From the time I learned to read, I loved reading about sports because that told me how people reasponded to stress and, unlike war, nobody got killed. When I graduated from Indiana University I did my two years in the army playing baseball and writing propaganda and came out looking for a job in media. My first taste of the big time was covering the Bill Mazeroski World Series for Newsday.
For the next 45 years I have watched athletes--male and female--responding to pressure, both succeeding and failing. I covered World Series, Super Bowl, NBA and NHL championships, Final Fours, Indianapolis and NASCAR, and the atrocities of Little League and high school sports. I found common human elements in all. Twice, what I found, led to my nomination for the Pulitzer Prize.
All the while I was hearing the stories of how black athletes had to endure so much injustice, which led me to interview and collect what went into Carrying Jackie's Torch. What I learned stunned me and I tried to pass on to the reader things that have been hidden by time. Those events, the cruelty, and the courage, should not be forgotten.
When not following or writing about sport and sports figures, I enjoy travelling with my wife, Anita, skiing, food, more skiing, more travel with Anita, casting an eye on the follies of politics, and doing whatever I can with my son Mathew, his wife, Susan, and my daughter, Neila, who showed me what goes into being a female athlete.
