The BJ Sports Department in 1972 had four future Hall of Famers and the best informed horseracing writer in the Midwest.

Sheldon Ocker was inducted into the National Baseball Hall of Fame in 2018.

Tom Melody was inducted into the Keyser High School Hall of Fame in West Virginia, joining former BJ managing editor Scott Bosley in the Keyser HOF.

Milan Zban was inducted into the Marshall University Hall of Fame in Huntington for his baseball and football prowess.

Warren Harding High graduate Ray Yannucci was inducted into the Warren (Ohio) Hall of Fame and founded and was owner/publisher of five NFL team publications: Browns News/Illustrated, Broncos Report, 49ers Report, Ravens Report and Oilers Report.

Jack Patterson’s horseracing expertise was impeccable.

 

Sheldon joined a sportswriters Hall of Famers group that includes Ring Lardner, Grantland Rice, Damon Runyon, Heywood Broun, Shirley Povich, Dick Young, my late, former Dayton Daily News boss Si Burick, Jim Murray and Cleveland’s Hal Lebovitz.

That’s pretty classy company.

Sheldon’s 33 years of covering the Cleveland Indians for the BJ easily qualified.

Sheldon switched from the Cleveland Cavaliers to the Indians in 1981 when Bob Nold decided he didn’t want to spent his entire spring and summer on the road or in Cleveland.

Sheldon retired from Ol’ Blue Walls after the 2013 season. His wife is Stephanie.

Tom Melody brought his no-nonsense, no bowing to hifalutin people in power attitude with him from his West Virginia upbringing.

That didn’t sit well with Cleveland Browns owner Art Modell, who tripped over his ego so badly that in 1963 he pushed out the best and most creative coach in Browns history, Paul Brown.

All Paul Brown – co-founder of the team named for him – did was win seven league championships in 25 years in the fledgling American Football League and the National Football League.

The Browns won the NFL in 1964 with Paul Brown’s players, but didn’t do it again for 55 years . . . and counting.

Paul Brown switched to the Cincinnati Bengals, who named their stadium Paul Brown Stadium. They recognized talent.

Paul warmed up for his NFL career by coaching Ohio State to the 1942 national title and Massillon High to only 10 losses in 11 seasons.

Massillon’s stadium also is a Paul Brown Stadium.

His 1940 Massillon team is considered the best high school squad ever in Ohio. It beat Kent State University in a scrimmage, 47-0.

Former BJ reporter Bill Hershey thought more highly of Tom Melody than Art Modell – King Arthur in Tom’s mind – did.

Bill wrote to me:

“In the early 1970s Nick Skorich was the Browns' coach and the team was having a bad season.

“Tom wrote what is still my favorite sports lead.”

 

"It was Halloween and the Browns came to the stadium dressed as football players."

 

“Just right!”

 

"Besides that in the early 1970s Tom let me work on Friday nights to take sports' scores and even let me cover a high school event - not sure what sport it was. The Friday night hours helped put food on the table and also helped me fulfill a boyhood wish to be a sportswriter.

"Tom was one of the best.”

 

Former BJ editor Charles Montague also volunteered praise for Tom Melody:

 

 “I asked Tom Melody one day why he always referred to Browns owner as Arthur Modell, never Art?

“ ‘As in King Arthur?,’ Tom replied, being a man of few words. He was conveying how he felt about the imperious Browns owner, who felt reporters should be cheerleaders for him and way he ran team.”

Tom Melody is in the Keyser (WV) High School Hall of Fame, as is Scott Bosley, former BJ managing editor. Scott lives in Kalamazoo, Michigan and played football at Keyser High with the late Mike Melody, Tom’s brother.

Tom was at the BJ for 42 years. He lived in Norton and later Wadsworth where he passed away in 2019. His wife of 61 years is Sharon.

Tom was born June 10, 1937, in Cumberland, Maryland, to the late Joe and Bertha Melody.

Tom and Sharon’s children are Joe of Lexington, Kentucky, Chris (Wendy) of Kingsland, Georgia, Kathie (Jeff) Priest of Wadsworth, Matthew (Theresa) of Cincinnati and Mary (Rob) Yeiser of Verona, Wisconsin. They have 17 grandchildren and two great-grandchildren.

