Last week, I wrote a column for Poynter on Tom Gage, who was inducted into Baseball’s Hall of Fame the same year the Detroit News took him off the Tigers beat.

During our conversation, Gage mentioned he was nervous about the speech he had to give Saturday during the induction ceremonies at Cooperstown. He noted he was a writer, not a speaker.

Deadline Detroit has excerpts from Gage’s speech. The writer did a terrific job.

(Who) am I?

Well, if you’ve loved baseball all your life, I am you. 

If your first memory of watching TV is a baseball game, I am you. 

If you couldn’t wait for the first day each spring that the new baseball cards were out, once again, I am you. 

I’m an adult version of a kid who wrote game stories after playing All-Star Baseball, a wonderful game of spinners and discs, for hours on the floor of my bedroom. My dog ate a player one day – I mean he ate half his disc – it was Gus Zernial of the old Kansas City A’s – so as a kid I even wrote a story about the disabled list. 

And.

And the first manager I covered after I got on the beat full-time — kindly, but less than loquacious Les Moss — answered the first three questions I asked of him by saying “you never know” to all three.

About that time, I was thinking to myself: “This is not going to be an easy beat.”

It wasn’t — and that holds true even now. Baseball is not an easy beat. You miss weddings, you miss funerals, you miss birthdays. I say my son is 29 going on 18 because of all the birthdays I missed.

But I loved the beat. I couldn’t have done it for as long as I did, with all those deadlines, if I hadn’t.

I loved it because every game is different. There is always a nuance to write about, something that makes each game unique. You just have to recognize it.

And I loved it for the individuals of the game. There are great players who are great people — too many to mention. But one I absolutely have to is Alan Trammell, one of the most admirable individuals I’ve ever met in baseball.

I liked self-effacing players the most. I also liked players with humor. Still do.

An excerpt from a post I did for Awful Announcing:

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Fox Sports showed that trying to air 10-11 hours per day of golf is no easy task. Surely, Fox will adjust its coverage and get better for future U.S. Opens.

ESPN, though, showed how great golf coverage can be if done well. I go way back with Tirico to when he was breaking in as ABC’s host for golf. I remember telling him once at a Western Open in Chicago that I fully expected him to be the host of an Olympics some day. It still might happen if he ever leaves ESPN, but the Monday Night Football gig keeps him very happy. Bottom line: You could see back then that he is a true talent and that he would make it big.

So it always is a treat getting to hear Tirico navigate ESPN’s coverage of the British Open. The same holds true for Van Pelt. The former Golf Channel anchor not only knows the game, he has a passion for it. I would be thrilled to hear his voice on every golf telecast.

Azinger always has been a favorite. As he showed as the last victorious U.S. Ryder Cup captain, he has a bit of an edge to him. He is an entertaining listen.

Did anyone note that two of ESPN’s on-course reporters were women? It is great that Judy Rankin still is walking the fairways at age 70. Dottie Pepper also is solid with her analysis.

After watching Holly Sonders stumble her way through questions at the U.S. Open, you have more appreciation for how Tom Rinaldi handles post-round interviews. And praise to Gene Wojciechowski, one of the best in the business, for accentuating the coverage with his various features. Loved the one about the Old Course Hotel being pelted by balls by the recreational players on St. Andrews. I am proud to say I once bounced a drive off the hotel.

It hardly is a secret that the official Twitter for a team always will try to put a positive spin on a defeat, no matter how bad things get.

However, you have to appreciate the person who handles the Twitter feed for the Chicago Cubs. There was this post on Saturday at around 6:30 p.m. Central following Cole Hamels no-hitter at Wrigley Field.

Yes, of all the history that was made Saturday, Dexter Fowler’s two walks certainly merited a mention. Keep in mind, this was the tweet that included the recap of the game.

To be fair, immediately after the game, the Cubs official Twitter did acknowledge Hamels’ feat. However, it made no direct mention that the Cubs were being no-hit during the game.

Spanning the globe to bring you the constant variety of sports media:

Colin Cowherd will have to make one of last apology before leaving ESPN. USA Today’s Jorge Ortiz reports on the reaction from a statement he made on Thursday’s show.

“It’s baseball,’’ Cowherd said. “You don’t think a general manager can manage? Like it’s impossible? The game is too complex? I’ve never bought into that, ‘Baseball’s just too complex.’ Really? A third of the sport is from the Dominican Republic.’’

