George Kimball RIP

Snickers Man

Very sad to see that George Kimball, the sportswriter who penned a weekly column on the US sporting scene for the Irish Times, has passed away.

Although mainly known in the US as a boxing specialist, his column for the Irish Times brought a taste of the gamut of American sport, presented in a manner palatable to Irish tastes. Better than anyone I have come across in print, he got the fact that American sport occupies a different place in the interests of the average sports fan on this side of the Atlantic from the sports which which we are more familiar.

American sport is exotic to the average European. In fact it is one of the few areas of modern American culture that remains so. Americans have been spectacularly successful at exporting their music, fashion sense, fast food, TV and movies to the rest of the world. But, for a variety of reasons, they have never been able to sell their sport in the same way.

Kimball understood this and his weekly column was the sporting equivalent of Alistair Cooke's legendary Letter from America on BBC radio. Not an indepth blow by blow account of all the big stories but beautifully written and enthusiastically recounted vignettes that painted delightful pictures of the depth and variety of the American sporting scene.

He could present gruesome reports on the political skullduggery that surrounds the fight game while leaving us in no doubt that he still loved the sport; he could fill us in on the strengths and weaknesses of the teams contesting the playoff stages of the NFL; write amusingly caustic accounts of the levels of chauvinism that attend the singing of "God Bless America" (usually by the Irish born tenor Ronan Tynan) at baseball games and also turn his hand to basketball and ice hockey.

His column was unmissable; now sadly it is no more.

That's two great sportswriters the Irish Times has lost this year.

ac20

I loved his column every Thursday in The Irish Times. Boxing, American Football, Baseball, didnt matter what sport he wrote about, his knowledge was second to none.

RIP George.

Benny_Cake

He was one of the rare breed of sportswriters that could produce fascinating articles, even if I knew nothing about the sport concerned.RIP George.