A guy from Keyser that I encountered during my 3-month winter stays in The Villages, Florida remembered Tom because “there’s a Melody Music Store” in Keyser today.

After his BJ retirement I met Jack Patterson mall-walking at Chapel Hill Mall, when it was THE mall that drew cars from the widest area, according to an auto license plates check.

Jack was a super expert when it came to thoroughbred  horseracing. He passed away in 2011, wife Barbara in 2009. They attended 31 Kentucky Derbys together in Louisville, where John S. Knight showed up for every Kentucky Derby, flying from Miami, before spending his summers and autumns at 44 E. Exchange Street.

Jack, the son of John and Kathlyn Patterson, and Barbara Lyntz were classmates at Warren G. Harding High School in Warren, Ohio, then dated after Jack ended his Army service in 1951 and married in 1954. It lasted for 55 years.

They had four children, John Patterson of Cuyahoga Falls, Mike Patterson of Boca Raton, Florida, Patricia of San Jose, California, Kathy of North Canton and Valerie of Tallmadge. They had 11 grandchildren.

They spent their final years in Munroe Falls, moving from Akron.

Jack came to the BJ in 1955 and stayed for 38 years.

Later, when Stu Warner, the Mad Hatter, became executive sports editor, he inherited sports editor Tom Melody, Sheldon Ocker, Jack Patterson, Ray Yanucci, Paul Bailey, Bob Nold, John Seaburn, Jim Derendal, Milan Zban and added Tim Farkas, Barry Forbis, Kevin Huhn, Ken Krause, Mike Naragon, Larry Pantages, Dick Shippy and Dan Thom.

Youngstown State graduate Ray Yanucci, who will be 77 in December, parlayed his 1977-80 Cleveland Browns coverage into a career with entities tied to National Football League activities.

The Browns hired Ray in 1981 to launch and manage Browns News/Illustrated as its editor-in-chief.

In 1986 Ray formed an investment group that purchased Browns News/Illustrated, which is published for 16 years and peaked with 50,000 subscribers before its 2001 sign-off.

One by one Ray became owner/publisher of 49ers Report, Oiler News, Broncos Report and Ravens Report. He ran all five out of his Berea office.

Ray was co-founder of the Akron Browns Booster Club, which  became a charter member of Browns Backer Worldwide.

In 2003 Ray became a consultant for the revamping of Notre Dame’s Blue and Gold Illustrated.

In 2005 Ray became consultant/publishing director for The Huddle, the Browns’ in-house publication.

In 2006 Warren Harding High graduate Ray was inducted into the Warren Sports Hall of Fame. Paul Warfield was his teammate during Ray’s years at Warren Harding High.

Ray has staged charity golf outings for years in Warren in memory of his brother, Ron Yannucci, who passed away in 1996 at the age of 50.

Ray met his wife, Marge Brekoski Yannucci, at a Warren record hop when they were between 9^th and 10^th grades. Both were avid dancers. They were married June 25, 1966 in Warren.

Marge graduated from the Trumbull Memorial Hospital School of Nursing and had a 48-year career as a registered nurse, including 40 at Summa Health in Akron where she was once was named most outstanding nurse in the Summa network.

Their children are former Stow High cheerleader Kelly Yannucci Stanford of Avon, who has a daughter, 11; and former BJ first team All-District soccer player at Stow Marc Yannucci of Streetsboro, who has a son, 10.

Ray is an avid golfer, with a hole-in-one to show for it.

He prepped for his BJ NFL coverage days with high school and later Kent State beats at Ol’ Blue Walls.

Their travels took Ray and Marge to London and Hawaii and NFL cities all across America (after all, Ray covered 23 Super Bowls). In recent years, they have made Naples, Florida a regular vacation spot.

Ray was named best analyst in the Cleveland area by the PD when he co-hosted a Browns pre-game show in 2002-2003.

 

Milan Zban wrote for the PD, the Youngstown Vindicator and the BJ.

 

Milan Zban had an outstanding athletic career in military, collegiate and minor league baseball. Just two days out of Youngstown East High School in 1950, he left for Sanford , Florida, in the New York Giants farm system.

That promising minor league career and excellent spring training effort abruptly came to a halt when Milan tore up his ankle sliding into second base.

