Viewpoint / Letters : THE BEST OF 1986 : Tip to Correspondents: Taking a Stand Works Wonders With Editor

L.A. Times Archives

Dec. 31, 1985 12 AM PT

You people at Sports Viewpoint anger me and (bleep) me off. I have written you at least six times in the last year and have never been printed. Half of the articles you print are trash and must be written by 2-year-olds.

I write an excellent piece (mail it on Sun.) and once again you leave it out.

How much $ does it take to get an article printed?

MARTIN S. MILLER

Northridge

Money has nothing to do with it. Try a little tenderness. Or try discussing the issues of the day in an interesting and/or pointed fashion as many Viewpoint correspondents do. These are some of the best letters that appeared in Viewpoint in the past year:

Scott Ostler needs a Designated Thinker. Every sports rule-tinkering example he cited happened during the infancy of the sport. Baseball, hardly an infant, has thrived for years without the ridiculous DH rule.

EDWARD R. COLBURN

Playa Del Rey

Does Mike Littwin live on the moon?

TIM WEAD

Venice

No, Littwin now lives in Baltimore, where he writes a column for the Morning Sun.

Where in the world did the L.A. Times go for Rick Reilly, Sports Illustrated by chance?

EVELYN CLEMENS

Los Angeles

No, Reilly went to Sports Illustrated from The Times.

Regarding Mike Littwin’s inane comment that the Bruins played with all the emotion of chamber music: If a basketball team played with the emotion and intensity with which the Julliard Quartet, for example, plays Beethoven, it would never lose a game.

DAVID M. SHERR

Santa Monica

Well, I guess it really is the baseball season. We’ve gotten our annual Don Sutton whining article. I would think that after 19 years, The Times would be as sick of printing them as I am of reading them.

KEN MARCUS

Los Angeles

Holy Moses! The Los Angeles Police Dept. got their man! Edwin the Terrible has been swept off the streets. Never mind that there do not seem to be enough officers to sweep up the gang robbing, beating and raping restaurant customers and employees. There were enough to nab Edwin the Terrible, and we can all rest easier now.

MARY M. MOORE

Van Nuys

The only thing more ridiculous than the Edwin Moses case is your coverage of the event. It certainly does not belong on the front page of the sports section.

KELVIN D. FILER

Compton

Please! I’ll do anything you say. . . . I’ll sign my life savings away, my home, my goldfish . . . anything! But, please, no more about Mary Decker and Zola Budd.

FRANK GATELL

Santa Monica

The more I hear of the complaints regarding treatment received by Frank Kush, the more I am convinced that we have the biggest generation of sissies ever spawned in the history of mankind.

GEORGE FRENCH

Torrance

I opened my Sunday sports section and saw that it was really a big sports day. The front page articles included Gordon Jones’ arrest, John McKay’s fine, Edwin Moses’ arrest and Bobby Knight’s expulsion from a game. Unfortunately, one writer violated your guidelines and wrote an article about a game and even gave the score.

Next week, I’ll read the Police Gazette.

STEPHEN SCHORR

Fountain Valley

Ricky Bell was indeed a courageous man who obviously suffered a great deal more than he deserved. His struggle was one that was not completely seen, while your story helped to show what a warm and caring man he was. Thank you for giving us readers a chance to see what real heroes are made of.

JASON BERRY

Beverly Hills

You can’t blame God for wanting Ricky Bell with him. He knew what He was doing.

WILLIAM J. REGAN

Woodland Hills

It’s nice to hear Reggie Jackson will play for the Angels again in 1986 unless he’s “an embarrassment to the club or himself” in ’85. If a three-year average of .234, 113 hits and 142 strikeouts hasn’t already embarrassed him enough, he’ll probably play forever.

ED HONECK

Orange

The one disappointment in UCLA’s march to the NIT championship: Mark Heisler got an expense-paid trip to New York.

LARRY BISHOP

Huntington Beach

Bruins, congratulations on winning the NIT. Nice going. But please don’t put the banner for proving you are No. 65 on the walls of Pauley Pavilion alongside the 10 NCAA No. 1s. It just doesn’t belong.

JOHN R. SHEPPHIRD

Costa Mesa

Thank you, Villanova, for the thrill of a decade.

CHARLIE BENZ

Santa Ana

Gordon Edes quotes Al Campanis as saying that Pedro Guerrero wants to play third badly. Isn’t that what he’s doing?

DICK SMITH

Long Beach

It was a great fight, but Thomas Hearns is the first fighter I have ever seen that, every time he landed a punch, his knees buckled, not his opponent’s.

FRANK G. CARLISI

Calabasas

The Agony and the Ecstasy--the Dodgers and the Lakers

BARRY BERNSTEIN

Santa Monica

Anyone who thinks Kareem Abdul-Jabbar is too old to run up and down the court with other players should remember he shares the same age with the fastest distance runner on earth, Carlos Lopes of Portugal.

BRAD KEANS

Woodland Hills

My God, what a relief! I’ve been waiting for this literally all my life. I’m a 28-year-old L.A. native who has been living the quiet agony of the die-hard Laker fan, lo, these many years. But now the green monkey is off our backs.

BILL GRIFFITH

Valencia

Re Mike Downey’s column in which he details his compulsion for wearing a baseball cap anywhere and everywhere, he cites his size as 7 3/8.

I can believe the 3/8, but not the 7.

ANGUS McDONALD

San Diego

Is there anything, anywhere that is worse than the ballpark organ?

DEAN NORTON

Los Angeles

The wave?

I have been reading the abusive, negative letters about the Dodger organization in your column for the past two months. Imagine, without Garvey, Cey, Lopes and Baker, the Dodgers are in contention in the Western Division. Maybe the front office knew what it was doing after all.

W. BENNETT

San Francisco

We lived through one strike.

We lived through two strikes.

But, remember, it’s three strikes and you’re out!

ALEX JOHNSON

Cucamonga

Is there a quote from Pete Rose in the Morning Briefing every day? Or does it just seem that way?

BOB SCHROEDER

Huntington Beach

Re: “The Last Days of Ty Cobb,” How pitiful! Surely no mother would want her son to emulate this baseball “hero.”

ELVA RICHARDSON