Pat Caputo Still Reminds Me Of Lewis Grizzard

Pat Caputo

Lewis Grizzard



I’ve said it before and I’ll say it again.

It’s posted all over this blog and my other sites for people to see – so I have no problem reaffirming this publicly yet again.

Pat Caputo is the best sports writer – best sports radio talk show host – best commentator on sports news in the greater Detroit Metropolitan area.

Including Windsor, which Caputo himself proclaimed to be “South Detroit” by way of expressing his displeasure for a specific Journey rock song played at the Joe Louis arena during Red Wing games.

Pat’s a personality to be sure.

He’s “The Book On Sports” – or simply “The Book” for short.

A character indeed.

He is a character of high character, in my personal and as always humble opinion.

I started following Caputo after hearing him on the radio, now broadcast on FM 97.1 The Ticket – Pat has been a mainstay on the radio waves keeping listeners involved in Detroit sports teams.

I’m a baseball fan myself.

Nobody in this town talks baseball like Pat Caputo.

Or hockey.

Or football.

Pat reminds me a lot – an awful lot – of my favorite sports columnist from The Atlanta Constitution and Journal – Lewis Grizzard. Grizzard was a masterful story teller who told you the story of the game as though you were sitting and talking to him. And he was deeply proud of growing up and being a Southerner – telling wonderful stories of growing up in his hometown Moreland, Georgia.

He loved and defended the area he grew up in – defending southerners against the often belittling Northerners who stereotyped all Southerners as … well … dumb.

That just plain ain’t true.

And Grizzard was also cited on several cases for being a racist – once being sued by a reporter who worked for Grizzard when he was the editor of a Chicago newspaper – a case Lewis won – although it didn’t matter much because once a stigma like being a racists is put in the minds of the masses – it sticks.

But Grizzard wrote exactly as he spoke. Charming, witty, and poignant.

And that is where most of all I draw the comparison between Pat Caputo and Lewis Grizzard. Both writers have been nationally celebrated and honored. Both writing with the same ease and manner in which they speak. Both personalities transcending the newspapers they wrote for to become easily recognized celebrities in their regions.

One a northerner who will stand up for the aching sorrows that Detroit has been through the last four decades; as the city tries so desperately to pull itself back up by its bootstraps to recover to the truly beautiful place it once was and in many ways still is at the corner of Lake St. Clair and Lake Erie – sitting in the middle of the mighty Detroit River.

The other a southern gentleman who stands up against the wrongfully projected stereotypes of what Georgia was by telling stories of his parents who divorced, and the local neighborhood population of Moreland.

Both do so with humor, with honesty, with some humility and with a little extra … panache.

But the days that Caputo writes and talks about are much different today than those of Lewis Grizzard some twenty years ago.

There’s more media today. And that media is interactive. There’s this whole Internet thing, you know.

The Book writes a blog online for the Oakland Press called “Open Book: A Sports Blog”. Caputo’s blog is the first I ever really followed – and is honestly the very reason I started headstuffing. Pat even helped me out here and there along the way.

Similarly it was Lewis Grizzard who inspired me to pick Journalism as a freshman in Georgia.

You couldn't really comment on a newspaper column in the old days - except by writing a letter to the editor. And lot's of such letters were written regarding one column or another of Lewis Grizzards. Sometimes Grizzard even wrote columns about the letters to the editor of readers despising him for one reason or the others.


I comment on Caputo's Open Book blog quite frequently. The collection of usual suspects that loyally comment are an eclectic bunch who really know their stuff and often expand the commentary from a single line of thought to a conversation that is held over weeks.

I’m the dumbest one in that eclectic crowd.

Conversations about who should hit second in the Tiger’s line up, and what’s really wrong with the bull pen and who could the Tiger’s get to play second base and who could the Tiger’s give up, and … well, you know … the usual sports blog / call in radio show kind of stuff.

But on the Open Book, we all kind of know each other – and we all kind of know the Book. And he kind of knows us too.

