When Ray Gallagher left the North County News in 2006, the revered and imitable columnist left a legacy felt throughout these perennial Northern Westchester proving grounds.
Gallagher’s array of punch lines lured me
in when he once labeled the attack position “as critical to the sport
of lacrosse as the bunghole is to the body.”
Perusing the columns, I saw
Gallagher quote a Hen Hud player who explained his
game-winning 3-pointer at the buzzer “felt better than sex.”
I was intrigued at a unique read.
Like so many others in the
Westchester/Putnam area, I kept reading.
I followed the unfiltered, no-limitations,
say-it-as-it-is columnist for 10+ years. I continue to read his work
at a religious pace.
Why?
The entertainment value of Direct
Rays is unrivaled. The unique style keeps us hungry for more.
Keep ‘em coming.
Maybe it’s because Gallagher will always
call out the self-proclaimed gurus. Maybe it’s because Gallagher is sure
to take a good healthy snipe at the lawn chair quarterback superintendents.
Pencil Pushers, as he typically has them pegged as.
Pencil Pushers, as he typically has them pegged as.
For 25 years, Gallagher has had a green light to call
out anyone who stands in his way. He is naturally never one to mince his
words.
He has always been forthcoming about any issue or any story leak
that needed to be addressed. Even the unruly group of Mom-zillas and Demanding
Dads were not free of Ray's verbal slayings. He won't let off-the-wall antics slip.
Above and beyond the hard-hitting
columns, Gallagher has constantly highlighted kids’ achievements.
I’ve recently thumbed through a bevy
of articles from top national sources, the kind you see
displayed at book stores and supermarkets and city newsstands.
Witnessing prominent writers and
columnists berate 16-year-old kids several times, it’s allowed me to
value Gallagher’s weekly writing in the Examiner News. He spreads the props
around in article after article, giving readers a bird’s eye view of the local
scene without the melodrama.
Rarely does today’s sports writer or
columnist or local guru provide an accurate account of the athlete, an
inside look that displays the individual’s intangibles, strengths,
tendencies, stats.
That’s what separates Ray from others of
his focus and skill-set.
The veteran gives you a verbal description
and takes you right to the field. Gallagher describes the scene a flair,
incorporating a wealth of knowledge along the way. He’ll soak up every little
detail to help paint the picture.
Typically, Putnam Valley slang
is tossed in there.
Gallagher is capable
of jump-starting the hype machine.
If writers are guilty of feeding the
beast, Ray is hurling cake and coffee down the beast’s throat after
a fattening Thanksgiving dinner.
Does Gallagher thirst for controversy?
Perhaps more than any reporter in this region.
Did he deliver controversy and take hard
digs? Early, often, and with efficiency. For student-athletes, however, he’s
been more than just “the writer guy.”
Sure, the man was guaranteed to heap terse
words on any superintendent who happened to grind his gears.
Sure, he warred with me over several
issues while I worked under him.
Sure, he wanted to kick my teeth in for
the fits I gave him. The feeling was certainly mutual, as word of our
beef spread through the news office like wildfire.
The smoke cleared, however, when I
learned to value the commitment while simultaneously appreciating the
work ethic Gallagher has instilled in so many.
He’s not one to fake it, either.
Each and every game I covered under
Ray’s guidance, I was interrupted by a steady barrage of text messages.
“Score?”
“What quarter?”
“Who’s got the ball right now, how much
time is left?”
“You alive?”
“Remember to quote both coaches and file
the article to me tonight, so we can kill it in this week’s section.”
This was prior to the emergence of
Twitter, when the updates weren’t so much necessary.
Gallagher was actually that immersed in
every angle of the game. Like a devout fan constantly checking ESPN
Gametracker, Gallagher values the high school sports scene.
Yes, his fervor for the competition is
real.
Keeping It Real
OK, Ray fired me three times altogether.
Pink slip number four was surely waiting in the wings,
during a few tense moments.
Each time, however, he opened the door for
a return. Each time, after a few jabs were exchanged, we agreed to get
to work and serve the community.
In Ray’s mind, the idea is not to
meet expectations but to slay them.
That’s where the standard is held. A
quarter century in a highly-pressurized environment, swamped with deadlines and
a hungry fan base stretching from Hastings to Langrangeville has the
potential to mold you a certain way.
