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The Spokesman-Review Newspaper
Spokane, Washington  Est. May 19, 1883

He’s not pleased, but he”s a Crabb

Vince Grippivince Grippi The Spokesman-Review

Well, we’re on a roll here.

Want to sell that old clunker in the garage? Call me. I’ll urge everyone not to buy it and it will sell tomorrow for three times the book value.

How about your house? The knickknacks your wife’s been collecting for 28 years of marriage? How about a new prep sports classification?

I feel a little like Jack Crabb.

How’s that for an obscure reference?

In the movie “Little Big Man,” Dustin Hoffman plays Jack Crabb, the oldest man alive. Crabb recounts to the narrator his adventures in the Old West. In one of his incarnations, Crabb served as a scout for a man he hates, General Custer, played beautifully by Richard Mulligan.

Custer knows Crabb wants him dead, so he asks the scout if he should take the cavalry into the Little Big Horn. In an incredibly funny scene, Custer declares Jack is his “reverse barometer,” that whatever he says to do, Custer will do the opposite and he’ll be safe.

Last week I urged the Washington Interscholastic Activities Association to reject a sixth classification that would gut the State B Tournament. Not wanting to be labeled a naysayer, I also urged the organization to support the Greater Spokane League’s proposal on revamping the forfeit rule.

Zero for two. A couple of more rejections and it will start to remind me of my attempts to get a date for the senior prom.

A nice girl ended up saying yes, but I’m pretty sure the C – and I don’t care if the WIAA doesn’t want to call it that – will be the death knell for what we know affectionately as the B.

The tournament won’t be the same without the Whitman County teams. It won’t be the same without half the Panorama. Heck, it won’t be the same without Neah Bay.

If there had been a C classification, we never would have known Naselle’s Lyle Patterson and his white socks. We never would have seen Lance Den Boer of Sunnyside Christian. We wouldn’t have had to look up Clallam Bay on a map.

OK, enough ranting. This is the way it is going to be. What do we do about it?

If next year is going to be the last of the “true” B tournaments, let’s make it the best. Let’s celebrate what the B has stood for these many years. Let’s send it out with a bang.

There is evidence Spokane has taken the B Tournament for granted the past few years. This year, the Spokane Regional Sports Commission had to host 17 of the 32 teams because local hosts – restaurants, hotels and other businesses – were almost impossible to find.

For next year, let’s hope those in the hospitality industry – the companies that make the most from the flood of outsiders coming into the town for the tourney – will step to the plate and make the 2006 trip memorable.

Then we have to welcome the new B Tournament in 2007. Even though it won’t be the tourney we remember without the St. John-Endicotts and the Willapa Valleys of the state, it will still be special to the students at the 32 schools that will be here.

We can’t take out our angst on them.

All of which worries me. Now that’s I’ve urged you to do the right thing, does that mean the city is going to abandon the B next year? Will sales of German sausage plummet Wednesday morning? Will the teams have to wander aimlessly around Riverfront Park because there is no one to show them where the Looff is?

Will I serve as a reverse barometer?

Well, if I am Jack Crabb, that makes the WIAA Custer and the C classification the Little Big Horn. We all know how well that turned out.