“The Word is Courage–What It Means”

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I wanted to write about all the things that happened in a 24-hour span in our world, our sports world, but I got knocked off center by what I saw on TV.

Carlos Correa opts out of his (350M) contract with the Giants.

His agent Scott Boras, involved in a public feud with San Francisco over the health of his client, voids the contract and delivers him to the Mets.

But my mind is side tracked by what I heard throughout the day on Wednesday.

I wanted to write about the passing of Franco Harris, and all the flashbacks to the Steelers’ Immaculate Reception, for the Italian Army, or the 4-Super Bowl rings he helped win in Pittsburgh.

But I just could not turn away from what was on my television.

I thought maybe I’d write about the must win games in the NFL this weekend, or the Lakers on going frightful injury issues, or the College Transfer Portal or National Signing date.

But I had to stand down on sports, take a time out to talk about society.

We have seen alot of things on our television, things of note, successes, failures, tragedies.

The Kennedy-Oswald shootings.  The trauma of 9-11.  The ravages of weather. A space shuttle explosion.  A presidential resignation. The ugliness of the elections.  The disasters at the border.  The riots in our cities.  The attack on the Capitol.  The J6 hearings.

Alot of historical damage to our nation, but now we witnessed something really special, ‘democracy at work’, and it was uplifting..

The war in Ukraine is about the suffering of its people, the tyranny of the Russian leadership.  It plays out on the nightly news.  Bombings of hospitals and churches, schools and office buildings, condos and houses.

We often use the word ‘courage’ in the world of sports.

How about the courage we have seen from President Zelensky of Ukraine?

His people’s courage.  The courage of the soldiers-citizens on the front lines.  The destruction in all those cities.  The nightmare of life and the death by the Russian assaults on cities and its citizens.  The war-crimes.  The courage to stand together.

Zelensky’s speech infront of an emotional Congress, was amazing.  It was a feel good reaction watching the standing ovations thruout his speech.  It was America at its best in terms of helping fund democracy to a country in need.

When Zelensky linked the battle of Saratoga in the Revolution to what his country was going thru, it touched a nerve.  When he quoted Churchill who came to Washington in 1941 after Pearl Harbor, it reminded us of how we helped defeat the Nazis.

And here in 2022, another leader, under assault came here to say thank you and asking for continued support, from Democrats and Republicans, and Americans en masse.

48 hours ago he visited his troops on the frontline near Kherson.  His soldiers, fighting and dying in the dead of that winter, stood with him, and then the soldiers autographed the Ukraine flag the President would bring to Washington.

He gave that flag to Nancy Pelosi and she in turn gave him the US flag that flew over the Capitol until sunset on the day he visited Washington, DC.  I was choked up watching the quality of his leadership.

America and its allies will continue to help this tiny European country in the battle of aggression.

It was a bad day globally for President Putin, architect of this disgraceful incursion on that country.  It’s his war plan to kill innocent citizens.  He believes he has the rights of Stalin to act like this.

On the same day, I thought back to the disgraced ex President Trump, for calling Putin a genius for how he leads Russia.  And then a text from the Georgian Congresswoman Marjorie Taylor-Green showed up, calling Zelensky a ‘Welfare Queen’ and Trump-Junior’s text calling Ukraine the US-51st state  and the GOP who refused to stand in the ovation for the Ukraine soldier-President at the end of his speech.

I don’t know if you are deeply religious.  I don’t know what eternal hell will be like when people pass.  But if Stalin-Hitler-Mussolini are there, they will be able to tell Putin and Trump and others what it’s like when they get there.

And on this day as we looked at that Ukraine autographed flag, I thought about the courage of Zelensky, facing almost certain death, to carry on and lead his people.

I’ve been to Oslo, Norway and the Nobel headquarters.  Zelensky deserves the Nobel Peace Prize for his leadership against the soul-less inhumane person that Putin is.

Just wanted to take time out from the games and players and teams I cover, to talk about a very type of courage we saw in Congress on Wednesday.

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