The bar isn’t just set high, it is
lifted to moon-scraping heights.
Shit, that bar is set higher than
Snoop Dogg on a music tour in Amsterdam on April 20. Like a veteran coach with
an established program, Ray’s year round commitment to success (and
professionalism) is of highest order.
For 25 years, Gallagher has had an eye for talent,
catching the story behind the highlight reel play.
For 25 years, he’s been delivering the
facts beyond the head-spinning run. He’s highlighted the factors beyond
the individual totals/stats.
He prides himself on having an eye for
that talent.
Gallagher possesses pages
of Wikipedia-like knowledge of Section I in his Almanac memory,
staying true to the local scene in which he got his scribe teeth cut.
More by-the-book scribes could peg
Gallagher’s work as over the top. You can’t argue, it makes for an above
average and more entertaining read.
Nicknames have been heaped on local
products at a never-dwindling pace.
Memorable ones include “Sully Webber,”
“Beast amongst Boys,” "King Mullet, "Big Bo" “Uncle Eddie,”
“Gangster Lean,” “Big Bo,” “Moose,” “Sheriff Mabus,” “Three Card Monty,” and
countless others.
Gallagher’s columns have been the go-to
read in Westchester/Putnam since Gallagher sported a mullet, John Stockton
shorts, Nike Swoosh shirts, and an old-school NY Giants skull hat.
A Mike Lupica of his heyday,
Gallagher once slammed anyone who interfered with his beloved sports
scene.
Father time and a workaday commitment to
more jobs than a Bronx-bred Jamaican has kept his brutal blasts of
superintendents and self-proclaimed power brokers to a minimum.
Piss him off, do a disservice to his beloved
high school sports community, expect this to take a turn for the worse. Ray
will unleash the mad writer within him, going on a verbal onslaught to however
needs a good pelting.
It’s always spruced up with laugh-inducing
sentences. There is always overboard creativity that the mainstream stiffs
and socially inept stat dorks lack. While more and more elitists become
too enamored with statistics and commitments, Gallagher has always found the
story behind the daily happenings.
Gallagher would rather write his own piece
about a kid overcoming adversity, breaking a story to his own local
crowd than cover a story that 40 angry journalists have their fingerprints
all over.
Sports Editor is usually a position where
once-prosperous writing careers go to die.
Amid the mountain of industry change and
an uptick in photos and editing, Gallagher’s writing style has remained the
same.
A Day In The Ray
It seems simple, carrying out as Ray
Gallagher does.
Sports consume him.
The 5-foot-9 Gallagher is dressed
like Billy Hoyle in “White Men Can’t Jump,” sporting the backwards
hat and surfer shorts on the sidelines as he snaps a library of photos at a
high school lacrosse game.
He refs three consecutive basketball
games, coaches a Little League team, then writes a pair of columns
complete with Section I rankings and player quotes.
Laced with analogies and metaphors,
Gallagher provides an accurate assessment of each league’s landscape.
Then, Gallagher vividly recalls a story about
his own day.
The lead guard and captain of a
Lakeland High basketball team, the Hornets were then recognized more
for their raging parties than their a souped-up fast break and
suspect defense.
A guy who can retell everyone else’s
story with accuracy can surely remember his own, even if his team engaged in
many memory-altering activities.
The ensuing day, Gallagher is lodged
inside a local town meeting and managing the fields for an upcoming event.
After working like a one-man construction
crew in scalding heat, Ray is finally home. He spends time with his wife,
Nikki, and his two children.
In Gallagher’s five-year-old son
Tyler and his eight-year-old daughter (nine in July) Meagen, Dad’s
love for sports is evident.
Father-and-kids activities include hitting
balls off the tee, scooping up ground balls with their lacrosse sticks,
and long games of “dribble chase” in the driveway.
During these intense games, Tyler and
Meagen’s ball-handling savvy is tested. They also make sure their father is
protecting the ball himself, as brother and sister swarm him and swipe at
the Spalding.
Would you expect anything else?
Gallagher and his wife run a photography
company, Picture That,
which shoots everything from corporate events to weddings to Sweet 16s.
