A Load of BS

This past weekend, I had the pleasure of visiting the new state-of-the-art studios of 88.7 FM, WNHU. It was impressive seeing new equipment being put to use in a renovated house. The annual alumni meeting was held in a nice, newly- constructed basement. It was a far cry from the old days where I spent the majority of my four years in a dilapidated basement. Allegedly, a deceased janitor walked the halls and ghosts of old orphans from the 1950s bounced dodgeballs in the bowels of the building. We were encouraged to share our experiences and stories of the past. It's hard to encapsulate four years of memories in an email without the reader losing his or her focus. I did my best to summarize my life at WNHU to the new station manager. Here's what I wrote: In September of 1994, I walked through those glass doors in the basement of Maxcy Hall and began the greatest four years of my life at WNHU. I loved sports and new alternative music, two distinct entities that garnered the la...

My friend Matt Mentone likes to tell the story of how he first met Jim. He walked into the WNHU studios, down in the bowels of dingy Maxcy Hall, one day back in 1995. The man extended his hand and said, "Hi. Jim Abbott, like the pitcher." I suppose there could have been more than one Jim Abbott in this world, but the one we would come to know and love was one-of-a-kind. This made it all the more sad when Matt texted me last night. He'd heard from a mutual friend that Jim Abbott passed away on June 11th at the age of 59. I later found out that he'd suffered a stroke in January and never fully recovered. When I walked into my first sports department meeting in 1994, I was a little punk with long hair who loved alternative music and sports. I'd previously met Jay McEnaney, WNHU's Sports Director and play-by-play man at the time. Next to him was a young Scott Criscuolo, whom I would later bond with over anything Mets and wrestling-related. Then, there was this...