Saturday, February 14, 2009

Stress: It's there and it's constant

Ken "Hawk" Harrelson, who's done TV play-by-play for the Chicago White Sox for nearly 20 years, spent one season as a general manager -- in 1986 with the White Sox.

He doesn't have fond memories of the job.

"It's the worst job in sports," Harrelson said recently. "But sometimes this takes a life of its own. You can go from a very good situation to a very bad situation. But when you don't fulfill expectations, it all comes to you. The focus shifts to you and not the players. You lay in bed at night, but you're not sleeping. You go through every scenario and think about what you can do or what's next. The biggest killer of a player is pressure. For a GM, it's stress. It's there and it's constant."