His wife is just as handy with the device
that sparked her husband’s career 25 years ago.
And so after an exhausting day,
Gallagher watches his beloved Mets on TV. They lose, but Gallagher doesn’t
lose his never-dwindling Mets pride.
As much as they suck, he will always be
encased in his Mike Piazza jersey and passionately supporting
the organization.
When the game is over, he retires to the
computer room to write another banger.
President of Putnam
The commitment to writing captivating
columns and shooting photos of each and every team in NCN and now the Examiner
News coverage area (NCN’s brother from another mother, same staff
different editors and ownership) never tailed off.
Many industry heads could have cited his
position as director of athletics for the town of Putnam Valley as a conflict
of interest
Think again.
In a humor-sprinkled 2010 column,
Gallagher ripped the Putnam Valley basketball squad into shreds
Shit, it was for their own good. The same
kids he grew up coaching needed a good verbal slaying to wake up and smell
the Folgers emanating from the kitchen.
During one eyes-burning sentence,
Gallagher made it clear this team needed to “stop getting high off games of
NBA2K or whatever it is” and get in the gym.
During the coaching vacancy, he pushed for
potential candidates to jump at the open position.
Gallagher reminded each would-be warrior
capable of reviving the program that the coach gets the keys to the gym.
Anytime he witnessed a kid put on a
shooting barrage in his open gym program, he steered that kid to practice
without fail. Everytime he saw a young gun emulate White Chocolate with
dazzling passes or enforce a 1990’s basketbrawl New York Knicks
style of defense, he gave that young gun the Varsity basketball
paper work.
His presence has always
been felt beyond his local coverage and columns.
Direct Rays kept it real with the
Putnam Valley kids, acknowledging that they ooze of potential and teams
could potentially hear the footsteps.
In that take-no-prisoners column,
Gallagher illustrated that an unwavering commitment was the only way they
would even sniff a playoff berth.
In that very column assessing the PV
hoops program, Gallagher didn’t pull any haymakers.
Like an angry village parent telling the
troubled youth “y’all are capable of so much more,” Gallagher walloped
them with words.
Not digging into them like the
recruiting pimp writers do, but keeping
it real.
One coach asked him, “Do they let you walk
in Putnam Valley?”
Others chimed in, wondering if Gallagher’s
tires were intact following that admittedly funny-as-spit column.
Some wondered if copies of Gallagher’s
Putnam Valley-torching columns had been used as urine mops and kick-starters
for bonfires by the Putnam Valley youth.
While some overprotective,
truth-fearing, and perhaps overbearing parents may have turned their nose
at the piece, many got a good kick out of it.
Ray was cognizant that this team had
talent, but clearly needed a better work ethic.
A few years later, PV attained the success
Gallagher envisioned. After he essentially called them out for being
lazy potheads (potheads with potential that is), they ascended into Section I’s
upper-crust.
During the team’s resurgence, Gallagher
provided a surplus of positive coverage.
Putnam Valley head coach Ed Wallach was
fired inexplicably, after leading the Tigers to a berth in the Section I
semifinals.
Surprise, Surprise– Gallagher
put his foot down
.
He verbally cooked those who instigated
the problem leading to Wallach’s untimely dismissal, standing up for what is
right.
During a rapidly-evolving
internet-dependent era, the old-school Gallagher earned a social media
presence.
Standing by his beliefs, defending
the man who got the raw deal, Gallagher sparked an online fire. He
got everyone from a diddle eyed Joe to a damned-if-I-know to comment.
It’s not as if Gallagher was out there
advocating for Wallach during the 25 years he spent covering him.
In fact, the two once came astonishingly
close to blows.
Both men were in each other’s grills
ferociously a few years back, when Wallach took a snipe at Gallagher-hired
refs during a youth game.
The bald guy with a penchant for
nicknames would have every bit of none of it.
The scene escalated.
Eventually, threats to call the police immediately quelled the flaring
tempers.
The personal rift ended abruptly.
When the Wallach helped resuscitate a once
pulse-lacking girls program at PV, Gallagher was the first columnist to
give him the necessary ink.
One minute he’s in the guy’s mug, teeth
clenched and eyes burning, ready to throw down.
Next minute? He’s commending him for a job
well done. Give criticism and respect where the criticism and respect are
due.
