ST. PETERSBURG - I have to give all
due credit to my radio co-host, Althea Pashman, for
without her I would not know how much I am ahead of
the curve.
Over the years I have written things
others have touched on days or weeks later. You take
a little pride in knowing you had an idea first. In
recent times I have syndicated my columns to preserve
what has now become more commonplace.
A few columns ago I tooted my own
horn because I penned the following:
| If Pat Riley can fire
Stan Van Gundy for winning, the least he can
do is fire himself for doing the opposite. It's
not like he doesn't have options, like with
L'Oréal or Garnier, more than he gave his former
coach who now has the Magic one win away from
advancing to the next round of the playoffs.
|
24-hours later, Riley stepped down (SEE
COLUMN)
But it happened again, and again, all in close proximity
to each other.
On my show, Speaking of Sports, I lashed out
just after nine in the a.m. this past Saturday about
Hulk Hogan, nee Terry Gene Bollea, and his whatever-rag
atop his rather hairless skull inside a court of law
the day before.
The bald-bandana, appropriately jet black considering
what he son had just pleaded guilty to, was never
removed nor was he asked to by anyone including the
judge. There was some speculation that it would have
created a scene and no one wanted that, now did they?
About three hours later, there it was on TBO.com,
a story about a "formal black" do-rag with
an explanation that it wasn't noticed at the time.
Huh?
The Hulkster is 6-foot-7, around 300 alleged steroid
inflated pounds and no one noticed him? Ever hear
of lakefront property in Arizona?
That is another story for another time but here was
little old' me pointing out something that appeared
elsewhere like it was somehow their exclusive.
But I digress.
Althea sent me a link to a story that appeared on
a TampaBay.com blog, dated the 12th of May. It was
titled The original Tropicana Field. Nice story except
something was written on November 17, 2007 by yours
truly with a picture that I had in my possession accompanying
the piece.
TampaBay.com is owned by the St. Petersburg Times
but when I saw the line, "The St. Petersburg
Times has unearthed a preliminary design for Tropicana
Field that included outdoor seating with a tent roof
to shield both the field and fans from the weather,"
I had to wonder what took them so long?
Obviously they have more resources than I, in fact
one of their writer's paycheck about covers my yearly
budget, but it took this mega-paper nearly six months
to "unearth" something I already had?
You be the judge.
This was the story that was syndicated by SportzNutz
last November, before the new stadium design was unveiled
by the Rays: Could
It Be Back to the Future in Rays' Quest For New Downtown
Stadium?
Then you have TampaBay.com's The
Original Tropicana Field.
I don't mind though.
Even though one of the Times' sports writers
think I am some sort of boob taking some of his space
on this planet, it's the gratification I get each
time someone actually follows my lead.
Maybe that's what grinds his gears so much.
I may just be in the right place at the right time
to come up with some of this but you know that is
how Pulitzer Prizes are won.
Not that I didn't have to use my spell check for
Pulitzer.
