Miklasz leaving Post-Dispatch

[-X-]

The real question for me is what he did to you to tick you off so bad that you recorded 2 of his broadcasts to piece them together and present to him.

He's sharing my oxygen.

 

[Alan]

Mojo Ram with a what if:
If a foreign sports writer referred to successful American athletes as "a marvel of modern science because they lived in a country full of fatties"...should he be vilified or reprimanded by the New Moral Order police?

Nor would they have been vilified. That example is not an appropriate example for this conversation.

Now let's try a version that is more appropriate to this conversation:
If a foreign sports writer referred to successful American athletes as "a marvel of modern science because they lived in the ghetto of New York which is full of fatties"...
Then yes, it has that "truth" and they would have been vilified. Appropriately. The ghetto implying blacks just as the DR implied browns.

 

[CodeMonkey]

He's sharing my oxygen.

Oxygen hell, what about the pizza?

 

[Alan]

BTW, I'm not going to post in this thread anymore so don't bother quoting me. There is nothing to be gained by continuing this conversation and much to be lost.

 

[Mojo Ram]

Then yes, it has that "truth" and they would have been vilified. Appropriately. The ghetto implying blacks just as the DR implied browns.

Is there a vast majority of brown-skinned people living in the Dominican?

 

[jrry32]

Are you talking about his "clunky" statement?


I actually think this part of his commentary said what he was referring to:
"A lot of those kids come from rough backgrounds and have not had opportunities academically that other kids from other countries have."

To me that doesn't say that he thinks people from the DR are "stupid". What it says is I think exactly what he meant - that people from the DR have little access to even decent education. That lack of education would not mean stupid but a lack of education that would teach things like critical thinking and really how to use the brain to figure out complex relationships. If anything, I think it is highly critical of the Dominican government and the importance that has been put on lifting their citizens up with education.

I agree that Collin is an idiot. I always thought that even when he was that dweeby scrawny smart ass on local TV. But racist? Never saw that in him.

I'd need to see everything to understand the context but that paints a different picture. Does anyone have the full statement?

As I said earlier, it's not about racism for me. I think the comment was insensitive and insulting. But I didn't know about that part so I'd need to see the entire statement in context.

No, he did NOT say that. You know what he said....and he never said that. That is fact.

"Faceplant, I get that you're not an academically inclined individual but my post isn't complex, you should be able to comprehend it."

Does that comment implicitly call you stupid? Yes. Does that comment accomplish the same thing as calling you stupid? Yes. Let's call a spade a spade.

 

[RamFan503]

I'd need to see everything to understand the context but that paints a different picture. Does anyone have the full statement?

As I said earlier, it's not about racism for me. I think the comment was insensitive and insulting. But I didn't know about that part so I'd need to see the entire statement in context.

The flap stems from Cowherd's comments on Thursday, which were made while debating whether it was difficult for a front-office executive to take over managerial duties -- using current Miami Marlins general manager/manager Dan Jennings as an example.

"It's baseball," Cowherd said Thursday. "You don't think a general manager can manage? Like it's impossible? The game is too complex? I've never bought into that, 'Baseball's just too complex.' Really? A third of the sport is from the Dominican Republic. The Dominican Republic has not been known in my lifetime as having world-class academic abilities. A lot of those kids come from rough backgrounds and have not had opportunities academically that other kids from other countries have.

"Baseball is like any sport. It's mostly instincts. A sports writer who covers baseball could go up to Tony La Russa and have a real baseball argument, and Tony would listen and it would seem reasonable. There's not a single NFL writer in the country who could diagram a play for Bill Belichick. You know, we get caught up in this whole 'thinking-man's game.' Is it in the same family? Most people could do it. It's not being a concert pianist. It's in the same family."

The bolded words are where I believe he screwed up. The sentence right after it is where I think he says what he meant by them though. Like I said, I have seen Collin many times surrounded by all walks of life. I just don't buy that the guy is a racist (and I realize you aren't saying he is). He has always said insensitive things in his diatribes if you really want to look at it that way. I'm not sure how insulting it is what he said unless you glom on mainly to the word "abilities". But that seems a little over the top as abilities appears to mean "tools" if taken in context. And tools would have to include education level in what he said.

