Not gonna do it!

I am not writing about Brett until he makes up his mind!

That being said, I read an amazing article today on Yahoo News. Granted, it was about a BoSox fan, but I can go ahead and forgive that because of what the guy was doing. The article was titled "Little Fenway a big hit for players and charity." Pat O'Connor in Essex, Vermont wanted to have his own Fenway. The guy could have just made his own Field of Dreams. (Which of course is his favorite movie) But he made his Fenway as close to the real one as possible, and then decided to host a charity wiffle ball tourney after the September 11th attacks. What started as a couple teams coming to play and raise some money while they were doing it, turned into a 3 day charity extravaganza which now raises money for Travis Roy's foundation. (For those unfamiliar, Travis Roy broke his neck in his first college hockey game. Buffalo Sabres fans know the story because Chris Drury was a teammate of his at Boston University, and brought the Stanley Cup to him when he won it with Colorado. The NY Times did a profile about Drury during the 2006 Playoffs detailing the friendship. O'Connor decided to use the tournament to raise funds for his foundation after reading his book "Eleven Seconds.") When the single field wasn't enough, he built a second, modeled after Wrigley Field in order to accommodate all the teams wanting to play in the annual tournament.

So let me just recap this. A random guy builds a baseball field in his backyard. He then hosts a charity tournament on a whim to raise money for the NY disaster relief. And if that wasn't enough, he decided to use the wiffle ball tournament to raise funds for a charity for someone he never met. And when there was a waiting list for the tournament, he built a second field. There's still a waiting list too. Over $715,000 has been raised for Travis Roy's charity to date.

Over the last couple days, I've blogged about a 19 year old who went to arbitration because his $880,000 contract wasn't enough for him. I've blogged about a 40 year old QB who is damn near getting a blank check from Zygi Wilf in order to come back and be the "savior" for a team left with little other option to lead them. I've blogged about a draft pick of the Bills who is one of only two in league left to sign, likely due to some minutia in the contract language not giving him this or that. But Pat O'Connor used his own money to make a ball field. And once he built it, the players came, just like in his favorite movie. But more than that, they came and played, not for the money, but to have fun. In their quest to have fun, they raise a whole boatload of money for a great charity. Really puts things into perspective, doesn't it? And gave me a welcome respite from the greed and insanity of the sports world, even for just a moment.

Thanks Pat, for giving me hope that sports isn't just about the all-mighty dollar.