Taking care of fitness every day

Taking care of fitness - The first time I saw 27-year-old rookie Ichiro Suzuki was like every time to the last time I saw him. My reaction was: “That dude is super fit, not to mention quick and explosive,” a focused technician of all things related to the sport of baseball. Trainers call it core strength, others call it naturally strong or country strong, and metabolism and supplements aside, you just know Ichiro is 100% nutritionally smart and disciplined. He was the leading vote getter for the Baseball Hall of Fame’s Class of 2025, getting votes from all but one free buffet baseball writer who is deep-dish anonymous for fear of getting stir fried by baseball fans around the world. 

I can’t see it - I emceed a track and field hall of fame banquet in 2011 and introduced Bill MacLachlan. Bill threw the shot 58 feet for Mt. Pleasant High School in 1968, the fourth-best in the nation that year. Then he was off to Maryland where he was ACC champ, tossing the 16-pound ball 58 feet. He also owned a high school discus personal record of 161 feet. And so at the banquet, I was expecting a 60-year-old weightman with a BMI of 35. But Bill was built like a marathoner and it opened my eyes to this pattern, when you’re an older athlete, you remember those people who told you what you couldn’t achieve, those who stepped on your dreams, suggested you set more realistic goals, then you discover in older age that although you proved all the doubters wrong, in the here and now people don’t believe your story, which is already written. If Bill were next to me drinking club soda at an afternoon happy hour and said, “I was ACC champion in the shot put; I'd have done the discus spin on my barstool.” To quote Chuck Berry, “C’est la vie, say the old folks; it goes to show you never can tell.”   

Can’t find linemen - Former Ohio State head coach Urban Meyer, with a checkered past like a calico house cat, said last week in an interview, “Skill people are now easier to find than linemen. You just can’t find linemen; everyone is looking for them.” But the 6-foot-2, 265-pound, three-point stance guy ain’t big enough. In most D1 programs, you can’t give that guy away; can't even invite him to walk on. You just know with the money being handed out to behemoths in the trenches that genetic engineering is underway as sure as steroids are out of control.

Jokers wild - Tennis star Novak Djokovic beat Carlos Alcaraz to advance to the Australian Open semifinals. He is a 37-year-old Serbian and is one bad dude. He is of Serbian and Croatian descent. Nikola Jokic is the 29-year-old, 6-foot-11 center for the Denver Nuggets. He is also Serbian, and many commentators describe him as a basketball genius. Oddly, two Serbians at the top of two vastly different sports would be nicknamed, “The Joker.” Just make sure they are laughing.

Paywalls - I’m leaving my game on the field, online paywalls tracking sports sites on two different browsers with strong-armed avatar girl scouts showing up saying ”you must accept cookies” has me more confused than Columbo at a convention of private eyes. There are now online services you can link to your debit card that will get rid of all the paywalls you crossed over but can no longer clear. “I’ve got your password, buddy.” 

Get with the program - The culture of sports has become so different moving from one sport to another. The words crazy good need to be kept separate because there is crazy and good inside each subculture. One way to judge high school programs is to see what happened to a certain class six years after high school graduation. Denzel Washington said, “The loudest person in the room is the weakest person in the room.” Too many people are talking too much noise before they accomplish anything. 

Snippets - “One, two, three, kaboom” that was my approach stroke as a Rehoboth Beach Patrol rookie in 1976. My head was whipping from side to side, but at least I wasn’t buoyant as my back half trailing and trolling would sink like a stepped-on water bug. My wife Susan is a beautiful swimmer and was the Lewes Yacht Club’s first coach, while I got jokes, “Heard any good strokes lately?” Cape boys and girls are a combined 14-0 in the pool. Coach Bill Geppert, along with Pete Olson, Rick Browkaw, Colleen Bailey and Julianna Danese, teach the strokes and set the lineups. I’m not smart enough to ask relevant questions like, “What about the humidity in this room like a head shop humidor?” I’m out like a water spout. Go on now, git!