I don't really care for the guy so I have no reason to defend him. I've thought he was funny at times but his shtick wears thin on me pretty quick. It just seems like a lot to do about nothing if you ask me.

 

[dbrooks25]

Just heard Bernie on the Fast Lane earlier. He will be on the 7 a.m. to 10 a.m. slot, so it looks like all of the shows currently airing will be back with minor time adjustments as Mike and Mike aired in this area up until 9 a.m.

I hate to break it to those of you who hate to read Bernie's stuff, but he will be writing columns for 101 espn now. He talked about how he can now do everything from one spot now instead of jumping from 101 to the PD.

 

[jrry32]

The flap stems from Cowherd's comments on Thursday, which were made while debating whether it was difficult for a front-office executive to take over managerial duties -- using current Miami Marlins general manager/manager Dan Jennings as an example.

"It's baseball," Cowherd said Thursday. "You don't think a general manager can manage? Like it's impossible? The game is too complex? I've never bought into that, 'Baseball's just too complex.' Really? A third of the sport is from the Dominican Republic. The Dominican Republic has not been known in my lifetime as having world-class academic abilities. A lot of those kids come from rough backgrounds and have not had opportunities academically that other kids from other countries have.

"Baseball is like any sport. It's mostly instincts. A sports writer who covers baseball could go up to Tony La Russa and have a real baseball argument, and Tony would listen and it would seem reasonable. There's not a single NFL writer in the country who could diagram a play for Bill Belichick. You know, we get caught up in this whole 'thinking-man's game.' Is it in the same family? Most people could do it. It's not being a concert pianist. It's in the same family."

The bolded words are where I believe he screwed up. The sentence right after it is where I think he says what he meant by them though. Like I said, I have seen Collin many times surrounded by all walks of life. I just don't buy that the guy is a racist (and I realize you aren't saying he is). He has always said insensitive things in his diatribes if you really want to look at it that way. I'm not sure how insulting it is what he said unless you glom on mainly to the word "abilities". But that seems a little over the top as abilities appears to mean "tools" if taken in context. And tools would have to include education level in what he said.

I don't really care for the guy so I have no reason to defend him. I've thought he was funny at times but his shtick wears thin on me pretty quick. It just seems like a lot to do about nothing if you ask me.

You know what, seeing the entire statement, I can buy that interpretation. He did a terrible job of phrasing it and made some poor choices in words. But it doesn't seem as malicious when the entire statement adds context. I withdraw my previous criticism. Still a dumb thing to say but doesn't seem malicious.(dumb because of his poor word choice/phrasing and dumb because an academic education has no connection whatsoever with understanding the game of baseball...to draw an analogy, I think boxing is actually pretty complex and yet Floyd Mayweather, who is very poorly educated, is arguably one of the best technical boxers in history)

 

[-X-]

Just heard Bernie on the Fast Lane earlier. He will be on the 7 a.m. to 10 a.m. slot, so it looks like all of the shows currently airing will be back with minor time adjustments as Mike and Mike aired in this area up until 9 a.m.

I hate to break it to those of you who hate to read Bernie's stuff, but he will be writing columns for 101 espn now. He talked about how he can now do everything from one spot now instead of jumping from 101 to the PD.

I'll still listen to him and read his stuff.
It's the same reason I pay attention to Skip Bayless.

 

[Faceplant]

I'd need to see everything to understand the context but that paints a different picture. Does anyone have the full statement?

As I said earlier, it's not about racism for me. I think the comment was insensitive and insulting. But I didn't know about that part so I'd need to see the entire statement in context.



"Faceplant, I get that you're not an academically inclined individual but my post isn't complex, you should be able to comprehend it."