That injury didn’t stop Milan from playing at Marshall Collegre in 1950, where he was a two-sport star. He won four letters in baseball, playing first base, and he lettered three seasons at both offensive and defensive tackle in football.

The Giants came calling again and signed him to minor league Class A contract. In 1956 Zban was assigned to Johnstown, Pennsylvania. Later he played for Michigan City, Indian of the Midwest League. The Crushin’ Croatian got his first home run as a pro off Tracy Stallard, the pitcher who in 1961 would surrender Roger Maris' record-breaking 61st homer. No wonder; Milan took hitting lessons from legendary Mel Ott while in spring training with the Giants.

During his BJ days, Milan lived in Hartville with his wife, Pat.

Milan is in the Marshall Athletic Hall of Fame — more than 12 years after he died of non-Hodgkin’s lymphoma. Milan had a minor league baseball career and wrote passionately about BJ sports.

Zban was born on April 15, 1931, the oldest of four children born to Mike and Barbara Zban. An East High Hall of Famer, he played football, basketball and baseball in high school, where he was class president.

His brothers John (a basketball player) and Bill (football) followed him to Marshall.

When East High football coach Tony Mason wanted his players to learn how to dance for the prom, he sent them to a class taught by a professional dancer named Pat Maniatis.

Milan covered the event and asked the teacher out. They married in 1959.

In 1971, Pat noticed a lump on Zban’s neck. He was diagnosed with lymphoma.

“When the cancer first hit, I remember him saying, ‘Gee, I’m lucky. I see kids in there that are 5 years old that have tumors,’ ” Pat said.

“That’s how he looked at life. He was 40, we had just moved here [to Hartville] and we found out he had cancer, but he never said ‘poor me.’ I remember coming back from treatments where he was throwing up in a bucket in the backseat, but he never complained.”

Zban battled cancer for 30 years, going back 18 times for treatment. The doctor told Pat that her husband had more chemotherapy than any patient he’d ever had. Zban finally passed away on Feb. 5, 2002 at age 70.

 

Still later, Terry Pluto switched from the PD and was named Ohio Sportswriter of the year multiple times. Terry wrote more than 20 books, mostly about Northeast Ohio sports.

Terry would write chapters for his books while riding a plane to and from games by the Cleveland Cavaliers, which he covered enthusiastically and magically.

Later, Brian Windhorst rode his coverage of LeBron James into a good career with ESPN.

The golden BJ sports era has a long history.

As for the rest of that 1972 BJ sports staff, Paul Bailey’s words zoomed through his stories like the Indianapolis 500 and Daytona 500 auto races that he covered.

Bob Nold preceded Sheldon on the BJ’s Indians beat till he tired of being away from home and family.

Rich Zitrin was by far the wildest character in that BJ sports department. Women who worked at night told tales about him . . . and others who regaled or harassed anyone around at night when the Sports Department was wrapping things up.

Jim Derendal has the most ignominious history, as coach of the Beacon Bombers, who were true to their name. They bombed out so often that you needed a flashlight to find them in the Cuyahoga Falls softball league standings.

Conversely, the Ladies of the Knight, as the BJ women called their team, were league champions. The Bombers played like a girl. Hell, not even like a girl when it came to the Ladies of the Knight.

Paul Facinelli’s greatest claim to fame was getting fired for doing his job too well.

Facinelli did a great job of exposing wrongful child sexual abuse convictions in Lorain County. Chief assistant Lorain county prosecutor Jonathan Rosenbaum, who masterminded the convictions, objected, the Elyria Chronicle Telegram sided with Rosenbaum and fired Paul in 1998.

In 2009 Lorain County Common Pleas Court Judge James Burge overturned the convictions of Nancy Smith and Joseph Allen, vindicating Paul.

Bob Nold, who passed away in 2009, was born in St. Joseph, Missouri, and was a University of Kansas graduate.

He was inducted into the Akron Baseball Hall of Fame for his coverage of amateur sports. He retired from the BJ in 1996.

 

His wife of 53 years was a perfectly named Autumn Delight. Their children were Robert B. Nold, Philip C. Nold and Michael J. Nold. They had seven grandchildren. Bob had a brother, John R. Nold.