John U. Bacon

When Mitch McGary played high school basketball in New Hampshire, he was one of the nation’s top recruits. Michigan fans were rightly thrilled when he decided to play for the Wolverines.

In his first NCAA tournament, last spring, McGary played so well folks thought he might jump to the NBA. Instead, he returned for his sophomore year – then injured his back so badly, he needed surgery mid-season. The Wolverines weren’t doing much better at 6-4, with Big Ten conference play still ahead. It looked like Michigan might miss the NCAA tournament.

The Wolverines proved them wrong by winning the Big Ten regular season title – its first since 1986 – with McGary cheering them on from the bench. McGary also beat the odds, recovering so quickly he dressed for Michigan’s final NCAA tournament game, joining his teammates for warm-ups.

The Wolverines’ dreams fell short when they lost to Kentucky in the regional final. After the game, the NCAA conducted its routine, random drug tests on a few players – including Mitch McGary.

This makes sense. No one wants to see a team using steroids win the title. The NCAA has a special role, too, in looking out for the health of its student-athletes – and the damage steroids can do is no secret.

The drug test McGary failed, however, was not for steroids. The NCAA can never seem to catch those guys. It was for marijuana, which is now legal in two states. Still, the NCAA’s rule is well known, and it was McGary’s job to follow it. He has no one to blame but himself – and to his credit, that’s just what he’s done. But when the NCAA gave McGary a season-long suspension, he decided to jump to the NBA.

I thought I was beyond being shocked by the NCAA. But I was wrong.

The basic idea, I get – and I support. McGary failed the test, and that has consequences. But the punishment is ludicrous – and the NCAA, more so.

Keep in mind, the NCAA doesn’t test for alcohol, even though it’s illegal for everyone under 21 – a group which includes roughly three quarters of college athletes. In fact, in Ann Arbor, the penalty for underage drinking is $350, and the penalty for possessing marijuana is 25 bucks. The NBA no longer tests for marijuana, because so many players would fail it.

I used to coach high school hockey, and I was pretty strict. When one of our players got caught smoking pot, we suspended him for a quarter of the season. But we allowed him to practice, so we wouldn’t lose him. We wanted him to learn responsibility, not leave. As one of my mentors told me, “When in doubt, err on the side of the kid.”

It worked. He learned his lesson, played an important role, and has since graduated from college. We’re still in touch, and I’m proud of him.

What did the NCAA teach McGary? If you turn down the NBA, return for your sophomore year, take school seriously, suffer a season-ending injury but cheer on your teammates anyway – and then you make one dumb mistake, you’re done. Nothing else matters.

Prohibition showed us that when our rules are ridiculous, the people who enforce them start looking ridiculous, too. And it’s a pretty good sign your punishment is absurd when the recipient would be a fool to accept it.

I wonder if any of the NCAA’s employees have ever smoked pot? Does the NCAA test them to find out? If an NCAA employee failed the test, would he be suspended for a year without pay? And if so, would he accept that punishment, or leave the NCAA to work for – oh, I don’t know – the NBA?

McGary has undoubtedly learned some lessons – but not the ones the NCAA is supposed to teach him, about accountability, second chances, and redemption. Instead, the NCAA has shown him that some authority figures can’t tell the difference between a civil infraction and a felony, and it’s given him an unforgettable lesson in rank hypocrisy.

And once you’ve learned that, I cannot blame you for going to the NBA. There’s nothing more to learn here, that you need to learn.

About the writer: Ann Arbor resident John U. Bacon is the author of the national bestsellers “Fourth and Long: The Future of College Football,” “Bo’s Lasting Lessons” and “Three and Out: Rich Rodriguez and the Michigan Wolverines in the Crucible of College Football.” You can follow him on Twitter (@Johnubacon), and at johnubacon.com.

The Chronicle relies in part on regular voluntary subscriptions to support our publication of columnists like John U. Bacon. Click this link for details: Subscribe to The Chronicle. And if you’re already supporting us, please encourage your friends, neighbors and colleagues to help support The Chronicle, too!

John U. Bacon

Nik Stauskas grew up in Mississauga, Ontario – a Toronto suburb better known for its neighborhood hockey games than for a Lithuanian kid spending thousands of hours shooting on his parents’ backyard hoop.

This year, Stauskas was named Big Ten player of the year. It worked.

Glenn Robinson III took a completely different route to the NBA: His father is Glenn Robinson Jr., also known as “The Big Dog,” and was the first pick in the NBA draft twenty years ago. If Stauskas had to work to get attention, Robinson had to work to avoid it.

They became strong candidates to leave college early for the NBA draft, which is their right. This week, both decided to make that jump, and file for the draft this spring. Stauskas is projected to be a high first-round pick, and Robinson not too far behind.

Good for them. They’re both nice guys, hard workers, and serious students. If a violinist at Michigan was recruited by the London Symphony Orchestra, no one would begrudge her for jumping. I might have done it myself.

But I do object to the pundits and fans claiming if the NBA dangles millions of dollars in front of a college player, “he has no choice. He has to go.”

This bit of conventional wisdom is based on one gigantic assumption: that the pursuit of money eclipses all other considerations, combined.

The idea that a great player might decide to stay in school to improve their game, to enjoy the college experience, or to pursue his education are  considered silly, even immature responses, when they’re considered at all.

And if he does decide to stay in school – as a surprising number do, despite the pressure to leave – these same people will call him a fool. Why? Money.

The funny thing is, we have actual data – tons of it – that tell us what makes us happy. And study after study shows it’s not money. It’s family. It’s friends. It’s work we care about. And that’s about it.