I liken it best to stopping into my favorite pub on my way home from work to sit and talk about the topics of the day with all the other guys like me who stop in the same pub – for a quick pop, but more so for the great conversation that is omnipresent.

But – as on any other blog – even including my own – are the anonymous commentators who insult and belittle the author – in stealth mode most often – not leaving a name behind their insults and put-downs.

Caputo publishes all these comments – wanting sincerely I believe to be transparent and allow his naysayers to have their say.

A lot of them are very rude. And Pat answers them with dignity – and usually with the response that everyone is entitled to an opinion. And the Book On Sports allows all opinions to be expressed.

I admire Pat for that.

I wonder – would Lewis Grizzard – should he still be alive today – would he have had a blog? I bet he would have – albeit he hated newfangled gadgetry like word processors – preferring the clicks of a typewriter and the ring of the carriage at the end of sentence flying back to begin the first word of the next paragraph.

And I wonder how Lewis Grizzard would have responded to such insulting comments posted about him on his own blog. I’m certain that he would have published them. But unlike Caputo – Grizzard would have cherished the opportunity to rip into each one just to hone his ability to craft the best retort.

Grizzard’s retorts would have been simple, sharp, and plainly stated in the tone of a true Southern gentleman:

“... And you sir are libelous scoundrel”.

But Is Golf A Sport?

The other day I was having a smoke at the office in the tiny shed we have allocated for those - like myself - who are addicted to nicotine.

In came one of my co workers – a young man who is by all accounts quite a college football fan.

During the course of our conversation, the question came up "yes – but is golf really a sport?"

"Golfers are not athletes" stated my young debating partner.

"Golf involves a precise movement of skill and agility to control the distance and aim over often substantial distances", I countered. "It ain't easy!"

"I don't consider any game you play while smoking a cigarette and maybe drinking a beer or two to be a sport!", countered my young elitist friend.

I stated my opinion that he was confusing sports with athletics, and my reasons why. And we left cordially agreeing to disagree.

My position on this topic has always been that the term "sports" has always been confused with the term "athletics". To me the matter has always been "what is the true definition of the term 'sports'"?

I have always defined sports as "the competition between two or more parties".

And I defined athletics as "the demonstration of a physical feat".

So by my definition – a spelling bee is a sporting competition. A weekly game of bridge would also be a sporting event. And yes, hitting a golf ball is a demonstration of an athletic feat.

The term "good sport" thereby meant one who competed fairly and never complained about the result of the matching of skill.

I always thought the word sport to be rather vague – and if you wanted to better categorize such sporting events – you would use terms "athletics" or "chance" – like a game of black jack - to better specify the type of competition.

But for all the debates, and for all my certainty that I was right in my stance – I never looked the words up in the dictionary or in the encyclopedia.

Until today.

The main definition of the word Sport comes closest to this explanation. This definition comes directly from the Merriam-Webster's dictionary:

"to amuse oneself : frolic <lambs sporting in the meadow> b : to engage in a sport"

Okay – nothing revealing about this. According to Merriam-Webster - it simply means to have fun.

So on to the Encyclopedia Britannica … how do they discuss the topic of Sport?

"physical contests pursued for the goals and challenges they entail. Sports are part of every culture past and present, but each culture has its own definition of sports. The most useful definitions are those that clarify sport's relationship to play, games, and contests. "Play," wrote the German theorist Carl Diem, "is purposeless activity, for its own sake, the opposite of work." Humans work because they have to; they play because they want to. Play is autotelic—that is, it has its own goals. It is voluntary and uncoerced. Recalcitrant children compelled by their parents or teachers to compete in a game of football (soccer) are not really engaged in sport. Neither are professional athletes if their only motivation is their paycheck. In the real world, as a practical matter, motives are frequently mixed and often quite impossible to determine. Unambiguous definition is nonetheless a prerequisite to practical determinations about what is and is not an example of play" Encyclopedia Britannica: Sport

Well, that helps a little more.

But according the good German theorist Carl Diem – the term Professional Sports is a paradox, a contradiction unto itself?

