John Schulian got a chance to reconnect with Chicago while selecting stories on the Bears as editor for the new book, “Football: Great Writing about the National Sport.”
When Schulian arrived in Chicago as a graduate student at Northwestern in the ’60s, he initially thought it was a Cubs town.
“Boy was I wrong,” Schulian said. “Even if the Bears go 0-16, they’re still going to love their football in Chicago.
Schulian eventually landed at the Chicago Daily News in the mid ’70s and moved over to the Sun-Times before leaving for the Philadelphia Daily News in 1984. He made his mark in Chicago as a columnist with an elegant writing style and uncompromising passion.
Looking back, Schulian has fond memories of covering sports in Chicago.
“It was a great town to be a sportswriter, great city to be working for a newspaper,” Schulian said. “It was far and away the best time I had in newspapers. There was so much passion. And people cared, and they read the newspapers. My now ex-wife would say, ‘I was on the train and I saw someone reading your column.’
“I remember (former Cubs manager) Herman Franks challenging me to a fight. The Bulls’ great run in ’78 when Bill Walton said the old Chicago Stadium was the loudest place he ever played in.
“Watching Walter Payton was the greatest gift I ever had. I never found him to be a scintillating interview, but he was by far the best football player I ever saw. What couldn’t he do on a football field?
“The one guy I truly remember was Bill Veeck. He was a great treasure. I preferred having an adversarial relationship with people I covered. I didn’t want to be a house man. It made for more honest sportswriting.
“Veeck, though, was so fascinating. He was so smart, so colorful. He was mischievous. He always was up to something. He certainly was the last of his kind.”