No. 192: SHOHEI OHTANI, PETE ROSE & ALEX KARRAS / The requisite sports-betting essay
Everyone has to do one. I'm not letting myself off the hook.
I run the risk of coming off old-and-in-the-way by typing up a commentary about my distaste for sports betting as we know it these days. For those who embrace it, you can scroll down to the bottom to find the over-under number of readers who opened this this essay.
It would never have occurred to me to write about this had I not landed in our local, an Indian sports bar for curry and beer. This was Sunday afternoon: The Elite Eight was on CBS; a Masters tune-up was on NBC; MLB was breaking out all over the place; and any number of NHL games and major-junior playoff tilts could have been tracked down. There could have been a smorgasbord, a different sport on every available big screen.
This is what was on every screen.
Nothing says sports like two goes on the screen looking at screens. And no, I didn’t doctor the colour of the pants of the guy on the left.
Sports has its iconic images that define eras and games: MJ taking flight from the foul line; Dwight Clark climbing a ladder to snag a …
Keep reading with a 7-day free trial
Subscribe to How to Succeed in Sportswriting (without Really Trying) to keep reading this post and get 7 days of free access to the full post archives.