Does that comment implicitly call you stupid? Yes. Does that comment accomplish the same thing as calling you stupid? Yes. Let's call a spade a spade.

You know what, seeing the entire statement, I can buy that interpretation. He did a terrible job of phrasing it and made some poor choices in words. But it doesn't seem as malicious when the entire statement adds context. I withdraw my previous criticism. Still a dumb thing to say but doesn't seem malicious.(dumb because of his poor word choice/phrasing and dumb because an academic education has no connection whatsoever with understanding the game of baseball...to draw an analogy, I think boxing is actually pretty complex and yet Floyd Mayweather, who is very poorly educated, is arguably one of the best technical boxers in history)

Holy crap, you didn't even read the entire statement before engaging in this discussion???? You could have read War and Peace in the amount of time you used to write some of the responses in this thread. Sheesh....

"Faceplant, I get that you're not an academically inclined individual but my post isn't complex, you should be able to comprehend it."

Does that comment implicitly call you stupid? Yes. Does that comment accomplish the same thing as calling you stupid? Yes. Let's call a spade a spade.

And yet you managed to sneak in a shot at me by framing it in the context of this discussion. Well played. And you know what? If that is your opinion of me that is perfectly OK. I can shrug it off.......... Cheers!

 

[jrry32]

Holy crap, you didn't even read the entire statement before engaging in this discussion???? You could have read War and Peace in the amount of time you used to write some of the responses in this thread. Sheesh....



And yet you managed to sneak in a shot at me by framing it in the context of this discussion. Well played. And you know what? If that is your opinion of me that is perfectly OK. I can shrug it off.......... Cheers!

No shot. Using an analogy. Don't take it personally. It's why I put it in quotes. Illustrating a point.

Nope, didn't read the statement. I don't listen to Cowherd and I rarely read articles from sports journalists.

 

[Dr C. Hill]

I never cared much for BM where the Rams were concerned. I wish him well in his new venture. There are a lot of people here in town who value his opinion.

 

[RAGRam]

Bernie's last article (I'll miss you you fat tub of shit).

http://www.stltoday.com/sports/colu...a-a2a2-7e7bc644d21f.html#.VcbQsMpWJVo.twitter

Bernie: A lifelong dream has been fulfilled

I’ve been sitting here at my desk in the home office on a late Saturday afternoon, trying to calculate the number of columns I’ve written for the Post-Dispatch over the last 26 years. I’m stumped. It figures. Unless it had something to do with a box score, I’ve always struggled with the math.

By my rough estimate — if we count the online pieces and the sidebars and the occasional game story — I’d put the total near 8,000. If I include my bylines as a football beat writer here in the mid-1980s, I’m guessing the scoreboard would reach 10,000.

It’s 6 p.m. on this Saturday, my last day at the Post-Dispatch, and deadline is approaching, and the thing is, I don’t know what to say. I don’t know if this is writer’s block, but I do know that my predicament is absurd. The prolific scribe who has authored 10,000 compositions of reputed sports literature cannot come up with words.

Where do I begin?

In my bedroom in my parents’ house. Really, that’s where it all started, this lifelong melding of the love of sports, the fondness for writing. The scene: a husky boy of 10, scribbling on loose sheets of notebook paper, his imagination afire, writing a story about the football game he’d just attended with his father. And after the boy was finished, having put the final block-letter sentence in place, he gathered the pages, put them in order, stapled them, and ran to his father to present the handwritten narrative.

“Here you go, Dad,” the boy would say. “I wrote the story about the Colts beating the Packers. I know how much you liked Johnny U.’s 51-yard touchdown pass, so I tried to do a good job of describing it for you.”

The father would read the pages, nodding and smiling. He’d tell the son it was good, and how much he enjoyed reading it. And that would be followed by a hug, or maybe a playful swipe of the boy’s mop of hair.

“Dad,” the boy would say every time, “when I grow up I want to be a sportswriter.”

Ten years later, the kid got a job at the Baltimore News American. Minimum wage, answering phones, taking scores, running to get the editors sandwiches and coffee, handling the complaints of angry readers, screwing up and getting hollered at by the grumpy men working the copy desk.


