Sports Then and Now

Michael Crabtree's catch and touchdown at the end of the Texas Tech-Texas game was the biggest play of the 2008 College Football season.

On the same day that a one-time star NFL receiver began serving a two year sentence in the New York State Prison system as a result of a self-inflicted gunshot wound, another potential NFL star receiver is continuing the self-inflicted implosion of what just months ago seemed like a promising NFL career.

When the San Francisco 49ers selected Michael Crabtree with the 10th pick in the 2009 NFL Draft most experts hailed the pick as a coup for the 49ers.

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Mike Coolbaugh checking out the sitaution with his two boys

As a writer who seems to specialize in the “xoxo” of the game, I often set out on a journalistic journey of sorts when I put words to paper. Although my intention is a good one, the motive often becomes a concentrated effort to elicit a certain response.

I’m not sure if it is a gift or simply the willingness to open up my heart, but more often than not, my goal is to make my audience feel the sorrow associated with an event. To warm the heart by moistening the heart. To make my readers feel the pain that the participants in the story felt themselves and to relate it to their own life.

And then sometimes, the story is so incredibly sad all on it’s own, that I don’t need to say a word. I simply need to recount the events and let the reader feel on their own. Read the rest of this entry →