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The family’s home was in Green Township, out by the old train tracks off county Route 611. Although Fletcher played a ton of pick-up football with the local kids growing up, his parents would not permit him in the county’s organized league.

“My uncle, who was drafted by the Green Bay Packers, had told my parents not to let me play football until I was in the eighth grade because he felt kids weren’t mentally or physically ready to put up with what’s going to happen.”

Soon enough, eighth grade came and it was love at first practice. Fletcher said he wouldn’t have wanted it any other way.

I’m glad I started late; I was a little more mature so when those tough things came along I could handle them,” he said.

Once he moved up to Newton High School, he wasn’t the biggest guy but he may have been the fastest guy.

“I ran a 4.35 (40-yard dash),” he said.

That’s scary quick, especially 30 years ago, especially in the SCIL. For some perspective, at this year’s NFL combine, only three players bested that mark.

Like great athletes often do, Fletcher excelled on more than one field in high school. In just his sophomore season, the baseball team won the county and sectionals along with being state runner-up.

Back in football the following year, Fletcher led the Braves in rushing. A dynamic Newton playbook limited Fletcher’s carries

“We had a very balanced offense attack; a lot of people were touching the ball,” he said.

By his senior year, Fletcher was the best runner in the county. He ran for a then record 220 yards in a game against High Point on just 16 carries.

On Thanksgivings Day, Fletcher rushed for about 160 yards on a soupy field in the driving rain to break the 1,000 yard mark.

“It the was the culmination of a great senior football season,” he said. “Back then, 1,000 yards was a big deal. I was the first back in Newton history and the second in county history. I only carried the ball 125 times the entire season, where as today kids carry 40 times a game.”

Like any smart runner, Fletcher is quick to credit those friends that worked in the trenches.

“I gained all those yards on a team that averaged maybe 175 pounds on the line,” he said. “They opened holes just enough for me to get through and that’s all it took. They were the reasons for my success. We weren’t a big group, but we loved football.”

Fletcher said he and his teammates prided themselves on starting a winning trend after nearly two decades of losing seasons at Newton.

For all his successes on the field, Fletcher wasn’t getting the recognition he deserved off it.

“I didn’t make all-county or all-area first team but was named second team all-state, which didn’t seem to make a lot of sense,” he said. “The coaches voted, and they voted for whomever was more popular, and I guess I wasn’t popular enough.”

“I consider him one of top ten players I ever coached, a good team member and all around good kid,” said John Zamos, a former Newton baseball coach.

Despite not getting all the accolades he may have deserved in high school, Fletcher said Saturday’s honor makes up for that.

“It’s humbling to me that I have been chosen by some of the best athletes that have played in the county,” he said. “They voted me in and thought I deserved to be there. A lot of the people that did make all-area and all-county ahead of me in high school are not in there. It makes me feel like there’s a real literal redemption — like I did belong.”

This story ran on Oct. 27, 2008 in the New Jersey Herald.

Its 4:30 a.m. and Sabrina Lucas’ sneakers pound against the pavement. Her run takes her along county Route 517 in Sparta and up Glen Road. On the surface, it’s just part of her preparation for the upcoming New York City Marathon. But to this mother and wife, this teacher and coach, these morning workouts are therapeutic — like a trip to the spa.

courtesy the NJ Herald

“It’s a chance to clear my head, reflect and release the stress of anything that’s bothering me,” she said.

Despite her take on it, getting up for a jog while most of us are tucked away in bed demonstrates a rare determination and commitment to excellence. That commitment will be recognized Nov. 1 when Lucas is inducted into the Sussex County Sports Hall of Fame.

It also will be a tribute to the parents from whom she learned that determination.

“It’s all about the work ethic; no matter what I did in life, my parents told me to do my best,” she said.

Lucas was born a continent away from Sussex County — on the Big Island of Oahu, Hawaii. Her dad was a U.S. Army aviator, mom an Army wife, their children Army brats.

“Up until eight we moved around quite a bit. After Hawaii, North Carolina for a year, New Jersey once for 18 months, Kansas for another year, Illinois for two more,” Lucas said. “But then the family came back to Franklin for good.”

She was 9; her brother Randy was 15.

Back to Franklin; where her parents met; where they fell in love.

