Miracle of Coogan’s Bluff

By Red Smith The New York Herald Tribune October 4, 1951 Now it is done. Now the story ends. And there is no way to tell it. The art of fiction is dead. Reality has strangled invention. Only the utterly impossible, the inexpressibly fantastic, can ever be plausible...

No Cheering in the Press Box: Red Smith

By Jerome Holtzman From No Cheering in the Press Box 1973 I never felt that I was a bug-eyed fan as such. I wasn’t one of those who dreamed of being a sportswriter and going around the country traveling with ball players and getting into the games free and, oh, dear...

Krim, Breslin, and the Million Dollar “Jewboy” Caper

By Seymour Krim The New York Times November 1973 Both articles are collected in Krim’s You and Me. Part One: Won’t You Come Home, Jimmy Breslin? A friend of mine who works for UPI airmailed Jimmy Breslin’s The Gang That Couldn’t Shoot Straight yesterday (two pesetas...

Night for Joe Louis

By Red Smith The New York Herald Tribune October 27, 1951 [This column is collected in American Pastimes: The Very Best of Red Smith] Joe Louis lay on his stomach on a rubbing table with his right ear pillowed on a folded towel, his left hand in a bucket of ice on the...