America isn’t perfect but there’s not a better place in the world for people of any faith.

It’d be easy to blame everything on 9/11 or the wars that came after. It’s really about the choices we made. By necessity we adapt to the realities of the world we live in, but...

It was too late to pray, though. The sky was clear. The helicopters were gone. Too late for so many things. My fists hit the floor. My head hit the floor. My heart broke, hardened,...

Boston got Roberts on the July 31 trade deadline—exchanging prospect Henri Stanley for the fleet-footed outfielder. Roberts fittingly got 86 at bats for Boston, but it was his speed on the bases that the Red...

An individual school can handle a resident idiot from time to time, but an entire school system is only as good as its weakest leader.

I have this thought, it’s horrible, and it makes me sick, but it’s true: one day these students will grow up and have their own kids, and they’re going to name them for men and...

There’s an article about Chicago closing dozens of schools and I should probably read it because it seems important and relevant—but to be honest, the headline about the professor in Florida telling students to ‘stomp...

Military life is hard, even cruel—especially for the kids.

True, [Gary Nolan] might not strike fear into the hearts of all you free-swinging power hitters out there—at least not in the same way as, say, Tom Seaver … but without question he was one...

Not long after graduation I was teaching at an alternative school and already I had serious doubts about my career choice. My students were hellions. I’d been assaulted twice. My car had been vandalized. I...

It feels like last week, but in fact we’re now closing in on five thousand days at war. I always picture Sami as a nine-year-old soccer stud … and yet there are soldiers in Afghanistan...

I felt a hand on my back, movement behind me, my guys making room, someone squeezing into our circle, and then one last hand joined the pile: my Korean aide. I guess it made sense....

It’s widely noted that among players currently eligible for the Hall of Fame, Maris and Murphy are the only two-time MVP recipients not enshrined at Cooperstown. In a previous book I argued Maris should be...

It’s a sobering thing, to see firsthand soldiers just home from war.

We could never go back to how things were on the day before 9/11, but maybe I could go back to who I was.

In high school I wrote an essay on baseball and my teacher told me I had to rewrite it on a more serious topic. So I wrote an essay about the World Series and my...

…it was one at bat during October 1975 that defined his [Joe Morgan’s] place in baseball history and secured the legacy of the Big Red Machine, all with one swing.

Educators are in the news, too. Usually that’s bad. I had a favorite college professor. He used to tell us, ‘If you make CNN as a teacher, you’re probably going to jail.

I felt like I should salute. If only I knew how.

After being maligned for his lack of offense for much of his career, [César] Gerónimo batted .280 with two home runs, a triple, three runs, and three RBIs vs. Boston during the 1975 World Series,...

A life well-lived in the present is all but impossible when you are tethered to your past.

My dad once told me that his biggest challenge after returning from Vietnam had been coming to terms with his own callousness. He’d made a deal with the war and traded his humanity for a...

In my life I’ve been very lucky to travel around the world and see students and teachers in nearly two dozen countries—but the most awe-inspiring experience I’ve ever had was two years after 9/11 when...

The career batting average (.254) during parts of five Major League seasons for Francisco Cabrera—which proves that it takes only one big hit, on the right stage, to become a legend. Cabrera is still honored...

Indira was surrounded by people who had given up hope, who blamed their own misery on the influence of Christianity and western cultures, and yet, literally in the midst of squalor, her family had created...

I felt so much pride, so much love. You get a handful of days like this in a lifetime. Take in every minute. They’ll be over soon enough, and you never know what tomorrow will...

… there’s almost nothing worse than spending an entire day anticipating watching a Yankees vs. Red Sox game, only to have the score be 9-0 in the third inning.

October 1976 was the penultimate performance of Bench’s Hall of Fame career. All the early success and awards and accolades thrown in his direction had prepared him for this moment—when the Big Red Machine became...

All over the world there are students, teachers and parents that face serious challenges every day. They need help with real problems that have life-altering consequences—and a group of intelligent professionals brought together to advise...

The service members who defend our way of life ask very little in return, but they deserve teachers who will be as relentless in teaching their children as the military is in protecting our interests...

And then came, perhaps, the biggest offseason move in franchise history … and no, we’re not talking about inviting Carlos Peña to camp or hiring Joe Maddon or appointing Andrew Friedman as Executive Vice President...

Sami and I had exactly one day together in the old world. On Tuesday the jihadists came to our front door and knocked down our buildings. Our new world was hijacked planes, anthrax, and Afghanistan....

We obviously don’t live in a perfect world. If we did, then my dad would never have volunteered for Vietnam so he could use the GI Bill to pay for college, Uncle Google would have...

Land of the Morning Calm.” It’s a country where you notice the filth and the smog on your first trip and you can’t imagine why you ever thought it was a good idea to visit....

Rally killer.” His confidence carried over to the field, just as it had since he began playing as a kid—he batted .265, and he led all rookies with 23 home runs, 87 runs, and 86...

People have been fighting and dying over religion for thousands of years. I could understand that fear. It creeps up on you a bit more when you’re alone in a foreign land. You certainly worry...

A son for a flag is a lot of sacrifice.

If there are any curses left in baseball, they are all on the north side of Chicago.

Pete Rose” dive into cardboard boxes used for bases … whether they needed to slide or not.

I thought, Dad.Could I go to Vietnam for you?Dad, I could do it. I could do it for you. I could go to the places you fought. I could find the bits and pieces of...

Honestly, I had no idea how to respond. My senior year of college I’d taken a seminar titled Public Education: Situations and Strategies. I thought about emailing my professor, maybe suggest some new topics and...

It’s much easier to remember the World Series heroics of Tony Pérez, Pete Rose, and Joe Morgan than it is to recall who set the table for Rose during Game 7 of the 1975 World...

For the first time in a decade I felt a voice rising from deep inside my soul. It cried out ‘what will you be today?’ and I heard ‘relentless’ booming from the rafters inside an...

Far to our left I could see a commercial airliner on final approach to Soekarno-Hatta. Far to our right I could see the outline of tall city buildings. The imagery was hard to ignore. In...

I asked my dad once if his high school teachers began treating kids differently during Vietnam, when they knew some of their students would be drafted and sent to war. I was curious because for...

I’m glad there are organizations like Dale Murphy’s I Won’t Cheat Foundation. I’m glad there are athletes with standards and morals who kids can look up to and learn from. I’m glad that for every...

I’d see the arrow. I’d think about attitude and perception. Maybe the green arrow on the ceiling is to Muslims as the KJV in the Motel 6 nightstand is to Christians.

All my life my dad felt this need to protect his kids from a war he fought, a war I believed could never reach out and touch us, could never hurt us—and yet he fed...

Ortiz is now synonymous with walk-off homers. After all, he hit a total of nine game-ending blasts from 2002-07. And that was just in the regular season. It was his blasts in the 2004 postseason...

“acceptable” as my heroes if you will, because they didn’t want me being influenced by athletes who lacked morals. Cal Ripken and Dale Murphy were at the top of my mom’s list of players she...