News & Observer | newsobserver.com | 2008 NCAA Men's Bracket

Two faithful readers passed away recently with The N&O on their minds near the end of their lives. 

The first was Sen. Vernon Malone of Raleigh, who died in April. Malone, 77, died on a Saturday after mowing his lawn and relaxing with his daily newspaper. That prompted various jokes when his friends and family gathered to honor him. "Saint Peter reached out and grabbed Vernon's hand, and the last thing he saw was The News & Observer," Gov. Beverly Perdue said during a service honoring Malone. Perdue said that image made her "just guffaw." Insert your own joke here (actually, insert it below). Read more about the Malone service here.

Another loyal N&O reader, Russell Buxton III of Cary, died 10 days ago. Buxton, 74, had been ill in recent years but was determined to make it to his 50th wedding anniversary on June 21, The N&O's Ruth Sheehan reported. He made it. He died June 24.

When his children were younger, Buxton used The N&O to stimulate debate at the dinner table. He would clip out an editorial or opinion column, especially those opposing his children's views. Then he would ask his son and daughter to argue the other side. 

His wife, JoAnn, told Sheehan: "Russell was always willing to share his views but he was particularly vocal during the last six months." Which might explain the note he wrote me about three weeks ago. He said The N&O was soft. "The N&O used to be a hard-hitting paper on Democrats as well as Republicans on exposing where money goes when it shouldn't go there, abuses of power, etc.," he wrote. "I wish you would get back your edge."

We're working on it, Mr. Buxton. If you have a good tip, please send it our way.  

--John Drescher

Photojournalist Chuck Liddy's Western NC waterfall project kicked off with help from multimedia guru Lamonte Garrett. It was the cover of our Arts & Living section Sunday and you can see the online version here.

We're shrinking the size of the weather info in the paper from a half page to a quarter page.  Times aren't easy - you know that - and we're having to make choices about how to save money.  So when we have to reduce the number of pages we print each day, something's got to give. What we have tried to do is eliminate some of the space-consuming visual elements while keeping information.

We have put a prototype of the what the weather information will look like and what it will contain. We'd like to hear suggestions about what info we should include and what we should leave out.  There are a lot of different ideas about what's important.  I have heard from the dew point lobby, the humidity lobby, the moon phase lobby, etc. 

Go here and leave your comments.  We're shooting for making the change around July 7.  

When I see unadjusted comparisons of salary figures between today and decades ago, I always want to take out my calculator. Today's example was in our Sports section, on page 6C. The AP reporter, writing about the retirement of Don Fehr, head of the players' union, was trying to make a point about how salaries had increased during Fehr's tenure.

He noted that the average salary when Fehr took over 26 years ago in 1983 was $289,000 and by last year it had risen to $2.9 million.

That seems like a meteoric rise. But when you adjust it for inflation, the 1983 average is more like around $624,000. I use the cost-of-living calculator of the American Institute for Economic Research. Different calculators will give somewhat different results, but you get the idea.

Now, going from an apples-to-apples average of $624k to $2.9 million is nothing to sneeze at, but it's not as dramatic as the 10-fold increase suggested by the article.

But forget about averages for the moment. There is no question that the baseball stars of today - as opposed to the journeymen - are making hugely more money than the stars of yesteryear. When Sandy Koufax and Don Drysdale of the Los Angeles Dodgers staged their famous battle to get better contracts before the 1966 season, they eventually got around $125k for Koufax and $110k for Drysdale. These were arguably two of the best pitchers in baseball history. In current dollars, Koufax ended up getting around $800,000 a year and Drysdale $720,000.

If they were playing today, they would be making between $15 million and $20 million a year. Apiece.

There is no question that star ballplayers were way underpaid before the era of free agency and the quarter century-plus of Don Fehr at the helm of the players union. Can you imagine getting both Koufax and Drysdale for around $1.5 million, combined?

