Watchdog

Here is my other Sunday newspaper column, my latest update on the ongoing Tony Kornheiser saga.

One of the benefits of my periodic chats with Tony is his trove of stories about olden times (the 1970s) at Newsday, where he said he learned much of what he knows today.

Kornheiser described scrappy Newsday's challenge: "How do you get attention when you do as good a job as The New York Times but we're not The New York Times?"

Not that Newsday was above occasionally taking advantage of the Times' relative prominence.

Kornheiser recalled a very late night when Bob Waters, the famously crusty old boxing writer for whom Newsday's annual sportswriting award is named, was in charge in the office when a well-known boxer died.

"So Waters gets on the phone and starts calling boxing people up blind, saying, 'This is Bob Waters of The New York Times.' This is 2 in the morning. I say, 'Bob, what the hell are you doing?.' And he says, 'Kid, after midnight everybody is from The New York Times."'