T.J. Simers

So much bellyaching in sports today, so many athletes talking about the adversity they overcome, and Octavio Sanchez loses his right hand, two fingers on his left, his nose burns off and he says, "I've been blessed." It's a lump-in-your throat UCLA...

Obviously, the good people in Los Angeles are very different from you people in San Diego. Or, as Bill Johnston, the director of public relations for the Chargers, put it in a recent blog to folks in San Diego: "What's with you people?'' The Chargers...

I just don't get some sportswriters. What do they want? I pick up Sunday morning's newspaper expecting to read about our guys' hard-fought victory, only to find a disappointing tale about what the winners didn't accomplish. Where's the gushing? Where's...

I had such expectations, the cast sounding terrific, the early Oscar buzz. Then I went and paid to see the worst movie ever made — dumbfounding how anyone ever agreed to make it — an idiotic, stupefying, colossal waste of time. I sat there...

An athlete plays 15 or 20 years, retires and there is great fanfare upon his departure. Maybe tears, maybe gifts given, maybe his number hung in honor. Los Angeles' very own Jack Disney calls it a day and he's just gone. Disney is good people. There...

My favorite TV show is "The Mentalist." I think Patrick Jane is just the greatest, so flippant and smart and capable of saying the most outrageous things at any moment. "Remind you of anyone?" I'm asking Lane Kiffin on Tuesday morning while mentioning...

It's a difficult admission, one that would trouble my poor mother if she were still alive. But on occasion, I can be critical here. I remember my mom once telling me, "If you can't find anything nice to write about someone, then go do a boxing, tennis...

There's no quit here, although I can only imagine how many folks wish I was on the verge of elimination. Before Monday's all-important Dodger game, I go to the clubhouse to remind Andre Ethier how important he is to the team. It's a discussion that will...

BOULDER, Colo. -- Proving it was no fluke when Sacramento State, Colorado State and Fresno State somehow found a way to beat Colorado, UCLA did the same Saturday. The gutty little Bruins, while not winning by 55 like mighty Fresno State, did a...

SAN DIEGO — I drove down here alone so that I'll have plenty of room upon my return to bring back any Chargers wanting an early start finding a place to live in Los Angeles. While here I thought I might as well ride the Choking Dogs for going belly...

SAN DIEGO — The other night after the Dodgers lost to the Padres, while the media met with Manager Don Mattingly, screaming could be heard from the nearby coaches' dressing room. "Passionate" screaming? General Manager Ned Colletti says with a...

So I buy into this Jim Mora-walks-on-water hoopla. "Discipline," as one UCLA honk after the next says as I arrive at the Rose Bowl, making the difference. I've only seen the Bruins play Rice, and I thought I was watching two high school teams. But I'...