Will are you saying you agree with,

"Players cheated, baseball ignored it."

Especially that first part...????

I thought this article was well written with greats points, and has easily been Passan's best since he started writing for Yahoo!! But his article on Team USA was off base (and basically took a cheap shot a USA players who got beat in a highly unpredictable round robin format). There was no shortage of talent or pride on team USA, at least from what I heard. I don't get how Roy Halladay or Bary Zito would have helped the US beat Mexico (jeez, we had Clemens on the mound). And after they lost to Mexico, if A-Rod would have smashed bats in the dugout, we would be hearing about how such poor sports the US is, rather than Passans jab at "taking the loss like cadavers".

He has had his moments, but I would like to see more articles with substance on a consistant basis over dramitic bad-mouthings before I qualify him as a leaper. He has a great writing style, but just like a ballplayer, tools does not equal skills.

I've thought Ken Rosenthal came out of nowhere to become a great writer for the masses, and Charles Robinson is a rare stand up guy on the football side as well who I thought made the leap last year.

Will, just wanted to congratulate you on making the leap from mere writer to Out of the Park Baseball injury guru. I've been playing that game for years, pretty much the exact same time period I've been reading UTK. I'm sure your help will make for a much improved game.

I don't know of any writers that have recently made the leap, but I was wondering if anyone had any Chicago writers that have/will. Frankly, I can't stand the Chicago newspaper baseball columnists - they adhere fanatically to Old World baseball knowledge, half of which hasn't been relevant since Billy Williams was playing, and are solely dedicated to being as controversial as possible. Reality has no place in their columns, it is very frustrating.

Thanks, Wrigleyviller. Was great working with those guys, but didn't realize they'd announced it yet. Can't wait to see the game!

TFD - yep, I agree. There's a semantic, but important difference between "cheating" and "against the rules."

Ruben - I don't have to agree with everything to like him! Rosenthal out of nowhere? I'll agree the move to Fox exposed him more, but he was already a great writer at the B'more Sun and Sporting News. I guess it seems like it if you didn't read him previously.

I got a non-sequitur after today's final four games.

Broadcaster analogy...

Joe Morgan: Baseball as Billy Packer:NCAA Basketball

true or not?

True, but it wasn't that I didn't agree with him, its that I felt it was more kicking someone (team USA) when they are down than anything. Those articles were not great journalism (though a journalist having a poor article is not the same as saying the journalist is poor. Even Barry Bonds strikes out sometimes). What I meant to convey is that he has his shining moments (the selig article), followed by clunkers (the team USA article), and until it he becomes more consistent, he has yet to complete the leap. Still doesn't mean he is not an incredible writer. But what do I know, my roommate was the english major in college, I split in math and poli sci.

As for Rosenthal, between college at UCLA, work, 3 IM teams, fantasy sports, etc., I didn't really have the time to read the Baltimore Sun in while in Los Angeles, and I stopped subscribing to the Sporting News about 4 years ago when I discovered more interesting information on the internet (BP, Yahoo!!, hardballtimes, etc.) It wasn't until he moved over to yahoo that I felt really exposed his great talents to a national audience. Zach over at Elephants in Oakland puts it very well when he says "There are writers who write about sports, and sportswriters. Most in the latter are hacks". Ken Rosenthal is a writer who writes about sports.