A little while ago I was sitting in church enjoying a Von Trapp Family moment. On the stage were my son, who was playing backup guitar, my son-in-law, who is the music director and lead guitarist; his brother, who was the drummer; and my wife and daughter, who are in the choir.

And, because this is a summer weekend and people are on vacation, they actually were the choir. 

I, lacking any musical talent, was in the back of the church. 

During the sermon, they sat back down and my son came over to sit with me, and he put his arm around me.

It was a good Father's Day moment.

He is a big lug who now towers over me.  I remember when I used to be able to carry him on my shoulders, but that was a long time ago. 

A couple of years ago, when he turned 18, he talked me into getting a tattoo with him.  I wrote a story about it and they ran it in the paper on Father's Day in 2007. Here it is. 

A couple of weeks ago, my daughter marked her first anniversary. In October 2007, when we were in the early stages of preparing for her wedding, I wrote a story about what it was like to be assuming the role of the father of the bride.  Here it is. 

The last couple of days I was thinking about getting old.  I taped a Headline Saturday show over at WRAL, and the subject was the coming rise in the elderly population. 

I taped the show because John Drescher, who usually does it with David Crabtree, was on vacation this week.

Also on the show with me was Tommy Goldsmith, who covers aging issues for us, and the guests on the other side of the table were Ran Coble, exec director of the N.C. Center for Public Policy Research, and Dennis Streets, head of the  division of aging and adult services.

Coble's outfit just released a report looking at the coming surge in the number of seniors as the Baby Boomers start hitting 65, and also the rising number of people in their 80s and 90s. If you want to see a summary of it, go here. 

The show airs 7 p.m. Saturday. 

If you watch it, you will see that in the beginning of the show, Crabtree turns to me to ask the first question.  At that very moment, I blanked. I faked it for a few seconds, stole a desperate glance at my notes, saw my question and saved myself.  That will explain why my question had a slightly long windup. This is why I am not in television, aside from the obvious lack of good hair. It is also a good idea to write down your questions in case your mind goes blank.

I'm taping Headline Saturday tomorrow, which airs on WRAL 7 p.m. Saturday. The show will be on the issues surrounding the growth in the elderly population, and how we're going to meet the needs of a rapidly increasing group of seniors.  If any of you have any questions you'd like me to ask, email me at dbarkin@newsobserver.com.  The show tapes at 9:30 a.m., and I'll check my email beforehand.

Alex Webb and Mike Zlotnicki have put together a Father's Day gift guide that will run in our Outdoors section in Sports Thursday.  This will be good for anyone who's trying to get a last-minute gift for the dad who hunts or fishes.  

Webb's day job is chief technology guru here at the N&O. He keeps stuff running.  Mike, our Outdoors editor, has been in Michigan at an outdoors writers conference, a gathering of guys who talk about things I have no knowledge of.  He's been blogging on it.

Tim Stevens, our preps editor, had an interesting post on his Preps Now blog about Rodney Purvis, a local basketball player who has justed finished up his eighth grade and is getting wide notice for his skills.  I'm expecting that recruiting sites on the internet will eventually start scouting promising third graders with exceptional crossover moves and quick first step.

This is the skinny from HoopsReport.com:  "Rodney Purvis-I can’t believe he is only an 8th grade. Nice looking prospect." 

There you have it. Rodney Purvis, projected high NBA draft choice in 2014 or so.

Seriously, one of the things Tim always tells me is that you can never, ever, tell what's going to happen to some promising 14-15-year-old.  Some kids just develop earlier, but then plateau, and don't amount to anything special. Some talented kids don't want to work hard and fall by the wayside, and never make it to college because of poor grades and a bad attitude.  The guys who eventually make it to Division 1 programs and to the NBA are not always the most talented basketball players on the planet. The playgrounds are filled with great players who lack the discipline and the mental toughness to stay in school, follow the rules and keep away from trouble.

So making any kind of projections about 8th graders is a dicey proposition at best.