Her father, Frank McChesney, moved there from Indiana in 1947, his junior year of high school. The Midwest kid they called “Hoosier Hot Shot” spotted Sabrina’s mother, Celia, a pretty girl with a passion for piano, at a local dance.

“He always said ‘the first time I saw your mother I knew that was the girl I was going to marry,’ ” Lucas said.

Hollywood has to get their ideas from somewhere.

When she wasn’t indulging in her mother’s love of music, Lucas tagged along with her father to watch the men play basketball at the Franklin courts down by the pond.

It was quality time with dad, she said.

“One day at the courts, the girls JV coach at Franklin High School, asked my father ‘does she play basketball.’ Dad said ‘No,’ and the coach said ‘she’s got a good athletic build maybe she should.’ “

So she gave it a try.

In spite of any build, that year was a struggle, one she remembers as horrible.

“I just was not an athlete my freshman year; I was lucky to get a minute during a blowout,” she said.

Lucas continued to work with her father at those courts down by the pond. Sometimes they would argue about her jump shot, about her defense, but they always played.

By her senior year, the girl who wasn’t an athlete was starting at power forward on an undefeated SCIL champion.

After graduation, Lucas moved onto Bloomsburg University to study special education and continue playing basketball.

By her sophomore year of college, she also was running cross country.

“At first, I just wanted to get in shape for the upcoming basketball season, but I caught the running bug.”

The following year, Lucas was running track as well, all the while remaining an honors student.

“I balanced my time so much better by being involved, there was no time to go out and just goof off. You had a set schedule and that worked well for me.”

At her graduation, she was named outstanding senior for the Class of 1985, an honor awarded on all-around performance.

“My parents were pretty surprised,” Lucas added, laughing.

From there it was on to Lehigh University for a master’s in education and a job as an assistant coach. Lucas said she was drawn to the teaching side of sports, and when she took a job at Wallkill Valley Regional High School in 1987 she was soon coaching three sports — cross country, basketball and track. Today, she still heads the boys’ and girls’ cross country programs and has been recognized as the New Jersey Herald’s Coach of the Year three times.

On Nov. 1, Lucas will join her father, a 1980 inductee, in the Sussex County Sports Hall of Fame. Their plaques will be on display together, not to far from those courts down by the pond.

Her husband, Bob Lucas, sees the final symmetry as emblematic of a bond that spurned his wife’s achievement in sports.

“Her athletic life — playing, coaching — was driven by her father. He gave it all in everything he did and his daughter does the same. She only knows 100 percent.”

This story ran in the NJ Herald on Oct. 20, 2008.

Jerry Manuel
The Mets collapsed again. This time Manuel steered the ship—ok, maybe there was a bullpen led mutiny. Regardless of fault, reports state Manuel is likely to land an extension with the team to manage again, and lord knows with the current state of the economy(more later) his wife won’t let him turn down a job. But we should feel for Jerry, another year trying to guide this collection of clowns into the playoffs ought to be brutal.

“A Hartford Man”
The Hartford Courant gave him no other name than “a Hartford man.” Whoever the man is he had a rough night. First off he was sleeping in his car at a Burger King, can’t be a good story behind that. Second, he is awaken by a few guys who are apparently cops. We’ve all been shaken out of a dead sleep, not fun–especially when your smushed into a car and the awakers are “cops.” Third, the cops were not cops, but robbers, who proceeded snag this Hartford man’s wallet and his power washer(?). And no, they didn’t pull a gun on him.
Can you imagine how much crap he’s going to get from his friend’s? “Yeah man, I could see why you thought it was typical protocol for the officers to confiscate your powerwasher…”

Lane Kiffin
The Oakland Raider’s head coach was fired today, although according to ESPN he was told the end was imminent last week. The 31-year-old Kiffin won just five of the 20 games he coached. He was officially let go by owner Al Davis via telephone and was not afforded the oppurtunity to speak with his players, and was dropped from the team’s payroll effective immediately—a rarity in professional sports because of those damn signed contracts. Some of the phrases Davis used in a press conference to describe his former coach were “flat out liar” and ”disgraced” the organization.  

