Thank you cards from athletes

Wrote a magazine piece in college, 1977 or so and got a nice note back from ... Steve Martin, via his management company.

 

it sure would've been unforgetable if i ever had recceived a card. closest thing was a handshake and thank you from chris mullin and his dad after a game in whick syracuse coach jim boehim and then viginia coach terry holland were in attendance. of course, neither landed him. he stay with uncle looie at st. john's, breaking the heart of then-struggling coack mike k.

i only covered high schools in n.y. for one season ('80-'81) but saw an awful lot of tremendous players, including mullin and a then-sophomore dwayne washington. at one of pearl's home games at boys and girls high in brooklyn, a couple of young men were eyeing my new toyota celica as i got out of it in the school lot.

a couple of other kids who'd seen me before at pearl's games told them, "hey, be cool, man. he's here to write about pearl."

ah, good times.

it was truly thrilling for a young shockey to see these guys and many other future "names" before anyone else. high schools were not covered nearly as widely as today so i was able to rave about mullin to all my st. john's friends before he ever played a game. it was so cool to see him live up to expectations.

"way it 'til you see this kid," i'd tell them. "he's a shorter, left-handed version of larry bird."

still makes me smile.

 

I recently received a card signed by members of a basketball team thanking me/us for coverage of its run to the state title game.
I couldn't help but react, "Great, but are they going to send one next year, too, when they go 4-17 and we don't cover them near as much?" Must have had my bitter undies on that day.

But the most uncomfortable I've been ...

My wife recently experienced a major health issue, which I wrote about in a column for the paper. In addition to all the kudos I received for that column, which were fine, one reader - the parent of a former player on a team I/we had covered extensively while it enjoyed extensive success - sent a card with a monetary donation.
A wonderful gesture, to be sure. But boy, did I squirm in those aforementioned undies. But what could I do? I can't give the money back, that would be insulting.

 

I've received a few cards and notes over the years. I even got a signed baseball in a case from a high school athlete at the end of his career, thanking me for my coverage of him over the years. I keep the ball on my desk at home.

 

send a thank-you note saying you are giving the generous donation to an appropriate charity.

 

I did a generational story on a local family and their run through the local baseball scene over the last 30 years or so. They sent me a thank-you card not long thereafter.

It's the only card I've received, though I was completely taken aback. I have, however, received quite a few emails and phone calls showing appreciation of coverage I've given to athletes and/or teams over the years.

It's definitely a nice, thoughtful gesture, and as someone stated before, really comes in handy when the cynical, frustrating nature of the industry starts to kick in every now and then.

 

Are you saying cashing it in for all 1s and a trip to the strip club was a bad use?
Seriously, that's not a bad idea. Maybe I should have done that. I suppose I still could, make a donation in that same amount and call it even ...

 

hey, if you did the strip club thing, who am i to protest, doc? ??? ??? ??? ???

 

Also from the Uncomfortable Department:

After writing about an extremely accomplished multi-sport girl one last time as our female athlete of the year, she not only sent a thank-you note for the interviews and stories of the past few years but included a senior picture of herself in her volleyball uniform.

The inevitable follow-up question should be coming in 3-2-1 ....

 

Recently, my area's athlete of the year sent thank-your cards to the office (the award was voted on by staff). I thought it was a nice touch and reflected well on the person because we obviously didn't need to get that. The award was earned, not given.

Similarly, I received a thank-you letter from an athlete at the conclusion of his collegiate career (he currently plays pro ball, though not in an American major league). It was hand-written and thoughtful.

I think there is a great sense of grace and empathy from those who would do that kind of gesture, or at least they have been instructed to do it by someone who, admirably, is teaching a lesson in grace and empathy. Those are two things, to me, that lack in our society, so it's always encouraing to encounter it.

 

Years ago I read a feature about Bill Murray, in which he said something along the lines of "Manners are all we have left."

The longer I live, the more I see his wisdom.

 

I, too, received a thank you card from a futuer NFLer, albeit while we were both in college. I saved the card b/c I had a feeling about the guy. Still have it saved in my spare room.

Also received a very nice letter from Jim Fassel when I wrote a feature about he and his youngest son, the one who was nearly killed when he slid throat-first into a table in his school cafeteria (I think that was the story...know it was some terribly fluky thing that nearly killed him). I thought that was really kind of the coach of the Giants to write a letter to a complete zero like me. Have that saved too.

My favorite thank you card, though, wasn't even a thank you card. I was at a weekly in 2001 and lost my job shortly after 9/11. It was a cesspool of a paper, and a shitty paper at that, in which I was surrounded by back-stabbers and people bereft of talent. I was told on a Monday that I'd be out of work on a Friday and that I could bail immediately and still be paid thru the end of the week. I gave it some serious thought, but I had just covered a basketball game benefiting a local coach who was killed on 9/11 and I thought it was important to write that story.

I also had another feature on one of the area's former ADs, an 80-something year old man who was being honored for his service by his school, and I didn't think it was right to bail on him. So I wrote my features in one day, without uttering a word to the pieces of shit in the room who greased the skids for my departure, and left the office.

A few weeks later, I was hanging out with the staff photographer--a good friend of mine and the only person on staff I could even remotely stand--and he said the ex-AD had stopped by the office shortly after the story came out. He asked where I was and someone in the office said I'd been let go.

"That's too bad," the ex-AD said. "I wanted to tell him how much I appreciated the story he wrote."

He then asked for like 10 copies. The photographer said the guy who split the sports section with me--and was the worst backstabber of all, since I was about 150x better than he ever was and he knew it--just stared straight at his computer as the ex-AD was gushing about me. So very, very sweet.