Shooter
With Ray, there always seemed to be a
story behind the story.
Oddly enough, there’s a story to his
first-ever writing gig.
During his first interview with the now
defunct North County News 25 years ago, one of the key questions hurled on
Gallagher was “can you shoot?”
Gallagher responded with an immediate
and cocksure, “Of course I can shoot… I’m from Putnam Valley!”
An avid hunter during his heyday,
Gallagher thought his superiors were asking him if he could shoot a gun.
They tossed him a camera and
film and a legend was born.
When a coach got fired, when turmoil
shrouded a program, when anything of note happened, Ray put it all out for all
of us to see.
The beat goes on. He is that guy with his
ear to the ground, the guy who revs up the talking heads.
The endless supply of nicknames, the
metaphors, the colorful analogies, they kept us reading.
This is a cat who could chuck
tomatoes at Peekskill with a few short, powerful sentences.
Gallagher once slayed an entire fan
base with the effortless pounding of the keys. Like a revved-up
New York tabloid writer ready to barbeque someone for front page fodder, Gallagher
ripped them.
He crushed Peekskill’s fan base
for losing their shit following a loss. His column the ensuing day painted
Peekskill as a real cesspool, a school rife with hood rats who over step their
boundaries after the game.
Years later, Gallagher lauded the program’s pride
and tradition as a keynote speaker during a state title
run.
This was back when five-year varsity
forward Mookie Jones (a highly-touted prospect who never panned out at
Syracuse) was dunking on foes all across the state.
Gallagher has written on teams working the
clock “like a meth-head works the dealer.”
He’s gone on long-winded rants about
first-class scholar athletes whom he’d welcome to his home without even
checking to see if his guns have been loaded.
He’s given words of warning and called out
teams for having cupcake schedules and wins that were weaker than Chinese tea
on a real scale. He’s given Player of The Year and All-Decade Team awards.
With 25 years of writing hard-hitting and
unique stories and columns, we give it up for a man who has truly stood the
test of time.
It can be an arduous task, appeasing
parents and giving everyone equal coverage. It can be draining, meeting
maddening deadlines while dealing with the greenhorns and interns.
For 25 years, Gallagher has handled it
with professionalism and punch-lines that jolt folks out of their seats.
One of Gallagher’s more moving columns was
one he penned on the late and legendary Tyrell Thompson, a smooth swingman and
indispensable leader who starred at Kennedy Catholic.
The column gave everyone an inside look at
what a truly excellent guy Thompson, who played at West Point and
served in the military, was.
There will never be another Tyrell
Thompson. Just a few
days following Thompson’s tragic death, Gallagher’s column illustrated
that fact.
Way down the line, former athletes will
crack out the scrap book to relive the glory days. They will show their
articles and accomplishments to children and grandchildren proudly. They will
re-read the article and the photo that captures the moment.
Then, they will look at the byline.
Most of them will remember the guy who
bears a striking resemblance to Mr. Clean being at the gym more than the
janitor, on the field more than the waterboy and the physical trainers.
They’ll remember the guy who
they developed a season-long rapport with, the guy who peppered
them with questions and kept the questions and columns coming. They guy who
never wanted the clock to stop.
I don’t know if Ray will ever retire.
The idea of extended
father time, hunting, fishing and watching his putrid Mets play might
seem appealing…can you ever imagine, however, a season of without
this guy perched on the sidelines, snapping shots and taking spoken notes into
his recorder?
I understand some industry
skeptics might wisecrack me for writing this, wondering if I am
aching to get hired (and fired) again.
Wondering if killing Ray with kindness is
my way of mooching a slew of photos.
This was written as a tribute, but I
hope it serves as so much more.
My hope is that a young person who
wishes to pursue true passion and dreams will read this.
My goal is that somewhere,
someone reading this will be sold on honing their craft. Sold on
living a life ultimately bigger than their own, touching others.
Twenty-five years at the helm, Ray Gallagher hasn’t lost an
iota of his luster.
Twenty-five years and he’s still writing
classics like Tim O’Brien writes epic war stories.
Twenty-five years, and his passion for
sports hasn’t waned a bit.
Thank you Ray. Thanks brother.