We're going retro...this is an oldie... I'm posting this because its one of the finest sports articles I've ever read...It was written by Jim Murray, probably the greatest sports columnist that ever touched a pen...If you are not familar with him, he was a Pulitzer Prize winning writer for the L.A. Times; he was also a 14 time winner of the "America's Best Sportswriter" award given out by the National Association of Sportscasters and Sportswriters...He passed away in 1998.. This article was written in 1986 about none other than Chick Hearn...One L.A. Icon on another....It's a fantasic read, and<font color="DarkOrange"> if u don't read it, u are only doin yourself an injustice ....</font> Here are some excerpts: <div class="quote_poster">Quote:</div><div class="quote_post">Chick Hearn. The world's greatest basketball announcer. The machine gun that talks like a man. The guy who did more than any other to take pro basketball out of the drafty gyms in Peoria and Altoona and put it on prime time. [...] But the Lakers had made a very important acquisition just before that series. In later years, they were to acquire Wilt Chamberlain, Kareem Abdul-Jabbar, even Magic Johnson. None, however, was ever so important as the free agent they picked up that winter of '61. Chick Hearn and pro basketball made Romeo and Juliet, ham and eggs, gin and tonic look like unmatched opposites. It was like a river joining a sea. Caruso finding a song, Van Gogh a brush.</div> Link
