Pete Rose a hero?

Cincy's Paul Daugherty criticizes voters for choosing Pete Rose as Cincy's hometown here.

Terrell Owens

As you can imagine about 50 percent of America's columnist opined on Owens.

Bob Ford says nothing about Owens is ever ordinary. Dan Wetzel and Pat Forde agree.
Dan LeBetard is predictable and blames the media. Gregg Doyel goes the other way.

Mike Wilbon doesn't like Owens, but he believes him.
Jason Whitlock says the truth became a sideshow.


The Irving, Texas police are angry that Owens' spin control is putting them in a bad light, including this quote:
"The officers reacted because they were called to this location to do this job. Now they're being put under a microscope by some fancy little football person," Senior Cpl. Glenn White said. "Give me a break. Those officers are 10 times better than this man. ... We police officers don't go out to these calls and make stuff up."

Nobody came out of this whole thing looking worse than his publicist, who seemed ill-equiped to handle media, which is... well.. her job isn't it?
This quote from her proves her total ignorance on depression.
"Terrell has 25 million reasons why he should be alive."

Jerry Izenberg

One of the coolest things about doing this blog was finding sportswriters I didn't know about. I've read a lot more good writing because of it. I hope some of it has made my own writing better.

Anyway one of the guys I found was Jerry Izenberg of the Newark Star Ledger. I wish I had found him sooner. He's heading to retirement and is looking back.

Here's part I and part II.

It's really good.

Peter's back

Peter Gammons is back in the saddle.

Quiet ESPN good.

Gene Wojciechowski isn't loud. He's isn't on the sports reporters. He isn't on First and 10, Around the Horn or any other ESPN show where columnists become celebrities. He just writes good columns. Gene, Pat Forde, Wright Thompson. All not very publicized. All good.

I like this one a lot on the NCAA's fair dealings with a Clemson freshman football player.
This Forde column on receivers vs. running backs is good too.

9-11

Three New York Area papers look at the five-year anniversary and the sports connections.

Kevin Kernan connects with the firefighters of House 10.

Lisa Olson gets the memories of NY athletes.

The Star-Ledger's Steve Politi tells a story most people haven't heard.

Los Angeles and lying Tigers

The underrated Les Carpenter has a strong story on the NFL's obsession with returning to L.A.

Michael Rosenberg doesn't believe the Tigers really booted Dmitri Young for performance reason. I don't believe them either.

Walk off

I liked this Nick Cafardo column on Carlos Pena

Andre's farewell

Filip Bondy, Jay Greenberg, Bud Collins, Liz Clarke and Christopher Clarey all weigh in on Agassi's farewell.

Shaughnessy

You don't see this side of Dan Shaughnessy often. He puts on his parent hat and writes a good column about Jon Lester being diagnosed with cancer.