I jumped over to Wikipedia to find out just who this Diem fellow is and why he is the authority used by such a prestigious reference as Encyclopedia Brittanica:

"Dr. Carl Diem (born June 24, 1882, Würzburg – December 17, 1962, Cologne) was a German sports administrator, and as Secretary General of the Organizing Committee of the Berlin Olympic Games, the chief organizer of the 1936 Olympic Summer Games (sometimes referred to as the "Nazi Olympics"). He created the tradition of the Olympic torch relay, and was an influential historian of sport, particularly the Olympic games." Wikipedia: Carl Diem

Okay – Mr. Diem was a Nazi with a bias towards amateur athletics. (My apologies to any Nazi's out there who think my terminology is insensitive).

But no place do I see the a correlation to the athletic prowess of the competitors in a sporting competition.

So I hold true to my own self concocted definitions stated earlier – that sport is merely a competition – and will add only that it is truly sport when those competing enjoy the activity.

So golf indeed is a sport.

You play golf. You might work on your game in practice – but you actually play the game when you are on the course.

How many times have you heard a professional golfer say that they would quit playing the day it wasn't fun anymore?

Why would you play if it wasn't fun.

And in any case – who is going to look me in the eye and tell me that Tiger Woods is not an athelete?

Is golf a sport?

Damn right it is.

My Not-So-Deep-Thoughts of a Summer Vacation Morning

As I sit here this beautiful summer morning by the pool, with my black lab Suzy sitting at my feet, I couldn't help but let my mind wander. And it occurred to me that at the age of forty seven, there are so many things about life that I still do not know the answer to. Because I am on vacation today – and my wife is out and about (as we Canadians say), I found myself with the luxury to write some of these questions – and a few observations – down.

These are my own not-so-deep thoughts of a summer vacation morning:

"How is it that a Mom's work is never done, but Dad's Honey-do list has no last page?"

"How come every kid in North America plays or has played soccer over the last thirty years, yet they keep telling me the game will never catch on over here?"

"If Darwinism is a scientific basis for natural evolution and based on the principles of survival of the fittest, then why are kittens so damned cute?"

"How is it possible for a child to move the entire contents of their bedroom into the living room in a matter of minutes, but it takes me an hour to put them back?"

"If we tell our kids that 'no' means no, then why do we answer their unreasonable requests with .. 'We'll see'"

"How come Dads always have to use the downstairs bathroom?"

"How is it that a Mom's work is never done, but Dad gets up at 6:30 every morning?"

"Why did I bother to get the full baseball package when the DVD player and the Wii are hooked up to the same TV as the digital cable box? Did I really think I was going to watch baseball games on the good TV?"

"Why is golf such a waste of time and money, but there is always time for bingo?"

"How come when there is pee on the toilet seat, all the women in my house blame me?"

"Why is it that when Dad watches a movie and one of the characters is a really hot looking woman, Dad gets in trouble … but Mom can read all the trashy Harlequin Romance novels she wants?"

"How can my wife actually know I'm looking at the gorgeous woman walking down the street when she is driving and I'm wearing very dark sunglasses?"

"Why is it okay for me to have a beer after cutting the grass on a hot summer day, but not after three loads of kids laundry on a Sunday morning?"

"Why is it that the sandwich my wife makes me tastes twice as good as the ones I make for myself?"

"Why is it okay to send my daughters to their rooms for a whole afternoon, but when I lock them in a broom closet for ten minutes, the cops show up? Maybe next time I should take their cell phones away first."

"Why hasn't anyone stood up against these evil breakfast cereal manufacturers putting toy surprises in the box?"

"Why does my black lab prefer the water in the toilet bowl to the fresh water in her dog bowl?"

"How come kids can swim in cold water in a swimming pool until their lips turn blue, but you have to drag them kicking and screaming into a bath tub?"

"Why is summer the fastest season to pass, yet winter seems to last half a year?"

"Why does Michael Jackson have more fans than Neal Armstrong?"

"Why hasn't anybody yet invented a Velcro fastener for socks so they stay together when you wash them?"

