[DICK JUSTICE] Give me/us credit

I seriously can't tell if he is joking or not, I sure hope he is, because if he isn't, he might just be the most egotistical writer this city has ever seen (sorry Fran).

http://www.chron.com/cs/CDA/ssistory.mpl/sports/3381053

No need to thank us, but . . . you're welcome
By RICHARD JUSTICE
Copyright 2005 Houston Chronicle

On the morning of June 1, your Chronicle sports section featured a large drawing of a grave marker.

We ended their season then and there. We lowered them into the ground and promised to speak sweetly of them ever after.

OK, we weren't subtle.

Thus it was born: the Season of the Tombstone. Did someone say lucrative T-shirt deal?

Because we're a civic-minded newspaper, because we care, because we're, well, immodest, we'd like you to know a dirty little secret.

That sports section changed everything. That sports section helped get your guys where they are today.

We're blushing and shuffling our feet. We're, well, pleased.

Go ahead and look it up.

The Astros went 70-41 after that. They'll open the playoffs Wednesday afternoon in Atlanta.

So show us some love.

Tell us we matter.

Write us cards and send us fruit baskets. When the Astros receive that World Series trophy later this month, Chronicle sports editor Fred Faour had better have a spot between Bud Selig and Uncle Drayton on the platform.

We heard from a lot of you about that section. We're hearing from some of you still. We're wondering why some of you don't let it go.

Some of you admonished us for not being more supportive of the hometown team. Some of you thought we should have buried the bums a month earlier.

Some wanted to know what time the bowling would be on television.

What we didn't expect, what flatters us to death, is that the Astros rallied around our tombstone.

"Yeah, it got some people fired up," Brad Lidge said.

That day, one of the local television gasbags ran around the clubhouse waving the newspaper.

He'd hold up the section and ask one of those questions TV guys are always so proud of.

"How does it feel?"

Even the Astros who hadn't seen the tombstone got a peek once
Mr. Caffeine was done.

He got some terrific sound bites, too. He found some guys didn't like being buried June 1.

Lance Berkman is fired up to this day.

"Does anyone still subscribe to the Houston Chronicle?" he chortled during Monday afternoon's pep rally at Minute Maid Park.

Thanks, Lance.

Funny thing is, just before he went outside and got a big cheer at our expense, he'd sung a different song.

"I was in full agreement with the newspaper," he told me.

Huh?

"How can you not write us off?" he asked. "It hadn't happened since 1914. By the way, that was Craig Biggio's fifth or sixth year in the big leagues."

Berkman was quoted extensively in Jesus Ortiz's story. He urged owner Drayton McLane to go get some players. He mentioned that Mike Sweeney, Todd Helton and Brian Giles would be nice additions.

Honest Lance
The next day when Berkman showed up at the clubhouse, Jeff Bagwell yelled, "Hey, Lance, are you aware you just added $50 million to the payroll?"

Berkman simply was being honest, which is what he almost always is. That's why people like him.

"In all honesty, I thought it was a little premature," he said. "A tombstone? Maybe it should have been someone staggering or with one foot in the grave."

I asked about the impact.

"No one was going to roll over," he said. "No one was going to say, 'Well, the Chronicle thinks we're dead, so we might as well be.' We were going to keep playing and see if something happens."

The strange thing is, Ortiz had stuck to the facts in the article that ran with the tombstone. Based on them, the tombstone was more than justified.

"If history is any indication — and history usually shows the way in baseball — the Astros are plugged to an EKG machine this morning," he wrote. "The pulse is weak, and some in the family are preparing the obituary."

The Astros were 14 games out of first place. Only one team had ever trailed by that many games on June 1 and made the playoffs.

Yet we'd struck a nerve.

I asked my boss why we'd done it. Actually, I began the conversation by telling him I loved his tie and wondered where he got it.

Then I zeroed in for the kill.

Remember 'Choke City'?
Why a tombstone?

"Not only were they losing, they were showing no signs of being competitive," Faour said. "That, plus that 1914 thing, made it look pretty bleak. Besides, if they did somehow recover, we'd have another great story.

"I'm glad they are using it as a rallying point. The Rockets rode our 'Choke City' headline all the way to a title. Maybe this will work out the same way for the Astros."

On Monday afternoon, I was looking for players willing to admit that we deserved more than a small share of the credit for this amazing season.

Me: "What credit would you give us?"

Biggio: "You guys? None."

Me: "Do I have to remind you I have a Hall of Fame vote?"

Biggio: "Really? Let me rethink that and get back to you."

Too late.

A few feet away, Brad Ausmus seemed anxious to address the subject.

Me: "Would you agree the tombstone sports section turned this season around?"

Brad Ausmus: "It may have been a motivation for some players. It has been brought up quite a bit."

Me: "What about you?"

Ausmus: "I didn't really care."

Me: "I have a Hall of Fame vote. Want to rethink that answer?"

Ausmus: "What are you going to do? Keep me out of the Hall of Fame? I think I've done a good job of that all by myself."

I was told that Tim Purpura waved the tombstone in front of the players during a team meeting that day.

'People noticed'
Purpura denies waving the section. He does admit holding something in his hand.

"I can't remember what it was," he said.

Hah!

He looked away. Even law school hadn't equipped him to deal with the likes of me. Cornered, he sang like a canary.

"I've still got it," he stammered. "Put it this way: People noticed."

He wouldn't say what he planned to do with it. I'm hoping it ends up on national television soaked in champagne during a World Series celebration later this month.

The T-shirt deal alone will make a bundle.

Next up: the Texans.

richard.justice@chron.com

 

"The Rockets rode our 'Choke City' headline all the way to a title."


Ummmm....Dick .....The Rockets rode Hakeem Olajuwon all the way to a title ....the "Choke City" headline was just a pile of horse crap left behind the wagon on the way there

 

Parts of the article yes, but not so sure about the overall premise of the article. DJ is clever (not good) that way. His way of saying, even though I was wrong, what I wrote was right and/or served a purpose.

Anyway, I personally feel that an athlete's pride is what brings them and their team back from the dead. If their motivation comes from a hack columnist, then, they don't have much pride to begin with.