TURK MAKING A DIFFERENCE – ONE DAY AT A TIME
For Turk Wendell, Wednesdays are special. And not just because he picked up his first win of the season on a Wednesday. That’s the day he is devoting to the community. The last three Wednesdays have included a trip to St. Mary’s hospital in Queens, a softball doubleheader with kids in Tomkins Square Park – Wendell. of course, pitched both games and pitched that night for the Mets – and this past Wednesday he paid a visit to the St. Aloysius Education Clinic in Harlem, where he was presented with a birthday cake.
Wendell says he gets as much out of it as the kids. noted one child Wednesday, “I didn’t know major league guys were real guys.”
There’s no one else quite like Turk, who quietly earned a college degree from Quinnipiac College this past year. “I like to make somewhat of a difference so once a homestand we do this, “explains Wendell, who works with hill Knee of the Mets’ from office to set up the events. “It’s pretty touching when you see kids in wheelchairs and things lie that. I come from a big family, six kids, I love kids and my daughter is just a year old, so things like this help you stay grounded.”
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WAR IS REAL FOR BRONX ‘KOSOVO KID’
The Kosovo stories keep coming and HBO’s Real Sports will have a fascinating look at Bronx boxer Elvir Muriqi on Tuesday. Muriqi, 20, is known as the Kosovo Kid. he is 7-0 with five KOs and trainer Teddy Atlas says he’s two years away from being a champion.
Three years ago, Muriqi came to New York with his family. This is a family of fighters. His father and 16-year-old sister have gone back to Kosovo to fight for the KLA. Muriqi will fight at the Garden June 19. known as the Great Albanian Hope, Atlas says the war is a motivating factor for Muriqi. “The ring is real,” Atlas says. “The was is real.”
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KNICKS ARE SCORING AT HOME
The soap-opera Knick season has been wonderful for MSG. The ratings are tremendous.
“There are so many characters to follow,” explains Mike McCarthy, MSG Network senior vice president and executive producer. “People like to watch successes, and failures maybe even more.”
The Knicks’ regular-season ratings average this year were 3.05, up 33 percent from last year. in household numbers, that means 207,781 households tuned in, 52,880 more than last year.
The first-round death match with the heat was rated at 5.63, 85 percent higher than the regular season and above last year’s first-round heat ratings of 5.35.
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WHITEMAN PEDALING TOWARD OLYMPICS
Some afternoons he has had to drag a burnt-out car off the Kissena Park track with the help of a bystander. he has chased away dogs, picked up handfuls of glass and begged teens on motor bikes to ride elsewhere for a half hour so he could workout. Kirk Whiteman will do what it takes to follow his Olympic cream.
Whiteman, a sprint cyclist, has collected a national title nearly every year this decade, but without a sponsor, the Canarsie high grad is left to “be creative” when he trains at the “decrepit” Kissena track in Queens of the unforgiving streets of the city.
“If God gives you lemons, make lemonade,” Whiteman, 33, says.
Whiteman is a living example of Just Do It! The Bushwick native trains four times a day as he gears up for this summer’s East Regionals, Nationals and Worlds in hopes of making the 2000 Olympic Games. he can’t have a regular job with his schedule and survives in Canarsie on savings and prize money. he stays at friends’ houses when he travels to races around the country. A sponsor paid all his expenses last year, but with track cycling getting about as much media coverage as bocci, there’s little funding now.
Whiteman got into the sport when he first saw Nelson Vails, a fellow African American and New Yorker, race on television in the early 80s. “Racing is mostly Smalltown, USA,” Whiteman explains, “But when I saw a black man, a brother from Harlem – from the streets like me – I said, ‘I can do this’.”
Whiteman, like Vails, started off by getting a messenger’s job in Manhattan, and has risen through the competitive ranks. As the defending Master’s World Champion, he has the chance at another milestone..if he can win September’s Worlds again in England, he will usher in the century in historic style. According to Whitemans’ extensive research, the last African-American World Champion was Major Marshall Taylor, who won the title in 1899, exactly 100 years ago.
“I just wish people could see that this is a great spectator sport,” Whiteman says, “Sometimes we go 40 or 44 miles per hour and there’s lots of bumping, elbows and head butts. Sometimes it’s slow and suspenseful. It should be on television more so that people could see something different, for a change.”
Yes, like a real Olympic athlete.