The Observer, October 21, 2005
Volume XXXVIII, Issue 8
Fans mourn the loss of legendary sportswriter
My Sunday mornings will never be the same again.
For as long as I can remember, after arriving home from Sunday morning Mass, I would immediately open the sports section of The (Lake County) News-Herald and turn to Hal Lebovitz's column. This was not your everyday sports column; the column would span almost the entire page, chock full of in-depth information on the three major sports teams in Cleveland. It was a heavenly sight to any local sports fan's eyes.
Sadly, The News-Herald will have to find something else to fill the third page of its Sunday sports section. Mr. Lebovitz passed away Tuesday morning at the age of 89.
Lebovitz, a lifelong Clevelander, graduated from Western Reserve University with a chemistry degree in 1938. He played varsity basketball at Western Reserve University (WRU) and then coached the WRU freshman team upon his graduation in 1938. Lebovitz was also the sports editor of the Reserve Tribune and features editor for the Reserve Red Cat while a student at WRU.
His professional writing career began with The Cleveland News in the 1940s, and he became the Indians' beat writer during their glory days of the 1950s. He later became sports editor of the The Plain Dealer in 1964 before moving to The News-Herald in 1984. He could also be seen in recent years each Thursday evening on More Sports and Les Levine, a local sports television talk show broadcast throughout Northeast Ohio on Adelphia Cable. Last year, a book named The Best of Hal Lebovitz, featuring his best and most popular columns, including "Never Cut a Boy," was published. Lebovitz later in his columns wrote how much he appreciated the wealth of admiration and respect from fans that he received when giving signings for the book.
Six years ago, Lebovitz was honored for his excellence and longevity with the prestigious J.G. Taylor Spink Award, the highest award in baseball writing. He and the Spink awards are recognized in the "Scribes & Mikemen" exhibit in the Library of the National Baseball Hall of Fame.
Lebovitz achieved a legendary career in sports journalism and in the Cleveland sports scene, but he also never forgot about his alma mater, Western Reserve, and maintained a great interest in both Reserve and then Case following the merger in 1968.
"He had a great fondness and love for the athletes and athletic programs at Case," said Mark Termini, a local sports attorney who graduated from Case in 1978 and, like Lebovitz, is a member of the Case Reserve athletic club hall of fame. "Even though he was such a towering figure in the Cleveland sports scene covering high-profile sporting events, he never failed to lose interest in Case athletics and the athletes. He highly respected the talents of the athletes there over the years."
Like most people who dealt with Lebovitz on a consistent basis, Mr. Termini had great respect for the legendary writer.
"It is rare to find a journalist who is able to keep a critical mind yet not be a critical person," Termini said. "He had a very unique skill that I have not seen in many journalists, where he could be very astute in his observations yet still maintain friendships with the people he dealt with."
For all of the contributions he made to the local sports writing scene, I will always associate Lebovitz with his Sunday columns. He closed each column with the words "See you somewhere, I hope." The one and only time I did see him in person was last month at the Case Reserve athletic club hall of fame's Sunset Cocktail Party. Unfortunately, he stayed only a few minutes, and I never was able to meet him. I regret not making an extra effort to introduce myself.
I often wondered about whether he ever read this sports section and what he would have thought about it. Now I am only left to wonder. If he did happen to see it, hopefully he would have seen a touch of his own writing sprinkled throughout the words. By growing up religiously reading his columns, his writing style has undoubtedly influenced mine. I could not have asked for a better writer to emulate; he wrote about Cleveland sports with a level of passion and clarity that I can only hope to come close to matching.
Meanwhile, at approximately 10:30 a.m. this Sunday morning, I am going to have one huge void to fill.
