Afternoon Baseball

Wiley book -- released today
Wiley tribute from 2004
Wiley Page 2 archive

Ralph Wiley died just over a year ago (June 13, 2004), right in the middle of the NBA Finals. He was someone I read enough and never expected to die so young that I started my blog with the news of his death.
A introspective, funny, knowledgable, thought-provoking and groundbreaking voice on football, baseball, basketball, race, society and just about anything else that interacted with sports, it's been interesting to see how Page 2 has evolved since his departure. At times, it seemed that his was the only serious voice in a section of silliness (disguised as a departure from traditional sports punditry), especially when Bill Simmons was gone, writing for "Jimmy Kimmel Live."

Page 2, because of Wiley, and because Wiley is no longer around, is much more personal, open, sharing, and willing to explore not just the game but what surrounds the game, and the feelings and bias of the columnists themselves*. From the vastly underrated Brian Murphy to Eric Neel to Alan Grant to the Father's Day column by Jeff Merron, Page 2 takes on sports in a serious way, but without forgetting the humor or challenging the knee-jerk reactions that sportswriters and fans so often have. Dave Schoenfeld, Tim Keown, and others also mix in more humor while still making great points.
So that means a little less of Jim Caple, keeping Dan Shanoff and Rachel Nichols on the gimmick pages, and keeping Simmons categorized so you know when there's a deep insight or just a great rant. And moving all the crap to Page 3, a forgettable hole if there ever was one.

*Skip Bayless, with his tone-deaf rantings, hindsight-is-my-only-view and holier-than-thou "white guy who's done no wrong" smirk, is a notable exception to the Page 2 style and stands out both for his arrogance and abrasiveness, even on the occasions when's right -- in some ways, trying to be Wiley simply by rote imitation. I wish Wiley was around just to show him how it's done.

But mostly, what you notice is a rapid increase in the number of Page 2 columnists. Whereas Wiley and Simmons (and for a time, Gregg Easterbrook) used to cover football, basketball and baseball without much help at all (basically, you had them and the regular columnists for each sport). The rest of the guys mostly goofed around.
Now, you've got 3-4 guys who are regulars on at least one sport, and a lot more collaboration and debate (much like the Wiley-Simmons showdown that would have turned into a gold mine). There's even semi-regulars like Patrick Hruby and Graham Hays, carbon copies of the better guys, who fill in the gaps sometimes.
All of the above are very good columnists. But in one way or another, they are all replacing a part of Ralph Wiley. That's how huge a figure he was.