The recent public caning of OC Register sportswriter Mark Whicker has been fun to watch. In response to the rescue of Kaylee Jaycee Dugard, the 11-year-old girl who was kidnapped and then kept captive by a maniac for some seventeen years, Whicker wrote a jovial column detailing all the major developments in sports Dugard had missed during her captivity.

A sample:

The Anaheim Ducks won the Stanley Cup in ‘07. Yeah, a hockey team came to Anaheim. Yeah, they built an arena in Anaheim.

Everyone jumped on the poor guy, but to me it was a distilled and perfect piece of local journalism. I mean, accusing a local newspaper columnist of leaden humor, brain-dead solipsism or freakish sentimentality is just a waste of time.

Anyway, Whicker apologized, and in the end I’m with Keith Olbermann, who pointed out that columnists are allowed to have bad days; it’s the guy’s editors whose heads should be on the chopping block.

The affair jogged something in my memory, but it took a few days before it coalesced. Many years ago, back in Chicago, a local sportswriter got off a column, written as well after an unspeakable tragedy, that I personally think deserves to be remembered in a hall of fame right next to Whicker’s.

At the time, I contributed a weekly column on music for the Chicago Reader. (It was called … Hitsville.) I wrote a piece about that column, which drew a couple of funny letters, including one from the guy who wrote it.

Some time went by and I had an occasion to revisit the topic, which generated a stream of letters it pleases me much to read to this day.

The first Hitsville entry came as the second item in a two part column:

Hitsville
May 19, 1994
By Bill Wyman

Bad Sports
A Quincy goes out to Rick Telander, a Chicago-based Sports Illustrated senior writer and a regular on the cable sports-talk show The Sportswriters. The award, its name derived from the famed punk-rock episode of the Jack Klugman TV series (”Why do people listen to music that makes them want to hate, when they can listen to music that makes them want to love?”), goes to people who say stupid things about rock ‘n’ roll. Telander contributed the unctuously written, awkwardly titled story “Sport no nirvana, but structure can be life-saver” to last Sunday’s Trib sports section. The splashily played article’s thesis was that if Kurt Cobain had been involved in sports, the natural bonding mechanisms of the game might have saved him. “There is something about sport that I feel could have helped fill a void in the Seattle grunge king’s life,” wrote Telander. “Cobain was a sensitive, small, and troubled youth, and his parents could not, or would not, give him guidance. And he had no team. And he had no coach.” Hitsville avoids reading sports sections as a matter of course: is this sort of analysis typical? Organized sports consists almost entirely of suit-and-tied strategists telling the players what to do every other second; rock ‘n’ roll is basically a forum for artists to express themselves. Even with this difference, however, there are in rock ‘n’ roll what Telander calls, with unbearable condescension, “authority figures.” Cobain, for example, had a powerful management company (Gold Mountain) and label (Geffen) behind him–and he repeatedly went out of his way to thank them publicly for their help, though it was fairly uncool from the indie perspective to do so. The second problem with Telander’s argument is that Cobain had an instinctive and thorough loathing of male rituals in general and of sweaty, macho corporate sport in particular. “Rock and sports,” writes the addlepated Telander, “are like restive siblings,…two flip sides of a two-metal coin. Those boys who can, play sports; those who can’t, play music.” Barf. Cobain needed sports like he needed a hole in his head.

The letters came in soon after:

It’s a Guy Thing
Surely Rick Telander deserves as much derision as one can heap upon him. If you’ve ever read one of his pompous, overblown articles in Sports Illustrated, or seen that silly Sportswriters show you know what I mean. Del Crustaceans indeed!
However, Hitsville [May 20] earned its own Quincy with the stupid statement that “Cobain had an instinctive and thorough loathing of male rituals in general.” Oh yeah? Then why was he in a rock band?
Despite the proliferation of wimpy college rock R.E.M. clones and wife-core bands (bands that include four members, one of whom is the guitarist’s wife or girlfriend, who plays bass or drums) rock ‘n’ roll is nothing if not a macho male ritual.
From Elvis on down through Hendrix and Paul Rodgers all the way to Nash Kato, B-Real, and most certainly Nirvana, it always has been. And that’s the way it should be. Rock on, righteous brothers!
Robert Heintz
Skokie

This one was from the columnist:

Bill’s Bitchin’
Dear Reader:
I was a little puzzled by Bill Wyman’s review [Hitsville, May 20] of my article on Kurt Cobain, suicide, and sport that appeared in the May 15 issue of the Chicago Tribune. While I welcome intelligent debate on any subject, I am curious as to what got Wyman so bitchy about a 900-word essay that basically asked if there was anything that might have prevented one of the world’s brightest young rock stars from taking his life.

