Ravens remember McNair as the ultimate teammate

July 9, 2009

The public tributes for Steve McNair began yesterday at LP Field in Nashville, a memorial service is set for today and the sad and sordid details of his life and murder keep slowly leaking out.

Recent columns

• Let's talk soccer. Really.

  July 8, 2009

  Let's talk about soccer. No, stay with me here. The whole column's only 750 words. How painful can it be?

• O's up, then down: Baseball can break your heart

  July 2, 2009

  The Orioles can't wait for the future to get here.

• Why can't the Orioles win on Sundays?

  June 29, 2009

  You thought that whole business of the Orioles hacking it up on Sundays was over, didn't you?

• Woeful Nats give O's fans (and '62 Mets) hope

  June 25, 2009

  Human beings need hope to survive. And nothing gives a baseball team more hope than looking at its schedule and seeing the following words: Washington Nationals.

• Big Brother is trying to steal your pitches

  June 22, 2009

  Recently I started talking to my wife while covering my mouth with my old Rawlings glove, a practice she finds disturbing.

• Give this team a hand

  June 18, 2009

  If you love baseball and care about the future of the game, you have to root for the Baltimore Black Sox.

• LPGA needs players with personality

  June 15, 2009

  The McDonald's LPGA Championship said goodbye to Bulle Rock in improbable fashion Sunday, with a Swedish rookie named Anna Nordqvist earning her first tour victory on a sun-splashed afternoon in Harford County.

• Why is there all this fuss over Michelle Wie? Follow the drama

  June 12, 2009

  I went to see Michelle Wie play at Bulle Rock on Thursday because I'm a sucker for drama queens, and there's enough drama in this young woman's life for any reality series you come up with.

• Day with wounded vets inspires Ravens

  June 11, 2009

  Next time you wonder whether we make too much of sports in this country, do yourself a favor: Go talk to a combat veteran.

• Young South Korean wins heading to Bulle Rock

  June 8, 2009

  Here's what you have to love about the LPGA: a player who stands 5 feet 2 and weighs as much as a Keebler elf is the talk of the tour this morning.

• At minicamp, Ravens rush to unite

  June 4, 2009

  Remember summer camp?

• Scott's homers please hometown crowd

  June 1, 2009

  If you play baseball for a living, here's the guy you want to be right now: Luke Scott.

• Hear that? That's the Wieters buzz

  May 28, 2009

  The Matt Wieters Era is here.

• Ravens' Peerman has makings of a role model

  May 21, 2009

  Tired of spoiled athletes dominating the headlines? Then you want to hear about Cedric Peerman.

• Female fans cheer for Rachel Alexandra

  May 18, 2009

  Rachel Alexandra, America needs you in a big way.

• Without beer, Preakness infield was less filling

  May 17, 2009

  They threw a hell of an infield party at Pimlico Race Course yesterday. Too bad nobody showed up.

• After drought, happy to have field days back

  May 15, 2009

  There comes a point in every man's life when he sits back, puts his feet up on the desk and thinks: How can I get a gig doing something I love that involves no heavy lifting?

• When one door opens, the cat walks in

  May 14, 2009

  I was not looking to take one last shot at cats before the new gig starts, but that's what people will say.

• Lousy survey proves Dads get no respect

  May 10, 2009

  Here's the cheery message that greets all fathers as we slog through this wonderful spring of recession and layoffs and swine flu: Dear Dad, take a hike.

• On tap if you rent rowhouse: free beer

  May 3, 2009

  Megan and Brian Murray want you to rent their house.

• Forget the anniversary, pal, and it's all over

  April 26, 2009

  After 31 years of marriage, you learn a few things. Here's the No. 1 thing you learn: Never, ever forget your wedding anniversary.

• MPT hauls in hot spots for great crab cakes

  April 23, 2009

  All the recession talk on TV got you down?

• Seniors have got game

  April 12, 2009

  Wondering what to do in your golden years?

• Bill Hagy was one wild fan of the O's

  August 22, 2007

  I am not going to tell you "Wild Bill" Hagy was a choirboy, because someone who guzzles nine or 10 Budweisers and shot-puts his cooler from the upper deck of a stadium before being led away in handcuffs probably doesn't qualify for that.

• Class acts amid the meltdowns in the Olympics

  February 23, 2006

  Sasha Cohen, Kimmie Meissner and Emily Hughes aside, it's easy to think of these Winter Olympics as another depressing reality show, only without a lot of bad singing or Donald Trump and his lacquered hair reducing some poor apprentice to tears.

• Medal man needs a mighty moniker

  August 21, 2004

  Sure, Michael Phelps appears to have everything a 19-year-old guy could want: fame, fortune and a chestful of Olympic gold medals that's the ultimate babe magnet, way better than hot wheels or walking your poodle past the bars at Happy Hour.

• For cicadas, the party's nearly over

  June 14, 2004

  I smell death in the air.

• Here cicada, there cicada, everywhere cicada cicada

  April 19, 2004

  YOU PEOPLE who haven't seen these things, you have no idea what you're in for.

• People can really get charged up over Isabel

  September 18, 2003

  TO SEE THE Isabel panic for myself, I went to Home Depot yesterday because there is simply no better place to be with a hurricane bearing down on you than a store the size of a NATO base that offers 15 varieties of duct tape.

• Even in face of 'Columbia,' astronauts say, carry on

  February 3, 2003

  BY YESTERDAY, the cold, sick feeling of seeing the space shuttle Columbia explode in the blue Texas sky was fading for many, replaced by a numbness as gray as the February dawn.

• Johnny on the spot

  January 7, 2003

  The first time I heard Johnny Holliday broadcast a University of Maryland basketball game was the winter of 1982. I was driving through some Eastern Shore backwater at night, and it was freezing cold, and the only light inside my little Toyota was the glow of the radio dial.

• Police chief dealing with nonsense from media

  October 17, 2002

  IN THE GLARE of the TV lights, Montgomery County Police Chief Charles A. Moose's scowl seemed to deepen with each idiotic question thrown his way, to the point where you wondered if the poor man's features could ever return to normal.

• Soon ghastly fish will walk off into the sunset

  August 8, 2002

  AND SO THE death watch begins for the northern snakeheads in that Crofton pond, the infamous "fish from hell" that provided us with so much entertainment throughout this long, horrid summer.

• Arming pilots both concerns and comforts

  September 27, 2001

  I'M TRYING to picture something here, and the more I picture it, the jumpier I get.

• 'Hoping for little miracles,' says firefighter of operation

  September 17, 2001

  IN THE spring of 1990, John Morris, a New York City firefighter and an old friend of mine, rolled up with Ladder 27 to the Happy Land social club in the Bronx, where a tragedy of unspeakable proportions had just occurred.

• What seemed like just another day actually wasn't

  September 13, 2001

  The morning after the worst attack in U.S. history, with images of a jetliner serenely plowing into a glittering office tower and the Pentagon on fire seared into our minds forever, maybe what was most startling was how utterly, blessedly normal everything felt.

• Exchanging vows is good reason to hit the ice

  February 15, 2001

• Experience is in their court

  February 12, 2001

  IT'S A LITTLE after 12:30 on a sunny February afternoon when the first game begins in the worn gym at the Bykota Senior Center in Towson.

• Man doesn't break a sweat buying lingerie for his wife

  February 8, 2001