"Why does my wife insist on planting so many flowers in our gardens that I'm just going kill from neglect anyways?"

"Why aren't there any professional kick-ball leagues?"

"Why is it that the eighty dollar designer sunglasses I just bought are broken or lost within the first day, but the dollar store pair I bought seem to be made of indestructible material?"

"Why do dogs like to eat kitty litter?"

"If cats truly hate water, then why do they keep falling in the toilet bowl?"

"How come when I was eight years old, my Dad wouldn't let me listen to rock-and-roll because it was music for druggies … but he played Johnny Cash's Folsum Prison album so many times I learned all the words to 'Cocain Blues' ?"

"Since getting our energy from the wind is so popular now, why aren't people putting sails on the motor boats?"

"If we are supposed to be moving towards electric cars that we plug into sockets when we come home every night, how come our power grids can't handle the everyone running air conditioners in July?"

" I think they should have a worldwide championship every year for all the professional sports teams of the world to play against each other."

"How come a beer tastes so much better when you're drinking it with a good friend?"

"Why don't people buy designer pool covers so they can find their houses easier when flying in airplanes?"

"If two wrongs don't make a right, then three wrongs should be a ticket-able offense."

"Why do rich people who live on the lake have swimming pools?"

"If the sun generates enough power to heat the entire planet and make the chlorophyll in all the worlds plants make them green, then why are my solar garden lights so dim?"

"Why is it every time I go to professional baseball game, there is a drunk guy in my section heckling the umpire and players? Is there one in every section?"

"Why is it now that the music I listened to as a kid often sounds like music that only a kid would listen to?"

"How come the solar blanket I cover my pool with to heat the water doesn't melt the plastic pole I role it up on when we go swimming on a hot day?"

"If perpetual motion is an impossible feat to achieve under the earth's gravity, then how come the water that flows over Niagara falls never stops?"

"Why is it the cutest moments of you children's young lives occur when you digital camera is broken? "

Ring-What?

There are a number of games played on the Canadian winter season ice.

There is ice skating on frozen ponds.

There is hockey.

There is curling – which if you don't know – is a shuffle board like game where each team tries to slide large heavy polished rocks into a target on the other side of the ice, and the team with the most rocks near the target wins. It's a great game of skill, accuracy and strategy.

And then there is ringette.

"Ring-what?"

Ringette. It's a game very similar to hockey. But very different in several key ways:

The players use a hockey stick – with the blade cut off – so they only use the shaft. The butt of the stick is taped.

The puck is replaced by a heavy rubber ring – like the one you probably played ring toss with when you were young.

The players pass the ring to each other much like hockey players passing the puck, but the skill in ringette is in receiving – catching the pass – because instead of just letting the puck hit the blade of your stick as in hockey, the ringette player has to lift their stick and try to put the end down in the middle of the ring as it slides by.

There are also some other significant rules that distinguish it from hockey – like the one that states that no offensive player can put a skate or a blade in the goalie crease, and no offensive player can play defense behind a line on their own side.

You know – rules.

But the key to ringette is trapping that ring on the end of your stick – and then slinging it off the end for a pass or a shot on net.

Oh, and ringette – at this point anyways – is pretty much played by the female gender.

So as the father of a seven and six year old girls, I was very interested to see ringette again.

The ringette I saw played this year was pretty elite. While visiting my cousin Sarah's family at their log cabin outside of Cambridge, Ontario – Sarah insisted that we attend a special game being played that day. The game was between two elite teams: The Paris Ontario Ringette Association's under 20 girls playing two Team Canada Squads representing those on or trying out for Canada's national team.

And this game was played the day before Team Canada made its final cuts.

To make it even more interesting, there were two girls from the Paris Ringette association trying out for Team Canada this day. And the crowd was torn between rooting for the Team Canada rookies, and their hometown squad.