It was heaven. Just perfect: low wages, grunt work, pressure, terrible hours, grouchy co-workers, bad food, caffeine overload, irate callers, and the occasional invitation to tag along with the old sportswriters who were gods to him.

Eventually the newspaper gave this kid a chance to write a few roundup summaries of high school games (no byline) and he didn’t mess it up. (Whew.) And then came a chance to write a bylined story on hockey immortal Gordie Howe, and I managed to pull that off without an editor throwing the story in the wastebasket.

In late 1979, the newspaper offered me a full-time sportswriting job at age 20. The weekly pay was $218, and it seemed like all the money in the world.

I felt like a rich man at age 20, simply because I’d fulfilled my goal. I’d done it. The handwritten stories for my father led to this. I’d accomplished my goal. I worked hard, determined to make my way into the newspaper business. I was there. I worked hard. I believed in myself. That paycheck had my name on it.

A paying writing gig at age 20 for a big-city newspaper? I didn’t need anything else. Right then and there, I’d exceeded my hopes and dreams.

Whatever followed was a bonus.

I’m officially leaving the newspaper business after filing this column. I’m headed off on a new career, doing a morning-drive sports radio show for WXOS-FM in St. Louis, and writing columns for the station’s web site. I’m 56, and it’s a great time to stretch, evolve, set off on a new challenge, and prove myself on another media platform. Just like the kid did so long ago. With this opportunity I can do the two things I’ve come to love so much: sports broadcasting and sports writing, all in one place.

I’m excited. But I’m also sad. Because from the time that I began scratching out those stories for my Dad, all I ever wanted was to be a sportswriter for a newspaper. I was a lucky soul, a guy who lived his dream. I’ve never lost that feeling of wonderment; it’s coursed through me for 35 years, constantly replenishing my energy and morale.

I’m sad because I know I am giving up things that I cherish. I’m no longer Rick Hummel’s teammate, and it makes me want to cry. I’ll never be seated next to Derrick Goold, the best baseball writer in America, as we cover postseason Cardinals baseball. Those dramatic October days and nights were the most satisfying experiences of my career.

I’ll miss football Sundays with Jim Thomas — and the way we’d engage in a running dialogue during the entire game, loudly questioning play calls, with colleagues laughing at the two of us going off.

I’ll miss being irritated by my ornery friend Joe Strauss — who has a huge heart, even if he doesn’t want anyone to know. I’ll miss working with our hockey writer Jeremy Rutherford, the nicest person I’ve known during my career. I don’t have the space to thank all of my colleagues, but please know that I appreciate everything you’ve done for me.

I’ve been blessed to spend nearly 30 of those 35 years at the Post-Dispatch. I had a never-ending adventure, walking into arenas and stadiums with a tingle of anticipation every time, because there was always a chance I’d witness something spectacular, something I’d never seen before. It was like going to the circus, every day. I didn’t have to grow up.

I’ll never adequately be able to thank you, the readers. Over the last two weeks when it was announced that I’d be leaving, many of you have roiled my emotions with your amazingly kind and generous emails. You’ve brought me to tears.

And really, that’s my payoff. I never gave a damn about winning awards, or impressing other sportswriters. I was proud to write for the great fans of St. Louis. I wanted to serve you, and if I gained your approval, that’s all I cared about. Because you took this out-of-towner in, you gave me a fair chance to earn your trust when I was a nobody, and you permitted me to become part of your lives.

Through it all you gave me your support and encouragement, and you tolerated my outbreaks of foolishness, and you offered criticism that pushed me to look inward and do better.

Our relationship doesn’t end here, but this a good time to pause and tell you how much you’ve meant to me.

I don’t believe sportswriters are important in the grand scheme of things. We save no lives, we protect no one from harm, we aren’t teaching children, we don’t take care of the sick or the aged, we don’t do research to find miracle cures for insidious diseases.

