Letter from the editor:
When I was 15, I flew to Pittsburgh to visit my sick grandfather, who lived in Mount Lebanon. A former journalist, my Poppy was one of the great characters ever to grace this Earth. He once got bored at a wedding and convinced 200 people he was the fifth man to walk on the Moon — “Sure, you remember Neil Armstrong and maybe Buzz Aldrin, but you don’t remember Charlie Carroll, the fifth man to walk on the moon?”
Poppy was a storyteller.
He was a proud Yinzer.
And he loved his sports.
All three points play crucial roles in why I’m involved withPittsburgh Sporting New and in what our team hopes to do to inform and entertain you, our readers.
When I stepped into the Pittsburgh International Airport at age 15, I was taken aback by all the black and gold sports gear people were wearing. Long-sleeve t-shirts, short-sleeve t-shirts, sweatshirts, jackets, hats, gloves, scarves and, yes, even underwear. Black and gold everywhere I looked.
Now, I’m from the San Francisco area, which is no slouch when it comes to sports tradition, but Pittsburgh was a whole new world to me. I walked past the Franco Harris statue and remembered my grandpa’s stories about the Immaculate Reception, which he listened to on the radio while sitting on the floor of a neighbor’s kitchen. I remembered his stories about getting to know Pirates great Steve Blass and being involved in the announcement in 1986 that had the city’s major corporations buying the Pirates to keep them in town.
Walking through the halls of the airport, I heard people talking about how the City of Champions had lived up to its name, what with the Steelers having recently won the Super Bowl and the Penguins the Stanley Cup. People were adamant that the James Harrison pick-6 was the greatest play in Super Bowl history and that Sidney Crosby was the second coming of Wayne Gretzky. I saw pictures of babies swaddled in Terrible Towels.
Toto, I don’t think we’re in Kansas anymore (or California)
Now, seven years later, I’m living here in Pittsburgh and acting as the editor-in-chief of Pittsburgh Sporting News. It was started to give the Steel City’s loyal fans a go-to outlet for all the sports news they could possibly want, but not just in a facts-and-stats kind of way. Sports should be fun and engaging. And Pittsburgh sports needs a bit of that Yinzer touch.
One of the first things that struck me about Pittsburgh Sporting News is its sense of community, both with the fans and among the staff. It’s a place full of positivity and creativity, with everyone wanting to help out and make each other better. The staff truly is remarkable, and it makes writing about sports all the more fun.
Here at Pittsburgh Sporting News, we totally get how important sports are. We’re all die-hard sports fans who yell at our TVs during games as though the players can hear us (don’t try to convince us they can’t.) We all talk about our teams in terms of “us” and “we.” We all know what it’s like to watch our teams suffer the agony of defeat, and we all know what it’s like to lose our voices from screaming so much when our teams win.
We get it.
And we hope to share with you in a way that will not only inform you but will take you behind the scenes with some of your favorite players and teams and will help you see the local sports scene in fresh, new ways.
My Poppy may no longer be with me, but his stories still are. And that’s what I — and this site — want to share with you: stories, memorable stories, and lots of them.
We hope you’ll join us on our journey.
— Shannon Carroll, editor-in-chief