I sat and watched this game. I was not new to ringette. Sarah has been involved with this sport with her Dad (my Uncle Fred) since she was little and living in London, Ontario. Together they started and founded the Ringette association in Mitchell, Ontario. And now Sarah is continuing the tradition for her two daughters Justine and Paige – to carry Ringette into the next generation. She is proud of the exceptional executive committee she is a part of.

When I was young and living in Minnesota, I played a little hockey. Very little – and probably very poorly. When we visited my Uncle Fred's one Christmas, he and Sarah invited my brother Paul and I out to skate a practice with them.

I still remember that day – and how incredibly fun it was. And how difficult it was to catch that stupid ring on the end of my stick. And how humbling it was to have younger girls skating circles around me.

As I sat and watched the warm ups for the game, Sarah explained to me why the older girls were skating with the younger girls from the younger teams.

"This is a very important part of ringette", explained Sarah. "Part of this games culture is to expose the younger players to the older players, on and off the ice, to help them learn and grow quicker".

So ringette also teaches team members to also be role models.

And as I looked around the ice at both the Paris and Team Canada skaters, they were each doing their part to help and inspire the younger Parisian skaters. The Team Canada goalie was talking to the younger Parisian goalie about how to get down quicker to the ice to block low shots.

As the game began, I was blown away by the skating skills of both sides. Better than the best boys I have seen. Faster and quicker spins and turns than I have seen at the AAA OHL level. It was an incredible vision of players weaving so quickly through each other that it almost seemed like positions were only a formality for score cards.

The skill and accuracy of the pass making – moving the ring to open ice and watching the team mate sling over to pick it on the end of her stick up the middle of the ice, whip it outside to the wing, and receive it back on the end of her stick and in the same motion fling it powerfully at the net for a shot – only to have the sprawling keeper block it away.

It was at least as exciting as hockey. And because the player has the ring on the end of their stick – the skating they can do – the spins and cuts and twists are so much more exciting.

It is really something to see.

If you were to ask a hockey player about ringette, he would likely tell you it's for girls.

But if you asked a hockey player to go play ringette with these girls, he would likely decline the offer.

Because hockey players do not want to be shown up by a bunch of girls.

Special Tiger Moments Keep Stacking Up

By now you have most likely heard that Detroit’s Justin Verlander pitched a No Hitter Tuesday, June 12, 2007. Below is a recap of the game showing this amazing feat.

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The game was not on Windsor Cable - unless you cough up the big bucks for the MLB package.

So - like every night, I was sitting in the back yard listening to the ball game - and it started to get special as early as the 4th.

Dan Dickerson and Jim Price painted that game so beautifully for me, I could see the wicked slider, and imagined the Infante - Polanco - Casey double-play. When I saw the replay it was exactly how I imagined it. It's in the video clip I embedded above.

But the most amazing thing was how they conveyed the importance of the moment - what was really happening - without saying it.

".. and the boxes all have zeros for Millwaukee!"

They never even came close to crossing the jinx line.

That was soooo great.

What made it more incredible was the fact he threw a fastball to the first batter in the first inning around 103 MPH. That’s as fast as most any man can throw. He threw a fastball 102 MPH to the last batter in the 9^th inning – some 110 pitches later.

That’s an amazing feat.

And he did it in our own yard.

Since Comerica Park assumed the role once that of Tigers / Briggs stadium seven years ago, it has seen

• The worst record in baseball – 117 losses in one season
• The 2005 All Star Game
• The 2006 World Series
• And now Justin Verlander’s No Hitter.

I told you earlier that Comerica Park was very special to Darlene and I. I believe now that Comerica Park has seen enough new history to be important to all Detroit Tiger Fans.

I also told you earlier how Willie Horton signed my daughters baseball card. He also signed his own card for Darlene. Mr. Horton is immortalized by one of 4 huge bronze statues in Comerica's center field

And this season I have been lucky to exchange comments and opinions with Detroit's best baseball columnist Pat Caputo - although I probably stay at a higher and lighter level than he would like.

I really feel close to this team - to this season. Any closer and I would be opening beers and lighting Marlborough's for Jim Leyland in the back yard.

