ShareThisThe news startled me.
"University of Louisville basketball coach Rick Pitino," I heard on the radio Tuesday morning, "is planning to retire ..."
I thought: Wow. There has to be something more to this, because Louisville is 12-0 and ranked No. 4. Coaches just don't bolt from a program with that kind of record unless there are compelling personal issues.
Then came, as Paul Harvey used to say, the rest of the story.
"... When his contract expires in 2017."
Let's see, that would be five whole seasons from now, by which time Pitino will be 64 and the planet of which he's an inhabitant might or might not be maintaining an elliptical orbit around the sun.
Not to put too much of a doomsday spin on things, but can we maybe get through the last few days of 2011 before we worry about 2017?
I hope I'm still alive and kicking in 2017, but all I know for sure is that today is today and the future is tomorrow. As for 2017, that's a can of worms best handled by basketball coaches probing their mortality.
"When you're 59, you're realistic that you don't have a whole lot of years left," Pitino said to reporters. "My contract's going to run out in 2017. I'm not coaching any more after that."
The announcement of Pitino's plans to retire in 2017 was greeted with this earnestly worded headline posted on the Louisville Courier-Journal's website: "Is the coaching end for Rick Pitino in the not-too-distant future?"
I guess it depends on how we define "not too distant." I happen to think 2017 belongs in the category of "so distant I've got to squint."
But then again, I don't live in Louisville, where basketball is a religion.
On a day he was contemplating his contract expiring in 2017, Pitino pointed out his habit of dwelling on the Here and Now.
"One thing I've learned to do with my age, I really don't look ahead," he said. "For years, I've been preaching the precious present and having to always subscribe to it."
To recap: A basketball coach who envisions himself working another five seasons doesn't want to look ahead, as it would violate his premise of living for today.
Got it?
I'm confused, but give Pitino this much: By beginning his swan song now, he put 2011 into a frame. It was a year retirements -- some forced, some sudden, some recanted -- dominated the sports pages.
On New Year's Day, after his Penn State football team lost to Florida in the Outback Bowl, coach Joe Paterno noted the stability of the Nittany Lions program.
"The athletic director was a kid that I recruited as a walk-on," he said. "The president has been with us now maybe 14-15 years. We have a lot of fun together. I don't see any reason to get out."
Within 11 months, the athletic director, university president and Paterno himself would be unemployed. Not unemployed is former Gators coach Urban Meyer, who retired from Florida because of stress-related health problems before deciding, last month, to take on the very stressful job of replacing Jim Tressel at Ohio State.
Health concerns put coach Phil Jackson, who won six NBA championships in Chicago and five more in Los Angeles, into retirement after the Lakers lost to the Mavericks in the Western Conference finals.
"This year, there's no maybe," Jackson said of his vow to bow out.
Tony LaRussa's retirement from baseball was more abrupt. The intensely competitive manager had just guided the Cardinals to their second World Series title in six seasons when he announced he was done at the age of 67.
Three-time Cy Young Award winner Pedro Martinez retired earlier this month -- more than two years after throwing his last pitch -- just as slugger Manny Ramirez, who quit baseball after being slapped with a 100-game suspension for juicing, had second thoughts about retiring.
Mike Modano, the best American-born player in NHL history, skated off into the sunset in 2011. He's headed for the Hall of Fame.
And, finally, there was Shaquille O'Neal. He called it a career at 39, after earning four world championship rings and scoring 28,596 points, a handful of which were attained at the free-throw line. Eschewing the tradition of somber farewell exits, Shaq turned his retirement into celebration.
"In light of today," he said in June, "I am retiring all my nicknames: The Big Aristotle, Shaq-Fu, The Big Shamrock, The Big Cactus, The Diesel and finally, the one and only, never to be duplicated or replicated ... Superman."
In 2017, Rick Pitino will be challenged to craft a formal retirement address as fun as Shaq's was in 2011, but I've got faith in the guy.
He's got six years to work on it.
(Contact John McGrath at john.mcgrath(at)thenewstribune.com. For more stories visit scrippsnews.com)
Must credit the News Tribune in Tacoma, Wash.