The comment has infuriated some natives of the Caribbean nation, which this year produced nearly 10% of the players on Opening Day rosters and disabled lists.

Toronto Blue Jays All-Star Jose Bautista expressed his indignation with a tweet directed at Cowherd that said, “before i rip you a new one, i would like for you to explain what u meant to say about baseball and dominicans, please.’

Adrian Wojnarowski is staying with Yahoo! Sports. Matt Yoder of Awful Announcing breaks down the possibilities for his future at the site.

Wojnarowski at Sports Illustrated would have been an intriguing storyline to see if the company could have duplicated the success of The MMQB for basketball and just how Woj would have been used for the magazine.  While he has written a number of interesting (and some very biting) columns over the years, Wojnarowski is best known for breaking NBA news on Twitter.  While the visions of Peter King and Bill Simmons (and even Nate Silver) are clearly seen in their personality and writing, it’s a bit more of an unknown what a Woj-vertical would look like in full fruition.

Now we see if Yahoo affords Wojnarowski that opportunity.  Yahoo does have their own blog network which is foundational to the sports blogosphere ecosystem, but I’m not sure Woj is just looking to take over Ball Don’t Lie.  We may see Yahoo go in a completely new direction with their sports coverage if they go the Woj-vertical route that fits somewhere between their more traditional and blog-based coverage of the NBA.  And if that does take place, what’s to stop the likes of Dan Wetzel or Pat Forde for doing something similar?  It could be the beginning of Yahoo trying some new things with their online coverage to emphasize their top writers a little more and give them more to work with.

Jeff Pearlman has an interview with Dave Maraniss in which he discusses his books about Vince Lombardi and Roberto Clemente.

Speaking of biographies, Jonathan Eig’s terrific book on Lou Gehrig is going to be made into a movie.

Lifelong Cubs fan Rich Cohen writes in the Wall Street Journal that he doesn’t want the promising team to become successful. I agree, although I say that as a lifelong White Sox fan.

All-Star ratings show MLB has some work to do. Michael Bradley at the National Sports Journalism Center.

Tom Hoffath of the Los Angeles Daily News writes on ESPN’s coverage of the Special Olympics World Games.

Jim Cramer gives career advice to a young blogger for the Philadelphia Phillies.

AWSM has a post on improving the relationship between reporters and PR representatives.

No pressure with this job, right? The Green Bay Press Gazette is looking for a Packers editor to coordinate coverage. Can’t imagine a bigger job at that paper.

An excerpt from my latest column for the Chicago Tribune:

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The upcoming radio rights deal with the White Sox and Bulls was nearly 90 years in the making for the WLS-AM 890.

According to longtime Chicago sportswriter Tim Cronin, a broadcast historian, Blackhawks home games aired on WLS during the 1927-28 season. Despite being one of the biggest stations in town, that marks the only time WLS was the exclusive flagship station for one of Chicago’s pro teams.

Until now. Last week, it was announced WLS will be the radio home for the White Sox in 2016 and the Bulls beginning with the 2016-17 season. Both deals run through 2021.

Suddenly, WLS will have the biggest inventory of games on the Chicago radio dial. The station also airs Notre Dame football and basketball.

Why the big jump into sports for WLS? It was a natural move for Cumulus Media, which bought the station in 2011. Cumulus owns Westwood One Sports, which airs the NFL radio package, and has other stations that broadcast pro games throughout the country.

“When you get the opportunity to get the White Sox and Bulls, it was too tempting to pass up,” said John Dickey, Culumus’ executive vice president for programming and content. “Those are two great brands. They absolutely will bring audience to the station.”

It hardly would be a surprise if WLS flipped to a sports-talk format considering it soon will be airing more than 300 games per year. Dickey, though, said there aren’t any plans to change from its current news/talk format.

“It’s a fun thing to talk about (going to all sports),” Dickey said. “But we still want to be all things Chicago for our listeners.”

Richard Sandomir of the New York Times breaks down Bill Simmons’ move to HBO. He notes that while he has been successful on multiple platforms, he has yet to conquer television as a personality.

Sandomir writes:

Simmons had a not-so-dandy stint as an analyst on ESPN’s N.B.A. pregame show, “NBA Countdown,” and was the host of “The Grantland Basketball Hour,” which was more “Wayne’s World” than big-time programming. His columnist’s voice did not translate well to the screen, with the medium’s time limits and craving for sound bites.