But our Tiger's have an Achilles Heel this year. Their bullpen has let us down more times than it has helped us for sure. Our record could be at least 5 games better right now if our bullpen could have held the lead the starters left the game with. I will let "The Book" explain it best. I posted my comments on his comments page.

Let's see how the All Star Game goes for the Tigers. Leyland will be the manager for the AL side, with Justin Verlander starting, and Maglio Ordonez starting in right. And who knows who else might show up.

Or not show up. It may be that Barry Bonds does not even go to the All Star game the very season he is to break Hank Aaron's homer record. Is that justice or injustice - an interesting debate?

Well, back to the basement to do more packing.

Mr. Grizzard and Mr. Caputo

As June arrives in Windsor in muggy summer fashion, I sit in my backyard listening to the Tigers game from Arlington, Texas. Tonight we are up 5 - nothing in the top of the fifth.

I'm tapping this into my little PDA. I hope this works.

Ask anyone who knows me, and they will tell you I am a sports freak. I love my baseball, my golf, hockey, and basketball. If the Lions didn't stink so bad, I might go back to loving football too.

Ask anyone who knows me and they will tell you that I actually think I know what I am talking about.

I am right more often than not. That puts me somewhere between 51% and 99% accurate. I can live with those margins.

When I was in university in Georgia, I used to read a sports columnist in the Atlanta Journal Constitution named Lewis Grizzard.

Although he was a sports columnist, he was more of a general humorist. I would buy the whole paper just to read his column. I loved the guy so much that I switched my major to be a journalism major and a poli-sci minor.

Why political science?

It seemed to me that joking about politicians would be funnier than sports. Perhaps - but sports are much more "real". And politicians are too easy to make fun of.

Mr. Grizzard died some time ago. Some would say his lifestyle kIlled him.

I write this blog in the memory of Mr. Grizzard.

I even try to emulate his style.

In Detroit, the best sports columnist is Pat Caputo. He writes for the Oakland Press and has a radio show -The Book on Sports - on 1270 AM.

I have a link to his blog site 'Open Book' on the left sidebar. I post comments quite often to his blog - pretending to be a knowledgeable sports fan, and Pat is very generous in his replies.

In one post, I was actually referred to as one of the great Canadians. Unfortunately he was kidding.

But I am enjoying this blog very much. To all who have been reading, thank you. I will try to do a better and more consistent job.

Below is a Lewis Grizzard Column from the Spring of 1992 - after his beloved Atlanta Braves lost the 1991 World Series to the Minnesota Twins. This is pure Grizzard:

The Boys Of Summer Go Under The Dome Lewis Grizzard Baseball season came to a rather rotten end for me in 1991. There I was in Minneapolis's house of horrors, the Metrodome, covering the seventh game of the World Series between Atlanta's Braves (with apologies to the Portland Oregonian) and the Minnesota Twins, a nickname a clever person said was insensitive to couples who couldn't have children. Around the fifth inning, with no score in the game, the ribbon on my typewriter, which was manufactured sometime around the turn of the century, suddenly wouldn't advance. I couldn't make letters and words appear on the white paper in front of me. I fiddled with the problem for six more outs and was nearing a panic stage. What if I couldn't figure out a way to free the ribbon? The game would end and I would have to write my column longhand and I hadn't written anything in longhand since my last essay-type test in college. And who could I get to help me with the ribbon? Everybody else in the press box was writing on a Star Wars computer. Who would remember about typewriter ribbons? By the grace of God, I finally hit the right lever inside my typewriter and the ribbon started moving again. Then the Braves lost 1-0 because Lonnie Smith went brain dead on the base path. I finished my column and left the Metrodome. Outside, Twins fans were celebrating by doing such things as climbing onto the tops of buses. I had hired a car and driver to take me back to my hotel. Some kids had asked my driver for whom he was waiting. "Some guy from Atlanta," he told them. When I arrived at the car the kids began heckling me. "We beat your [bad word]!" one screamed. "Go home, you redneck!" screamed another. Once I was inside the car and had locked my doors, they banged on the windows and roof and one of the Norse waifs pressed his nose and mouth on one of the windows. As I recall the incident now, I think he looked a little like Paul Tsongas. When I finally reached my hotel, shaken but unscathed, the bar was closed. I made a mental note that Minnesota calling itself the gopher state was an insult to gophers, and went to sleep. It is difficult for me to believe the 1992 baseball season is upon us so quickly. Wasn't the nightmare in Minneapolis just yesterday? Indeed not. The 1992 Atlanta Braves, defending National League champions, are about to open their season, and many questions arise. I will attempt to answer some of them: Can the Braves repeat as National League champions? Sure. You really think so? If you really must know, I'm extremely concerned about Cincinnati. What can we expect of David Justice this season? A lot of pouting when things don't go his way. Does the team have a drug problem? Well, they were drug all over the field during spring training but you can't really go by that. Will the chop come back? Was Custer surprised at little Big Horn? Will Jane and Ted have a successful marriage? Who do I look like, Dear Abby? Let's stick to baseball. What part of the Braves do you think will be the most improved? Their bank accounts. What would you like to see out of Lonnie Smith this season? An apology. If the Braves get to the World Series and have to play the Twins again, would you go back to Minneapolis? If I can take along a typewriter technician, and my own bat. http://www.lewisgrizzard.com/

