I want to tell you about one of our sports staffers, Jeff Holsinger.

I've been in the small newspaper business for 16 years now. In all that time I have never met a more level-headed kid.

I say kid because he graduated from Tippecanoe Valley High School in 1990. Then from Indiana University in 1994. Oh, to be young again. He came to the Times-Union in the fall of 1994.

He is highly sports literate, has a strong work ethic and an easy-to-read writing style. From a human resources point of view, he is a manager's dream. Very little supervision required. Just a pat on the back once in a while.

Until now, that is.

Suddenly - and inexplicably - he has been transformed into a monster.

Holsinger - according to Whitko Athletic Director Greg Roach - is out to destroy Whitko basketball.

The most recent insidious act perpetrated upon the Wildcats by Holsinger was a six-column-inch story that appeared in Wednesday's Times-Union.

In it Holsinger speculated about the future of Whitko's head basketball coach, Dave Henson. He also noted Whitko's current season record and compared and contrasted it with the previous 30 years.

How dare he!

The threat to the future and existence of Whitko basketball is so severe that it has become necessary to ban Holsinger from the pool of reporters that cover Whitko.

Roach, citing what he believes to be a long history of this type of activity by Holsinger, informed me that Holsinger will have to buy a ticket and sit in the stands if he wants to cover Whitko.

The crux of the issue is that Roach, who fully supports Dave Henson, believes Holsinger doesn't.

And that Roach, who did not support the previous coach, Bill Patrick, believes Holsinger does.

So when Holsinger compared Henson's season record to Patrick's previous record in that little article, it made Roach mad.

Roach says that people in the Whitko school district are really upset about the way we cover Whitko.

That's funny, because I didn't get any calls from Whitko fans this year.

I got calls from Warsaw and Wawasee fans who said we didn't do enough for them. But then I got a call from a Wawasee fan thanking us for coverage, so that canceled out the bad call. I got a call from a Triton fan, and one stopped in personally to thank us for the coverage we gave them. I also got a thank-you call from Manchester.

But no calls - positive or negative - from Whitko or Tippy Valley.

Regardless, Roach's assessment of our coverage of Whitko sports was that the South Whitley community would be better off without it.

My first reaction was to oblige him.

After all, we devote a good bit of time, effort, paper and ink to Whitko sports. If we didn't cover them, it would make our job just that much easier.

Whitko is one of six schools we cover. Who wouldn't welcome the opportunity for a 17 percent workload reduction?

But alas, who would really suffer?

Not us. Not the athletic director.

No, the only ones who would suffer would be the players, parents and fans who like to read Whitko stories and look at Whitko pictures in the newspaper.

So what do we do? Do we let the athletic directors of the schools we cover decide who will go to the games?

No, that doesn't sound like a good idea.

So for now, Holsinger will continue to cover Whitko sports as scheduled. But he will have to suffer a little bit. He will have to pay to get in. And he won't get to sit in the press box. That could be a real drag in football season. It's cold then, you know.

We will allow the athletic director to punish him.

But that's OK. He looks young enough to pass for a student. Maybe he could sit in the student section. It might be fun.

It's funny, really, what issues some people decide are important. In Indiana you can raise their taxes, cut their pay, slap their kids and kick their dog.

But don't you ever - EVER - mess with their basketball.

I guess that's why they call it Hoosier Hysteria. [[In-content Ad]]