NEW YORK -- I'm sorry, but it's a question whose time has come.Why are Swedish tennis players so dull?This has become a major issue here at the U.S. Open, after three Swedes made the men's quarterfinals and they had to pass out No-Doz. Personally, the idea has intrigued me since the day a sports writer fell asleep on my shoulder during a Mats Wilander press conference. And he hadn't even been drinking.
WIMBLEDON, England -- I am sitting with a yellow pad in the shade at an empty tennis court. I am trying to figure out where I went wrong as a child."Kindergarten?" I ask myself, nibbling at the pencil. "If I had only cut out kindergarten. Or bedtime stories. . . . "I have just finished watching Michael Chang play at Wimbledon. I have just finished listening to Chang conduct a post-match press conference. I have been watching Chang for days here at Wimbledon. This is my overriding impression: How old is this kid?
WASHINGTON -- Adrian Dantley took a hard right, steering his Mercedes through the streets of his old neighborhood. It is a hurting section of the District of Columbia, where wooden chairs sit on porches, and the corner store is spray-painted and looks closed. Dantley studied the place, as if for the first time.Begin again."Used to get in a lot of fights right here," he said, pointing to the corner of Sherman and Columbia."That schoolyard? Used to hang around there a lot . . . "
COLUMBUS, Ohio -- The ball was coming down from the darkening sky, there were two men around him, the angry crowd roaring like certain death, he was on the goal line, he bent his legs and he leapt in the air and all he could think of was . . . practice.
The small comeback story sits inside the big comeback story. Frank Tanana was throwing so badly two weeks ago Sparky Anderson took the ball away from him. No one knew when he would pitch again. Yet, there he was Tuesday night, pitching again, pitching well, allowing just three hits in eight innings. And winning -- his first win in seven weeks. Seven weeks? Bad to good. The small comeback story.
NEWPORT BEACH, Calif. -- His phone number was easy enough to find. He still lives in southern California, same house, same patio, same swimming pool. Someone said he was working on a book. I dialed the seven digits.For the last column of 1987, I wanted to talk with the year's biggest goat."Al Campanis?" I said."Speaking," said the voice.
THE LIVE ALBOM* My car, World War III, Chuck Long.* Three things that won't start on Sunday. * Oh, I get it. You win the Super Bowl, you get to wear sunglasses. You win the Cy Young award, you get to wear sunglasses. I get it.
WASHINGTON -- He was sitting in the grass near the 30-yard line, his head drooped, shaking in disbelief, even as the Redskin defenders danced around him in victorious glee. Chuck Long had just tried one of the simpler things in football, throwing away a pass, and he had missed the target. The target was the ground.The ground?
Mitch Albom writes about running an orphanage in impoverished Port-au-Prince, Haiti, his kids, their hardships, laughs and challenges, and the life lessons he’s learned there every day.
