chronicling it.

By the way...

Bill Plaschke is still on top of his game. His story about a Russian orphan playing baseball in California is excellent. Nobody finds stories like Plaschke. By the way, the orphan is a girl.

Wright Thompson looks at Zack Grienke's emotional problems and his return to baseball.

John Tomase looks at the tragic story of BU's Brittany Detwiler.

Phil Mushnick thinks we're overthinking the motives in the Duke lacrosse case.

Fire Portland

Rene Portland should be fired yesterday. I wholeheartedly agree with Graham Hays.

People are sick

Sales of Duke lacrosse merchandise ars soaring. What kind of person really purchases Duke lax stuff now. The article allows for the possibility that its being sold because the women’s team is No. 1. I don’t buy it. Nobody buys women’s team’s sports gear except boyfriends and parents.

The Washington Post has a fun look back at the 33 inning Triple A game from 1981.

Felix Hernandez is still promising, but more mortal than people originally thought.

Duke lacrosse

Bob Ford does a nice job of putting the Duke lacrosse scandel in perspective.

Not something to read but...

This may be the most ridiculous thing I've ever seen.

More Dixon and Hank Aaron

Diane Pucin and Kevin Kernan offer their reflections on Maggie Dixon's tragic death.

Hank Aaron isn't following Bonds' steroid accusations.

So sad...

Maggie Dixon


I paid only cursory attention to the Maggie Dixon story a few weeks back. Dixon was 28 and improbably led Army, a school usually equally bad in basketball in both genders, to the NCAA Tournament. Her age, the school and the fact that she was Pittsburgh coach Jamie Dixon's sister made this a good story.

I meant to hunt down some links to put here. But I forgot and never thought back until late last night when I found out that she'd died from an arrhythmia heart episode.

Just like that.

Adrian Wojnarowski wrote an excellent column for ESPN about her.

Opening Day