HAMILTON, Ontario -- The funny thing about these Dream Team performances: It's damn hard to tell who won. Is it the team with the long faces, answering questions about a disappointing night? Or the team waving little flags and blowing kisses to its fans?
DRYDEN -- "May I see the bird, please?"I actually yelled this. I know. It is not a sentence you can picture me yelling. It is not a sentence you can picture anyone yelling, except maybe Prince Charles or Ace Ventura, Pet Detective. "May I see the bird, please?" And that's not all. Here is the whole phrase:"May I see the bird, please?" . . . BANG!Blown to pieces.
PRYOR, Mont. -- These are grown men talking:"HO, CATTLE! . . . yo, cattle, yo, cattle! . . . EEEEE YUTYUTYUT! . . . move, you no-goods . . . AGGAGAGAGAGA! . . . HO, CATTLE! YO, CATTLE!"This is not normal conversation. Then again, we are talking to cows. Not we, exactly, because I am on a horse with my mouth open in utter disbelief. But the other people here at the Schively Ranch are instructing the cows to -- in cowboy talk -- git.Git?
Nothing for nothing. That's the bottom line of the Bob Probert equation. You watch him walk out the door now, motorcycle helmet under his arm, off to make big cash and who knows what trouble someplace else, and all you can do is shake your head and say what a mess, what a waste, what an ending. For all the stupid sympathy the Red Wings gave this guy, all the excuses, the lying, the coddling, the protection, the rehab -- not to mention the money -- in the end, he gives them his worst season and walks freely out the door, thanks mostly to their mistake. Nothing for nothing.
It's true, as a cop, I have plenty of weird days. But this was the weirdest. The chief calls. Wants me to interrogate a ball and a bat. I'm not kidding. A ball, a bat, and me. Down at the station. Under the hot lights."All right," I says, opening my notebook, "Mr. Bat, we'll start with you. The report claims you were kidnapped.""That's right," the bat says. He talks like he's ready to hit something. "In the middle of the game, some guy pops out of the ceiling, grabs me, and hides me in the venting system.""You must have been scared."
Maybe he wasn't "a giant in the industry" but he was big, physically big, a furry guy with a mop of hair, thick beard, cotton shirts, old shoes. When he waddled down the hall you had no choice but to say hello, and to say hello to Dorian Paster was to start a conversation that could go for hours. "He never stops talking!" some people moaned.What did they expect? He was a disc jockey.I would call him sometimes late at night at WLLZ, to leave a message for the morning shift producer."Where are you?" he would ask."Houston," I'd say.
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.
