Let’s Get This Party Started

Hello everyone, and welcome to The Stark Truth.

Bill Wood, a former Tacoma News Tribune cops reporter , was the public affairs office and my mentor while working for the Fort Lewis Ranger, the base’s weekly paper. Wood hung that title on the columns I wrote during my three-year hitch in the Army

Back in the dinasour age, everybody’s column had a name. Herb Caen of the San Francisco Chronicle gained fame with his column “It’s News to Me.” Those of you who are over 40 probably remember Royal Brougham, the popular institution at the Seattle Post-Intellingencer, who filed his notes column under the names “50-50” or “The Morning After.”

Brougham referred to himself as “Your Old Neighbor.”

Well, that’s sort of how I see this blog working. I want to get to know you; mostly I want to know what you’re thinking.

I’m going to throw some ideas and opinions out here, share some of the lighter stuff I come across and I hope you throw some ideas and opinions right back.

First, I want you to get to know me. Some of you already do. For those who don’t, here’s the short version on how I got started in this business.

For those of us who are older, there was a time when The Sporting News arriving in the mailbox was a major event every week. Before the internet, USAToday and ESPN, The Sporting News was our lifeline to baseball. My dad subscribed and I read it religiously. Joe Falls’ weekly baseball column, more than anything, got me hooked on reading. The Detroit Free Press columnist wasn’t the greatest writer, not in a literary sense, but his column was always filled with interesting stuff. It was a good read, a fun read, and I learned stuff.

So that’s where I first became interested in journalism. I was playing baseball and studying journalism at Olympic College when a draft notice showed up in the mail. I like to say I was a No. 10 pick. My journalism teacher at OC, Richard Gray, turned me on to the Defense Information School at Fort Benjamin Harrison, Ind. “If you have to go in the Army, it’s not a bad option,” said Gray, who had taught at the school.

Before I knew it, I was writing “The Stark Truth,” at Fort Lewis, and freelancing high school stories for the Bremerton Sun when then-sports editor Bill Schey took me under his wing. That was 1974. After being discharged from the Army, I return to OC to play baseball, but by fall, I was working fulltime at the BS.

Except for 1976, when I left to go to study journalism and play handball at the University of Texas, and another three-year period where I worked at CBSSportsline, was unemployed and worked briefly for the Kitsap Newspaper Group, I’ve been at the Sun for my whole career.

So I’ve got a little history in this area we call West Sound. I think what happened in the past is important and shouldn’t be forgotten, and I’ll write about some of those things.
I’ll also write about the Seahawks, Sonics, Mariners, Huskies, Cougars and MLS soccer because we care about those teams. We’ll also write about the BlueJackets, the Tomahawks, and motorcycle phenom Ryan Villopoto, the Kitsap Stampede and sports figures in our region.

We’re in a golf mecca. Gold Mountain’s bringing the region the U.S. Junior Boys championship in 2011 and the NCAA West Regional’s coming in the spring of ’08.
And what do you think of Robin Waite’s proposal to bring a 6,000-seat soccer arena to Pouslbo?

And why is there such apathy in the community for athletics at Olympic College? And why is the college considering changing its nickname from the Rangers to the Bears?
Why is nobody excited that Shaun Alexander’s healthy and returning to action for the Seahawks? The Mariners aren’t happy with Jose Lopez at second base, but they refuse to consider Willie Bloomquist as a potential starter at that position. Why?

If the Huskies get blown away in Hawaii this weekend, should Ty Willingham keep his job?

Those are the sort of the things I’ll address in The Stark Truth.

To make it work, I need you to share your opinions. If there are sports topics you’d like to talk about, this is the place to do it.

We’ve got a high school blog elsewhere on kitsapsun.com — go to sports, and then click on the prepzone — but if you want to discuss high school sports here, we’ll do that, too. I’d like to enlist your help in coming up with an all-time, all-area basketball team.
Who would you put on it?

How about this five: Marvin Williams, Christian Welp, Rick Walker, Bill Morris, Bernie Fryer.
Off the top of my head, here’s some others to consider: Ed Loverich, Miah Davis, Louie Soriano, Kent Kingman, Steven Gray, Jud Heathcote, Don Thorsen, Chris Thorsen, Billy Landram, Ted Tappe, Jake Beitinger, Jud Heathcote, Mike Kendall, Ryan Kaps,

Let the debates begin.