I speculated that the best parts of the sports world–teamwork, discipline, nurturing instruction–might have been of benefit even to a tormented poet like Cobain. The worst aspects of sport–domination, subservience, repression–help no one, of course, and I have written often about this fact.

But there is a structure to games that seems to help athletes cope with bigger problems. NBA player Brian Williams, for instance, was suicidal last year, but his sport, his coaches, and his teammates helped him get treatment for his depression and become productive again. In rock, who tells the superstars no? So you overdosed on drugs, just cancel the concert. Cobain’s people made many excuses for the star, even denying that his near-death in Europe several months ago was a suicide attempt. The glorious freedom of rock is also its biggest pitfall.

I didn’t suggest that Cobain should have been a jock, as Wyman seems to think. I said, rather, that athletes “find shelter in the fabric and discipline of their game.” I only wish Cobain could have found similar comfort.

Beyond his misunderstanding of my point, Wyman used some words that I found unusual. I haven’t seen “addlepated” since Dickens, for instance. And “barf”–whoa, the creativity. But as the old saying goes: those who can, write; those who can’t, be critics.

Rick Telander

All was quiet for a few weeks, until yet another tragedy transfixed the country. I offered up this observation:

Hitsville
June 24, 1994
By Bill Wyman

Bad Sports II
Watching O.J. Simpson’s absurdist flight from the law last Friday night, Hitsville was suddenly struck by a thought: What if Simpson the celebrity had not been born and bred in the uncaring, rough and tumble world of sport, but rather had been nurtured in the more solidarity-minded world of rock ‘n’ roll? There’s something about rock ‘n’ roll that I think might have filled a void in the Hall of Famer’s life. In rock ‘n’ roll, the artist is never truly alone: he or she is surrounded by bandmates, producers, agents and managers and label people, all concerned with his or her well-being. In the world of sport, by contrast, even the most popular figure, like Simpson, apparently had no one around to help him work through his problems. Even after he was accused of a grisly double murder, no one could persuade him to handle the charges sensibly. As a rock star, he would have had a trustworthy and loyal drummer or bassist at his side, or at least a manager and a lawyer to help him out. As it was, Simpson had no authority figures around. And he had no bassist. And he had no drummer. Sure there are some wife-beaters and murderous stalkers in rock music, but they find shelter in the fabric and discipline of the world of music. That, tragically, was something O.J. didn’t have.

Some people remembered the previous exchange; others didn’t. The letters, including another from Telander himself:

The Big Hurt
Editor:
I didn’t pick up the most recent edition of the Reader till today; you must have already received dozens of letters in response to Hitsville’s pointless observation [June 24] of the O.J. Simpson car chase episode. In wondering how O.J. might have handled his life differently had he been in a rock band rather than on a football team, Bill Wyman points out that there are many concerned people around a rock star should he or she have a personal crisis. Wyman surmises that “the fabric and discipline of the music world” could have saved Simpson. I have two words for Wyman: Kurt Cobain.
While I firmly believe in the naive notion of the transcendent, healing power of rock music, with every music biz fatality we are constantly reminded that there is pain that cannot be soothed by anything or anyone.
Lori Malinski
N. Moody

