Little did I realize when I answered an ad in the Daily Transcript back in December of 1986 looking for a part-time sportswriter that I was about to embark on a four-decade voyage through the world of high school sports.
That most enjoyable adventure has to come to an end as I have submitted my letter of retirement to the higher-ups at the Boston Herald. It is a bittersweet day as I still love my job and love the people I work for, but all good things have to come to an end at some point in time.
When you have been in any job for 40 years, there are a lot of people to thank for helping me along the way.
I was fortunate to have started my career at the Daily Transcript. I couldn’t have asked for a better starting spot, covering Dedham, Norwood, Needham, Walpole, Westwood and Xaverian. It was there where I met the legendary Frank Wall, who instilled in me the need to be passionate about what you do. He was a legend in the Norwood community and I was blessed to have learned from Frank.
There is one other key figure from my Transcript days but he will be prominently mentioned shortly.
At the Boston Herald, I have been blessed to have people in the upper levels of management such as Pat Purcell, Joe Sciacca and Joe Dwinell who were firm believers that there is a place in a major Boston paper for high school sports coverage. When you’re getting that sort of support, it makes the job so much easier.
They weren’t the only ones who supported high school sports at the Boston Herald. The cavalcade of sports editors I was fortunate enough to work with along the way: Bob Sales, Mark Torpey, Sean Leahy, Justin Pelletier and Bruce Castleberry as well as Mark Murphy, Joe Thomas, Bill McIlwrath and Barry Scanlon were fantastic bosses and people I have and will always admire.
There is one name I omitted and it was by design.
Without Hank Hryniewicz, there isn’t a chance in hell I am where I am today. He took a chance on a 26-year-old writer with ZERO experience at the Transcript, believed in me and gave me every opportunity to succeed and fail.
As fate would have it, when I was the victim of a newspaper budget cut at the Daily Transcript in May of 1990, Hryniewicz had already moved on to the Boston Herald and was in the process of working his way up the corporate sports department ladder. He helped me get an interview with Sales and I wound up getting my foot in the door as a part-time agate guy working late shifts on Saturday and Sunday.
Without Hryniewicz, there is absolutely no Ventura in this business.
From there, it was a matter of biding my time until a big opportunity came along and that came when Bob Holmes left for the Globe. Stephanie Tunnera moved in as the high school sports editor and I landed the job as her assistant. I stayed in that position even as Jim Clark took over for Tunnera and I enjoyed every minute of working for the two of them.
When Clark moved on to the copy desk, I was essentially entrusted with the job of high school sports editor. I’ve received plenty of accolades and awards over the years but what tends to get overlooked are the people I worked with.
I have been extremely blessed to have had a slew of fantastic co-workers, tireless employees who share the same passion for high school sports that I’ve had. They are truly the lifeblood of the paper and I will certainly miss each and every one of them and thank them from the bottom of my heart.
In closing, I want to thank the student/athletes, coaches, athletic directors and parents for allowing us to cover their kids and let us tell their stories. Without you, there is no us so I will always be eternally grateful.
Thank you and keep supporting the paper that has been and will always be my paper – The Boston Herald.
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