National Sports Journalism Center

I was going to take a pass this week. My house is upside-down. It’s being dressed up for sale. Workmen crawling over every board. Right now there’s a thundering, grinding, scraping noise five feet over my head. Somebody’s sanding floors. But since when, I ask, does silence have anything to do with a reporter’s writing? I have written from the co-pilot’s seat of a twin-engine Cessna, and I have written at ringside of heavyweight championship fights with drunks slobber-editing over my shoulder. So why not write from my basement with five dogs quivering in anxiety born of an instinctive understanding that the roof’s gonna cave in any second?

Still, I will make this one short by offering three links, one thought, and one mystery.

First, Steve Marantz’s remarkable interview of Mike DeArmond of the Kansas City Star, done for Sports Media Guide. Few of us have been in Mike’s place. All of us can understand how near that place is.

Second, Jeff MacGregor’s column for ESPN.com made me laugh because it was dead-true funny, not only as comment on sports reporting but because it was published by ESPN, the undisputed blowfish champ.

Third, a piece by a former sportswriter, Eli Saslow of The Washington Post took readers on a serendipitous journey that newspapers do best. Online, maybe you’d have clicked on it, maybe not; maybe you’d have clicked through, maybe not. I think not. It’s not the kind of story that you’d arrange to have waiting when you turn on the machine. But if you held a newspaper in your hand, just glancing at whatever came into view, you’d be charmed by this unexpected delight. You’d know more about Obama, more about a neighbor, and more about America.

The thought: Scott Michaux of the Augusta Chronicle, in writing a Tiger Woods piece, reminded me that I had said Tiger coming to the 2001 Masters – in search of a fourth straight major championship – was “the most eagerly anticipated golf event since September 1930.” (Hello, Jeff!) Michaux wanted to know what I thought of Tiger’s impact on this Masters. I told him, “Back then, Tiger was a golden child chasing history. That was fun. Now he is a man who says he is ashamed of himself. Whatever happens this time, it will be no fun.”

Mystery: In the house-cleaning, we came across a bunch of stuff that had been in drawers for years. At one point, I said, “Look, a check for a million dollars!” A more careful look showed that it was, indeed, a check – from The Blood-Horse magazine in payment for a feature I had done on horse racing’s sunshine boys, Charlie Whittingham and Bill Shoemaker. The check was dated May 9, 1986. It was for $1,000.

Well.

That would pay for some housecleaning.

But, 24 years later, would the check be good?

The answer next week.

Dave Kindred’s next book will be "Morning Miracle," an inside-the-newsroom account of two years in the life of The Washington Post. Now a contributing writer at Golf Digest, Kindred is a Red Smith Award winner and member of the National Sportscasters and Sportswriters Association Hall of Fame. He can be reached at inkstained1@aol.com. He can be followed at Twitter.com/DaveKindred and facebook.com/people/Dave-Kindred/509353295.