• At Extracurriculars I wrote about another sportswriter-on-sportswriter rant (the best kind!) as Dave Kindred demolishes Dan Le Batard’s old canard (wow, that rhymes!) about “dumb” sportswriters, a slur updated for the digital age.

While Le Batard unleashed his fury at fellow traditionalists, the rancid nature of Deadspin once again reared its ugly head, venturing far beyond its usual poor taste to include an apparently complete absence of journalistic ethics. Not that Deadspin and ethics usually go in the same sentence anyway. That’s a lamentable tale all the way around.

• The always-provocative Jason Whitlock might have written one of the best columns of his life, about gay umpire Billy Van Raaphorst and the humiliating treatment he endured recently from Edmonton Capitals manager Brent Bowers. Most of the time Whitlock goes out of his way to ruffle feathers; in this case only unreconstructed bigots will be mad.

I was once invited to appear on a radio talk show hosted by former Major League umpire Dave Pallone, who was closeted during his time in the bigs. We were talking about women’s sports, and he was rather genial and mild-mannered on the air. But he didn’t take any flak on the field, most notably from Pete Rose in a fiery shoving incident that landed Charlie Hustle a 30-day supsension and a $10,000 fine. However, Pallone resigned in 1988 because over allegations involving a teenage sex ring. Although he was cleared, the damage had been done, and his orientation was soon revealed in a newspaper.