One might consider sportswriting at The Crimson a thankless job, sort of like being a New York Yankees manager under George Steinbrenner.

You almost always hear about your mistakes, assuming that people actually read your recap of the bowling team's awards dinner. And you almost never hear anything positive, outside of "at least his article wasn't any longer."

But most of us aren't in sportswriting for the glory alone. If so, we'd last about as long as the Detroit Red Wings come playoff time.

I just love sports, and that's what got me into 14 Plympton St. in the first place back in February 1993. Then-sports editor John Trainer '95 was tabling in the Freshman Union, and I decided to sign up for the hell of it.

I had played soccer and baseball through high school but knew I wouldn't have the time to continue those activities at Harvard. Then again, not playing for them was probably my version of a good deed.

So assignment number one was to cover the men's squash team's national championship match against Yale. They won (surprise), and writing it up took a couple of hours. And, of course, it's a special feeling seeing your byline the next day for the first time.

As the spring progressed and I finished my comp by covering the baseball team, I started realizing that sportswriting was a fun activity. You get to be involved with sports while at the same time providing a service to the community. Did anyone say grades?

But what really got me sold was my sophomore year when John asked if I'd like to cover the men's hockey team. It was a tough decision to forego being a fan (I was a rather vocal one as a freshman, I must admit), but it was a great opportunity.

It also didn't hurt that the team went to the NCAA Final Four that season, and even though the team struggled the last two years, that didn't detract from the job.

Besides hockey, I also assumed the women's soccer and softball beats the past two years, in addition to picking up numerous other stories as the editor.

Becoming the editor was also one of those things I never thought I would do. It began as a favor to John when someone else who was supposed to be an assistant sports editor dropped out at the last minute in the fall of 1993, so I stepped in.

Little did I know then that I would spend as much time holed up in the sports cube and on the road covering certain events than I could have doing anything else. Twelve-hour days were the norm at least once a week when I became head editor in 1995, but it wasn't as bad as it seems.

First and foremost, this was a labor of love. We aren't getting paid to do any of this, just like our fellow students who participate on the athletic teams.

And I tried to keep that philosophy in mind when I was covering the Harvard sports teams. Yes, I wanted to write the best possible stories I could, but there were going to be certain things I wouldn't do.

If an athlete really screwed up in a game, I couldn't get myself to rip into him or her in the paper, unlike some of my predecessors and colleagues. They are our classmates and they are still amateurs, so there didn't seem to be much to gain by making a person feel bad.