Bob Padecky

Sports Columnist at The Press Democrat

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Articles

Friday’s court ruling on college athletics has stripped away the illusion of college athletes tied to higher education

2 weeks ago | pressdemocrat.com | Bob Padecky

Money divides us, always has, always will. From the cars we drive to the house we buy, to the clothes we wear, money separates us and judges us. Last Friday, in a U.S. District Court ruling, that gap became so wide in college sports that the industry has now been reduced to a money grab. And, my oh my, let the hostility begin. Universities now pay their athletes. A coach now will judge who can get what and how.
Padecky: Shohei Ohtani, Aaron Judge represent what’s best about baseball

1 month ago | pressdemocrat.com | Bob Padecky

Never thought I’d be here again. So much time has passed. So much self-importance has floated across my gaze. So much strutting, chest-thumping and braying like a mule. So many games felt like an ego audition. And then it happened. Aaron Judge and Shohei Ohtani happened. I felt like a kid again. I’m checking the box scores, news flashes and rumors about the two baseball players. Both men appear to be who they are in front of the camera.
Padecky: With Pete Rose’s banishment over, will baseball remember why?

1 month ago | pressdemocrat.com | Bob Padecky

From the grave, Pete Rose is free at last. His family, his friends, the omnipresence of gambling as common as breathing and the President of the United States pressuring baseball’s commissioner for reinstatement made Tuesday’s announcement almost inevitable after Rose died last September. “I’ll get elected to the Hall of Fame after I die,” Rose said just before his death last year. How did Rose know that? Did he have insider information?
Warriors’ championship DNA is an intensity borne of experience

1 month ago | pressdemocrat.com | Bob Padecky

Pressure, when applied to your car’s tire that needs it, expands, giving buoyancy, stability. Pressure, the kind that happens between the ears, also expands but, instead of stability, you’re liable to run off the road, become disorientated, find yourself talking to a lamppost. It’ s like taking a tortuous two-hour final exam. Like forgetting how to hold the pencil.
Warriors coach Kerr should run for office

2 months ago | pressdemocrat.com | Bob Padecky

Steve Kerr has gone out of his way to anger, irritate and, in general, push people to clenched teeth by expressing himself without hesitation. And yet, Golden State’s coach remains smudge-free. If Kerr has a detractor that person must exist in a place without electricity or running water. Protected by his stature in sports, Kerr should run for political office. A little background here.
Padecky: Florida wins the NCAA championship, and the memories come rushing back

2 months ago | pressdemocrat.com | Bob Padecky

It’s been 56 years since I went to college there and yet here I am wearing my Florida cap, my Florida shirt and a window sticker with an alligator wearing a Florida letterman’s sweater. I try to keep my collegiate heritage on the down-low, as Gainesville truly is light years from Northern California and it’s hard to explain why I didn’t mind living with swamps, sweat and skeeters.
Padecky: Pushback on the tush push controversy is behind the times

2 months ago | pressdemocrat.com | Bob Padecky

The Tush Push is a popular country line dance that, as far as I can tell, does not involve an actual pushing on the tush. Age, height, weight and grunting seem to bear no influence, as having the desire to crush someone’s skull. Physical contact is nonexistent, except for the occasional flinging of brow sweat. It’s a beautiful thing, two 20-step movements, in choreographed unison with fellow hoofers who seem to be, dare I say, smiling. Tension?
Padecky: Dollar signs showing up everywhere in sports - even high schools

Mar 25, 2025 | pressdemocrat.com | Bob Padecky

Last Wednesday, the needle inched a bit further to where one day, a boy, age 10 — who can dribble a basketball like a magician — will look to his father and ask, “ Hey dad, what it was like being a kid?”Last Wednesday, Mater Dei High School in Southern California announced it had signed a multimedia rights deal with a sports marketing company. It would be for 10 years at $1 million a year.
Rose getting reinstated to MLB with Trump’s help? Don’t bet on it

Mar 10, 2025 | pressdemocrat.com | Bob Padecky

Baseball’s spring training, if you believe the poets, represents life anew, flowers blooming, people emerging from igloos and Mother Earth having cleansed the landscape from another harsh winter. A young man’s fancy returns to. . . “Major League Baseball doesn’t have the courage or the decency (to reinstate Pete Rose),” wrote our President on Truth Social. With characteristic tact and sensitivity, he added,“ Baseball is dying all over the place. (MLB) should get off its fat, lazy ass.
Padecky: Sports in the United States are reflective of a cantankerous society

Feb 24, 2025 | pressdemocrat.com | Bob Padecky

Once upon a time, a professional athlete in this country didn’t have to worry about his house being burglarized, never called the U.S. administration a“ Nazi movement,” never was shot walking down the street, never said a woman s place was in the home making babies and never heard America’s best friend, Canada, boo the playing of our National Anthem. Kinda makes you wish for the good ol’ days when all hell broke loose because the 49ers’ Colin Kaepernick quietly took a knee in racial protest.