On a list of the critical jobs in a city’s culture, we’re probably at the bottom. But when I click open an email and see a message from you telling me that you’ve been reading me since you were 12, or that my work enhanced your enjoyment of sports, or that my columns motivated you to pursue a career in journalism, or that you clipped out a column and read it to a dying parent … my goodness, I’m just blown away.

That makes everything worth it. The deadline meltdowns, the long road trips away from home and loved ones, the lonely hotel rooms, the horrendous eating habits, getting mugged after a game in Philadelphia (that happened), being trapped in the upper deck of the ballpark when an earthquake hit the San Francisco Bay Area (that also happened).

It wasn’t in vain. Your messages have let me know that there was a purpose to this madness, and that our words had some value. This makes me happy. None of you had to write to me. We’re on this earth for a blip of time. Sportswriters come and go. Columns are written, they are read, they’re quickly forgotten, and then they become kitty litter or a cleaning surface for lake trout.

God gives us the precious gift of 86,400 seconds every day. And I’m eternally grateful that so many of you used a few of those seconds to reach out to me through these years, to give me your opinion, to offer praise, or to submit a sharp rebuke.

The humble origin of my newspaper career began in the late 1960s, when I presented my primitive-form sportswriting to my late father. And as I close this it’s occurred to me — in a way that really hits me — that I’ve been doing pretty much the same thing with you for nearly 30 years.

I wrote stories for my Dad, and he liked them even if they weren’t very good, and his encouragement gave a young boy the inspiration to follow his dream. That lad grew up, and he would write 10,000 columns and stories for you. And you’ve critiqued them, and appreciated them, and objected to them. But most of all you’ve read them.

I can no longer write for my late father, but I have had the special privilege of writing for you, and the reward is just as powerful. You see, for all of these years I’ve still been the boy in the bedroom, excitedly writing about games, and presenting my work to you.

I’m much older now, but some things never changed, including the enthusiasm for my work. I needed some help along the way, and you’ve kept me inspired, right down to this final sentence, because you’ve enhanced my life by preserving the beautiful and innocent dream of the boy in the bedroom who wanted to grow up and be a sportswriter.

 

[Zombie Slayer]

Would he have been fired if he made those exact same comments about people in a country where most of them are considered "white?"

Would someone other than a white male who made those exact comments be fired?

Would a woman who made those exact comments be fired?

To me the answer to those questions are highly likely to be no. Most people are not against moving toward a society where we don't degrade or talk bad of others, whether directly or indirectly. Where people get annoyed and defensive over things like this is when these double standards come out. This is not even a story if a minority or woman said that more than likely. Just my opinion.

 

[Irish]

Thanks Bernie, for everything. You are the reason I wanted to be a sports writer, and the reason I got into professional writing to begin with. I think I speak for hundreds, if not thousands, of young men and women in the St. Louis area who have been inspired by you for the past 30 some odd years.

 

[Rmfnlt]

Bernie did to me what I think good columnists do to their readers:
* He made me mad
* But, he made me think

Yeah, his columns were over the top a lot... more emotion than I was used to - or cared for - many times.
Yeah, he flip-flopped numerous times... probably influenced, to some degree, by the "feedback" from his audience.

One thing's for certain - he was never boring.

When I first started reading him many years ago, I was younger and didn't want to hear any negativity about my Rams, even if it had some truth to it... so I slammed him repeatedly.

But, as I got older... and the team tested my faith to it's inner core, I looked at his columns a little differently. Sure, he was still writing things I really didn't want to "hear", but the circumstances (all the losing) made me open my mind up just a tad.

When I did, I realized that he got it right sometimes... he wasn't always wrong or anti-Rams. I truly believe he loves all the teams in STL (although clearly, his real allegiance is to the Cards).

So, good luck Bernie...

I probably won't listen to you much (I don't live in STL), but my rememberance will be of a columnist that brought out the best in me as a fan (made me think) and the worst in me as a fan (acid tonged responses to some of your writings).