Stupid Ahistorical Drivel
Dear editor:
I do not number myself among Bill Wyman’s detractors regarding his musical criticism, but I am outraged by the obscenely stupid, ahistorical drivel he slobbered recently about O.J. Simpson [Hitsville, June 24]. The obvious idiocies are stunning: first, the history of rock and roll all too plainly shows that managers, agents, producers, and label people do not consistently effuse benevolent “concern” about musicians’ “well-being.” Second, does Wyman seriously believe that O.J. had no manager, no lawyer, no agent? As for bandmates, the tender bassists and drummers lovingly extolled by Wyman, O.J. had teammates, first and foremost of which was his college and professional buddy Al Cowlings, who was his teammate for ten times longer than the average life span of a rock and roll band. Even more obvious, rock and roll bandmates are often less than supportive: Wyman needs to reread his history, sadly lacking for a professional rock critic, about the legendarily acrimonious and often destructive musical partnerships that pass for the “solidarity-minded” world of rock and roll. Wyman’s short-term memory is also deficient: not two months ago he mourned the passing of Kurt Cobain, a troubled rock star who had the full complement of bassist, drummer, agents, managers, etc, but still managed to off himself amid the oh so rosy world of rock music.
However, Wyman’s last statements anger me most. What does he mean that the “potential wife beaters and murderous stalkers in rock . . . find shelter in the fabric and discipline of the music world”? Is he asserting that there aren’t any actual wife beaters and murderous stalkers in rock music? Excuse me? Ike Turner, anyone? More importantly, one of the key aspects of domestic abuse is the way it is hidden, ignored, covered up, and sheltered from public knowledge, something Wyman is contributing to by erasing it from the history of music. Second, what is it these potential beaters and stalkers find shelter from? I would think that the objects of their beatings and stalkings would have to seek shelter from them. I assume that Wyman meant to say that those musicians with the potential to beat or stalk find that, in the nurturing world of rock and roll, they can control their behavior, which is a crock in and of itself. However, his unfortunate phrasing implies that the music world shelters and protects these desires and behaviors, giving the impression that Wyman thinks that the music world’s ability to shelter its wife beaters from harm to themselves, rather than to others, is somehow a laudable thing. Although I hesitate to accuse Wyman of intending this meaning (I do heartily accuse him of extreme stupidity, insensitivity, and at the very least carelessness), it sounds like he is saying that what the potential wife beaters and stalkers in rock and roll actually find shelter from, what O.J. “tragically” didn’t find shelter from, is justice.
Meaghan Parker
Hyde Park

The Critic From Another Planet
Whatever Bill Wyman feels about Rick Telander’s opinion about Kurt Cobain’s lack of a coach [Hitsville, May 20], it is just that–an opinion. Mr. Telander is well versed in the facts of his chosen field, something that cannot equally be said for Mr. Wyman.

Bill Wyman states, “Organized sports consists almost entirely of suit-and-tied strategists” whereas “rock ‘n’ roll is basically a forum for artists to express themselves.” What utopian planet does Bill Wyman live on? I’m sure many musicians would love to go live there too.

Sure, maybe at the level of bar bands and small indie labels music may be played purely for art’s sake–people who play ball in college and the minor leagues may play for the love of the sport. But once you sign to a major label you become part of a giant selling machine that refers to you and your music as “product” and your talent is assessed by how many “units” you sell. Who do you think caused Nirvana and Jane’s Addiction to change the cover of their albums for K mart? A bunch of their buds going “Whoa dude, I find this kind of offensive”?

Maybe the Reader should have Steve Albini write your music column. At least he knows what the music business is really like.

Mark Springer
Chicago

Rock vs. Jock
Dear Reader,

It was with great annoyance, and little amusement, that I read Bill Wyman’s latest volley in the continuing juvenile pissing contest between himself and Rick Telander (”Bad Sports II,” Hitsville, June 24). Shame Bill’s tongue, fat with promise. Telander’s piece on Kurt Cobain’s death was pretentious and misguided; Wyman’s initial response [Hitsville, May 20] was based on a misinterpretation of Telander’s point and appeared strangely defensive. The attempted chastising of Telander in last week’s O.J.-based missive was nothing more than unnecessary one-upsmanship. I read Hitsville every week to learn interesting things about the national and local music scene, not to read grown men quarrel like a couple of children on a playground. Since Telander has already been awarded one, Hitsville should give itself a Quincy and move on.
Brian Beck
Chicago

Sports and Drugs and Rock ‘n’ Roll
Dear Reader:

OK, I give. Hitsville psychologist Bill Wyman is right: sports are evil. Just look, as Wyman has [June 24], at what playing football has done to O.J. Simpson. Never mind that Simpson hasn’t strapped on a helmet in nearly 15 years, he clearly is representative of the athletes of the world.

Kurt Cobain killed himself while high on heroin, but as Wyman wants us to know, that’s just one of those little speed bumps on the road of rock creativity. Cobain couldn’t have handled somebody in a position of authority and respect offering him good, stern advice. Nah. After all, he had fellow junkie, er, wife, Courtney Love to guide him. And there was all that advice he could get from those other great Seattle band members, people like Stefanie Sargent of 7 Year Bitch or Andrew Wood of Mother Love Bone. Huh? They’re dead, too, of overdoses? Darn.

One of Cobain’s problems was increasing friction with Nirvana bass player Krist Novoselic. Cobain should have solved that by using the bassist from Hole, his wife’s band. Her name is Kristen Pfaff, and . . . what? She OD’d on smack two weeks ago?

Well, nevermind. Rockers are artists. They need no guidance. But beware those World Cup soccer players. Thanks for setting us straight, Dr. Wyman.

Rick Telander
Sports Nut