The U.S. Economy
Help. 
I know a market isn’t a person, but there are a way to many people hurting to ignore this one just because it defies the meaning of a word. When your father describes his LX Toyotya Camry to his frends(“No Don, I’m not kidding she really does have a V6 under there”) nobody bothers him about it.   

by Tom Toles

In journalism, the use of anonymous sources is a controversial topic.  This past February The New York Times printed this story on John McCain relationship with lobbyists—and questions about ethics, transparency, and conduct were shoved into the main stream conversation.  Students at Columbia University took a look at The New York Times use of anonymous sources both before and after 2004, when Editor Bill Keller revamped the paper’s policy on publishing quotes from the unnamed. Take a look, the results were published this month in the Columbia Journalism Review.

Thoughts?

Popular Science ran an small blurb online last week about the possibility of animal waste products as alternative energy sources, including the graph seen below.

If this seems a tad pie in the skie,’ there are real life examples to draw from out there.

In San Francisco dog waste is being collected and fed to a anaerobic digester which converts it to methane gas. Methane gas can power machines run by natural gas, i.e some stoves, heating systems, etc.

In Vermont, cows dung has been used to produce electricity for the past three years. 

And in 50 years here’s my hope. I’ll sit in a rocking chair on a front porch and tell my grandchildren a story. It will have a moral: buy only the things you need, less is many times more  and certainly some logic: businesses are in the business of making money.

I’ll tell them about leverage and sub prime mortgage rates and cheap credit and credit card debt. They won’t know what the hell I’m talking about and chances are neither will I.

I’ll say something about all that economic jargon just being grains of salt in a tidal wave that came crashing down on the financial sector and world economy. I’ll tell them the wave was created by us, our own ignorance, our greed and our choice to live beyond our budget. 

Maybe their grandmother will chime in about the failed risk management of investment banks and insurance companies being the problem, and I’ll probably call her a liberal ”know-it-all” who shouldn’t interrupt me when I’m talking to my grandchildren. Then I’ll laugh as tell them she has a point…sort of, but those companies who made unwise, hyper-profitable decisions felt the pain later.

And then my voice will rise and my eyes will grow wide, I’ll stand and become animated.

They will share my excitement, curious to know what exactly their crazy grandpa is going to say next. Pride will saturate my words as I tell them of my generation changing it for the the better, a generation made sure they were informed–we understood our healthcare plans and loans. I’ll tell them the efficient house they stand in, that runs on something renewable, was only a hippie’s pipe dream when I was a kid. And then I’ll bend down so my eyes are level with their own and I’ll tell them the world is a better, more sensible place but their still is plenty to be done.

And perhaps the littlest one will tug on my shirt tails and say she still doesn’t understand something. She will ask me about the man we saw just the other day stumbling down the street without shoes or clean clothes, she will ask me about the children on TV–or whatever is melting our brains in 50 years–that were 14 years old and reading on her third grade level.  She’ll ask her grandfather, with the innocence only a child can own, what did your generation make better for them ?

And I’ll shake my head at the idea of a complex world and feel my pride of only moments ago evaporate. I’ll search for inspiring words, but in the end my answer will be less than she deserves, something like ”I don’t know sweetheart, grandpa doesn’t have all answers.”

The model makes sense. Massive three-bladed turbines spin with the wind, they are attached to a rotor–think helicopter– which also spins. The rotor is hooked up to a generator which converts the mechanical energy to electrical. That energy is sent to a transformer and its transfered to a place where we can use it.
Here’s what bothers me, how is New Jersey going to use this.

I’ve seen a few of these down in Atlantic City but thats not goin to do the trick. As Matthew Quirk of the Atlantic points out, all the windiest places are where most of the country doesn’t live. Whats it’s going to

Supplied by Rutgers University

be the cost to transfer the sweeping winds of the Southwest to the urban Northeast? More than just the installation of power lines. Wind farms need large open areas, continued population growth means less. And as Quirk also details, wind power has proven to be flaky in its infancy, despite bold intiatives laid out by our government. 

A good friend of mine often talks about a world where you go to the Shell station and have a variety of choices to power your vehicle as the optimal scenario. I tend to agree. The best to come from this renewable energy revolution will not be a quick fix, almighty solution–but the continued invention, innovation, and progression of a country(and world) long dependent on a single energy source.