Cleaning out the inbox- One last time

I know that I said the last cleaning was the final one for 2018, but there are still some leftovers and I'd like to start fresh for the new year-especially with the Rose Bowl and final Browns game coming soon!

We start with two passings, one of which I was waiting to do a larger feature on and never seemed to have the time, but watch for an upcoming Forgotten Superstars feature on David Pearson, NASCAR's "Silver Fox", who passed last month at the age of 83.
Pearson, who was arguably the greatest driver in the circuit's history in its "Golden Age" (Yes, better than the better known and somewhat overrated Richard Petty) won the second most races in NASCAR history (105) behind only Petty's 200 wins, which sounds pretty clear-cut on the better driver until you consider Pearson's wins were accumulated in less than half the starts of Petty and Pearson would only drive three complete NASCAR seasons- winning the circuit title on all three occasions.
I'll write more about Pearson down the road, but there was a reason a young R.S rooted for David Pearson on the rare occasions NASCAR was televised in the '70s, and that was when I wanted to give my buddy Miguelito a racing nickname for his skill on our trips-there couldn't be a higher compliment than to be named "David Pearson".

The other passing of note was former Oakland Raider wide receiver Warren Wells at the age of 76.
Wells was the Raiders best deep threat until the maturation of Cliff Branch in the middle 1970s and played only four seasons in pro football.
Wells was plagued with off-the-field problems that basically ended his career when he was arrested in the locker room following the Pro Bowl for the 1970 season.
A chain of issues resulted in Wells spending ten months in jail causing him to miss the 1971 season.
The Raiders would release him after Wells wasn't the same player in the training camp session for 1972 and he would never play again.
Wells caught 156 passes for over 3,500 yards with 42 touchdowns in only four years and still ranks tenth all-time with the Raiders in receiving yards.
Wells's career yards per catch at 23.1 was the NFL's all-time leader in that category until the league changed the required number of catches for qualification from 150 to 200 and Wells 158 catches would no longer qualify.
You can only imagine his numbers, had he been able to stay on the field.
In many ways, even though the problems were different, you might look at Warren Wells as his generation's Josh Gordon for wasted talent.

With my purchasing the MLB package for years, one of the pluses to that package is that I am able to see many of the various team's local television networks.
I love the Giants network with their television crew of Duane Kuiper, Mike Krukow, and Amy Gutierrez, who I have given so much of the credit for my Giants fandom, but when I watch the Indians, I'm not as big of a fan and I often go to the visiting feeds to see some different pairings when they play the Tribe.

I don't always watch the American League teams from California to hear their announcers, but I've written before about looking for the White Sox when Hawk Harrelson was behind the mike, but maybe my favorite AL broadcasting bunch is in Texas with the Rangers.

Dave Raymond and C.J. Nitkowski are a smooth pairing that isn't afraid to occasionally criticize the home team if needed and Emily Jones McCoy has been a long-time favorite dating back to her days with hosting all of those Big 12 football team previews on the Fox Sports regional networks back in the internet infancy when those TV previews were so helpful (Emily also is a Tech grad, which must have come through somehow as I didn't know that at that time)
I've written before of my childhood Ranger fandom before the trade that turned the ten-year-old R.S. along with his baseball world upside down and still have a soft spot for them (especially since they ditched the red hats).
Emily writes a tribute to one of her favorite Rangers, the recently-retired Adrian Beltre, that talks more about the man and his family than the player that is certainly headed to Cooperstown as well as a long-time member of my long-suffering and star-crossed fantasy team, Akron Rubber Ducks.

Emily, as I mentioned, is a Texas Tech grad and that's a good bridge to the next article as the Los Angeles Times and Brady McCullough writes an extensive article on new USC offensive coordinator Kliff Kingsbury, who was recently fired by the Red Raiders.
McCullough writes of Kingsbury's youth, his family, the tragic loss of his mother, Texas high school football, his time at Tech, and even his problems being a single man in the coaching profession.
Kingsbury comes off so well in the article and it's easy to see why he's so popular with fans and in the coaching community.
I understand why Texas Tech felt it needed to fire Kingsbury, but there was a coach that would have likely been there for life and I think Tech was just on the verge of making a move in the Big 12.
We'll see how well new coach Matt Wells will do, but I have a feeling that Tech might have cut Kingsbury loose too soon.

Since the last cleaning of the inbox held plenty of notes on World War I, I looked up the SABR biography of Eddie Grant, who was killed in the Argonne Forest in France during the war.
Grant, who played for four teams including the New York Giants, for whom he was playing when Grant decided to enlist in the war in 1917, was killed in the four-day search for the "Lost Battalion" in 1918.
Grant was memorialized with a plaque that was in play in centerfield at the Polo Grounds before being pried off after the final Giants game in 1957 and was never seen again.