John A. Walsh, the former executive editor of ESPN who was associated closely with Simmons, said that Simmons was trying to fit his television work into a lot of other endeavors.

“What Bill was attracted to was launching Grantland,” Walsh said, “and if you’re launching Grantland and writing a column and doing podcasts, I don’t know how much more time is left in the day.”

Simmons, who was said to be earning $5 million annually from ESPN, has long been considered one of the most original voices in sports journalism and a magnet for younger fans. David Hill, a former chairman of Fox Sports, said in an email that Simmons stood out from “an ever-crowded field of nonentities (the perennial talking head).”

Hill added, “Mr. Simmons has a voice and is a personality,” and said: “Personalities work! Look at what John Oliver has done for HBO — getting headlines within minutes.”

I like the potential for Simmons at HBO. Obviously, the network needs to come up with the right format for him.

Considering Bill Simmons now is officially at HBO, it probably is time for Grantland to take him off of its home page. This is a screen shot from Wednesday.

His last B.S. Report podcast was on May 8. Just a tad dated with NBA playoff talk about the Houston Rockets.

He also is featured in a May 8 podcast for a summer movie preview. Isn’t it time for the fall movie preview?

What’s the point of keeping Simmons’ presence on the site? Time to let go Grantland.

A good move for Bill Simmons and HBO. More analysis to come.

The official announcement from HBO:

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Bill Simmons, one of the most influential figures in contemporary sports media and the founding editor of Grantland.com, and HBO have entered into a major exclusive multi-year, multi-platform agreement highlighted by a new weekly series coming next year, it was announced today by Michael Lombardo, president, HBO Programming.

“We have been fans of Bill Simmons and his work for a very long time,” said Lombardo. “His intelligence, talent and insights are without precedent in the areas he covers. We could not be more thrilled for him to bring those talents to HBO and to become a signature voice at the network, spanning the sports and pop culture landscapes.”

“It’s no secret that HBO is the single best place for creative people in the entire media landscape,” Simmons said. “From the moment I started talking to Michael and Richard [Plepler, HBO chairman and CEO], it was hard to imagine being anywhere else.”

HBO will be Simmons’ exclusive television home. The overall agreement, which begins in October, provides for a comprehensive partnership on a variety of platforms between the network and Simmons. Among the elements of the new deal will be a talk show set to premiere in 2016 that will air on the main HBO service, as well as the HBO digital platforms HBO GO® and HBO NOWSM. Topical and spontaneous, the show will feature stories and guests from across the sports and cultural landscapes.

Simmons will also have a production deal to produce content and assets for the network and its digital platforms, delivering video podcasts and features. In addition, Simmons will be consulting with HBO Sports, working closely with HBO Sports president Ken Hershman on non-boxing-related programming, including the development of shows and documentary films for the network.

Bill Simmons has served as a sports columnist, TV host and analyst, two-time New York Times bestselling author (“Now I Can Die in Peace: How the Sports Guy Found Salvation Thanks to the World Champion (Twice!) Boston Red Sox” and “The Book of Basketball: The NBA According to the Sports Guy,” which was #1 on the New York Times bestseller list), Emmy® Award-winning documentary film executive and podcaster. He was the founding editor of the landmark Grantland.com website, which launched four years ago and was recently nominated for three National Magazine Awards, and wrote the groundbreaking “Sports Guy” column for the past 14 years for ESPN and then Grantland.

A native New Englander, Simmons generated the concept for the network’s acclaimed “30 for 30” documentary series, becoming one of its Emmy®-winning executive producers, in addition to ushering in the network’s presence in podcasting with his highly successful podcast “The B.S. Report,” which debuted in 2007 and featured such guests as President Barack Obama, Jimmy Kimmel, Chris Rock and Lena Dunham, to name a few. It was the #1 sports podcast on iTunes last year with more than four million downloads per month.

Simmons began writing for ESPN.com in 2001, and starting in 2002, was the lead columnist forESPN The Magazine for seven years. He also served as a writer for “Jimmy Kimmel Live” on ABC from 2002 to 2004.

Simmons earned his Bachelor’s Degree at the College of the Holy Cross and earned a Master’s of Arts in Print Journalism from Boston University. Simmons lives in Los Angeles.