If We Could Really Capture a Moment

Well, tomorrow I have to hop on a train again and ride back north to Toronto.

The purpose of this trip is “knowledge transfer”. I am to transfer a portion of my knowledge to those taking over our contract in November.

I am to perform this knowledge transfer without the use of tin head covers strung together with curly wire and electric flashes bolting the knowledge from my brain to theirs.

Instead – I am simply to tell them. And they are to remember what I said. Maybe they will take some notes, write some stuff down - depending on the quality of knowledge I provide.

Kind of simple, don’t you think?

But it does bring to mind the device I hope to invent in my mad scientist laboratory one day.

If you’re a sports fan, you will appreciate this.

Imagine if you could put a cap on somebody that would capture all aspects of their brain – like Tivo-ing a live sports event.

Everything that person experienced would be captured in this recording.

Then you can take that recording and give it to another person. They put on their cap, hit the “play” button, and play back everything the first person experienced.

Imagine if you had this recording cap on Hank Aaron when he broke the Babe’s home run record. We have all seen the tape of when he did it. But imagine if you could actually see it through his eyes, feel the adrenalin pump through his veins and his heart beating as his hands felt the bat make solid contact and the ball fly’s over the fence, and the explosion of emotion that erupted in that moment of realization.

Imagine.

Imagine Tiger woods watching that magic chip shot that rolled down the slope and on the last rotation hang before falling in the cup in the 2005 Masters.

I know that I would pay most anything to play a round of golf like Tiger, even if it wasn’t me playing. Just to know what it feels like would be incredible.

Or imagine recording your own emotion as saw your newborn child for the first time. You could play it back like a home movie.

It would truly be remembering. Although some may argue that the memory is sweeter than when it happened.

Imagine how diplomats could use such a device to establish a common ground. “Oh, now I understand how you really feel about that”. Of course the political ambitions and the lies they inspire would also be captured.

And think of the way that the education institutions would be changed. A lecture from inside of Steven Hawking s mind. The greatest experts knowledge would simply be copied into your brain.

But of course, like all new technologies, there are darker ways this would be used:

Governments would use the device to find out their enemies secrets.

Military Intelligence would use the device to uncover enemy plans.

Of course, pornographers would use the device too. I am not so naive to not realize this would be the devices first immediate use. I believe this is how VHS actually beat out Beta.

But the sickest would be from those who would create “snuff” experiences. Killing themselves or someone else while wearing the device and capturing the experience.

But imagine what man could learn from such a device. Imagine how our collective intelligence would skyrocket. Imagine how our social barriers would tumble. Imagine how our ability to agree would be increased.

Imagine. Or would it better for some inventions to not be invented?

If only we were smart enough – disciplined enough to know what truly is best.