sandy koufax, center, the legendary dodger pitching ace wanted

to do something nice for joe torre’s, right, non profit in 2010

so he took the stage to be interviewed by

the notorious tj simers, left.

notorious because tj would tell it like he saw it

and he usually saw things through

bitter-colored glasses.

tj’s biggest fans would say they aren’t bitter, they’re

true.

theyd argue the world sugar coats everything, especially journalists, particularly sports journos because they can’t burn bridges because they have to work with these teams every day, year after year.

i enjoyed reading tj because i wanted to see who pissed him off now

koufax gets his ass kissed by everyone. clearly he wanted to be interviewed live by someone who wasn’t going to kiss his ass.

and thats the lesson i learned from tj, indirectly

if you are known as the person who makes you fucking earn that A

then sometimes the best in the world will want to come to you

and only you.

so keep on keeping it real.

(which was your job in the first place)

photo by Dodger Blue World