Weekly Treat — Mussina Goes Out Right

I suppose ESPN’s SportsCenter is only appeasing our taste for the salacious in sports, but even I found this morning’s show noteworthy in its presentation choices.

There were several minutes of coverage and discussion about Dallas Cowboys cornerback/soap opera star Adam “Pacman” Jones and his reinstatement to the NFL after completing alcohol treatment. Reporters were on the phone. Analysts were in-studio. News flashes were scrolling along the bottom line.

Subtly mixed in was this one little nugget of sports info that will be stashed away with the millions of other tidbits accumulated throughout the year — New York Yankees pitcher Mike Mussina retired Thursday.

There was always something odd about Mussina in that there was nothing odd about him. There was no controversy, no star attention, no flashiness about the right-hander.

And in New York no less.

Every year, the hubbub around the Yankees dealt with whether the Bronx Bombers would have enough pitching to make a run at the World Series. Yankees pitchers of all sorts came and went over the years (Hall of Famers Randy Johnson and Roger Clemens, on-again-off-again Yankee Andy Pettitte, etc.) but Mussina was a staple. He was boring. He was ordinary. Even his nickname — The Moose — was drab.

And yet, he won baseball games.

Mussina will retire with 270 career wins, 30 shy of the acclaimed 300 that pitchers set as a target. He had planned from the start of the season to call it quits after 2008. It wasn’t generally known he would hang it up at the end of the season. He will ride off into small-town life without a Cy Young Award, a World Series ring or a guaranteed spot in the Hall of Fame (all of which could have been attainable, if unlikely, had he continued pitching a few more years.

Some guys never know how to retire. Jerry Rice was once an Oakland Raider. Michael Jordan played for the Washington Wizards for a few seasons. And Clemens, well, that’s a whole other matter.

But Mussina seems content. Some might argue it’s because he wasn’t the dogged competitor like Rice or Jordan or Clemens and is well enough to go out without a title.

But happiness doesn’t include championships for all athletes.

Mussina is “Example A” and a good one at that.

(For a short story that better illustrates the life of Mussina, check out ESPN.com writer Buster Olney’s blog)