But ignoring our own values invariably creates unhappiness. Ditto, greed.

The happiest people I know have lived the most meaningful lives, including dedicated schoolteachers, talented musicians and friends working for nonprofits that actually help others.

My dad, like just about everybody else who works at a university, turned down more money from the private sector to keep teaching, researching and treating his pediatric patients. My mom spent ten years teaching grade school, and decades later, she still hears from her students.

The late Chris Peterson, a psychology professor at Michigan who won the Golden Apple Award for teaching in 2010, studied happiness. He discovered the biggest factor in job satisfaction is not hours or prestige or pay, but one good friend. That’s it.

Perhaps that’s why every former Michigan athlete I know who played in the NBA, the NFL and the NHL says they liked playing for Michigan best.  That list includes Stanley Cup champions, Super Bowl winners, and millionaires.

Mike Kenn played for Michigan in the late ’70s, then played 17 years for the Atlanta Falcons, 251 straight starts. He told me, “I watch the Falcons play on Sundays, and I hope they win. But on Saturdays, I live and die with the Wolverines.”

Jim Mandich was the captain of Bo Schembechler’s first Michigan team in 1969, and an All-Pro tight end on the undefeated 1972 Miami Dolphins. He stayed in Miami, and did a lot of radio and TV for the team. When the Detroit News’s Angelique Chengalis asked him a few years ago, when he was facing terminal cancer, if he still had time to follow Michigan football, he said, “Are you kidding me?” Mandich said. “Of course I care about that stuff, to the point of irrationality. It will always be Michigan first, cancer second.” He didn’t even mention the Dolphins.

Yeah, this is what the NCAA wants us to believe, which always makes me nervous. My contempt for that organization is growing – and I didn’t think that was possible. But that doesn’t mean everything they say is always wrong.

So, for Nik and Glenn, do whatever is right for you, and good luck. You’ve worked hard and beaten incredible odds to create those options.

But don’t think for a second that just because someone offers you money to do something, you have no choice but to do it.

If you do, you’re not buying your freedom. You’re selling it.

About the writer: Ann Arbor resident John U. Bacon is the author of the national bestsellers “Fourth and Long: The Future of College Football,” “Bo’s Lasting Lessons” and “Three and Out: Rich Rodriguez and the Michigan Wolverines in the Crucible of College Football.” You can follow him on Twitter (@Johnubacon), and at johnubacon.com.

The Chronicle relies in part on regular voluntary subscriptions to support our publication of columnists like John U. Bacon. Click this link for details: Subscribe to The Chronicle. And if you’re already supporting us, please encourage your friends, neighbors and colleagues to help support The Chronicle, too!

John U. Bacon

On Sunday, the Michigan Wolverines faced the Michigan State Spartans in the final of the Big Ten men’s basketball tournament. After a decade of domination by the Spartans, John Beilein’s Wolverines held the upper hand the past four years. After losing two stars to the NBA and one to back surgery, they surprised just about everyone when they won the regular season Big Ten title this year by three games. Now they had the rare chance to beat the Spartans three times in one season.

Well, they say beating your arch-rival three times is almost impossible, and that proved true. There was no debating this one. The Spartans beat the Wolverines by 14 points. Spartans’ head coach Tom Izzo is doing what Tom Izzo does: Getting his team ready at just the right time for a good run in the NCAA tournament.

But Sunday’s game might have given both teams what they needed for the tournament: a spark of confidence for the Spartans, and a wake-up call for the Wolverines. I’ll bet both Izzo and Beilein are smart enough to use the Big Ten final game to motivate their players.

But, whatever happens in the NCAA tournament, both teams have elevated basketball in the state of Michigan – and with it, the rivalry between them. And they’ve done it the right way, too.

Since Izzo took over in 1995, he has graduated about 80% of his players – higher than the average of the student body at large.

Izzo grew up in the Upper Peninsula, and he’s proud of it. “People work hard up there,” he told me. “They’re straight with you. Kids are brought up that way, and that’s the only way they know. It’s in their blood. Remember this: All kids want to be disciplined – doesn’t matter where they’re from or who their parents are. I believe that. Discipline is a form of love.”

By that definition, Izzo’s players get a lot of love – and Beilein loves his players just as much. The year after Beilein took over in 2007, his players notched the most improved grade point average of any Michigan team. His players either go to the NBA, or graduate on time.

When I was watching Michigan beat Indiana two weeks ago, I looked out on the court and realized all but one of the starters had taken my class on the history of college athletics. (And no, despite the name, it’s not a blow-off. I’m a tyrant.) But why hadn’t the fifth player on the court, center Jordan Morgan, taken my class? Because I don’t teach master’s-level courses in engineering. That’s how you do it.

For decades, the rivalry between these two basketball teams never peaked, because one team was always riding high, while the other usually trailed far behind. But now, finally, both teams are performing at the game’s highest level, on and off the court.

In 2001, Izzo told me, “It should be a Duke-North Carolina thing around here, because there are too many good players in this state for one school to get them all.” Thirteen years later, the success of both teams has proved Izzo right: There’s more than enough talent in the state to fuel two top teams.

To equal the Duke-North Carolina rivalry would take a few decades, of course, but so long as Beilein and Izzo are coaching, that’s the direction Michigan-Michigan State is going.

The big winner here is college basketball. For all those who say the term “Student-athlete” is an oxymoron – and at too many schools, it is – these two programs stand as solid proof that you can do it the right way, and still beat the guys who don’t.

About the writer: Ann Arbor resident John U. Bacon is the author of the national bestsellers “Fourth and Long: The Future of College Football,” “Bo’s Lasting Lessons” and “Three and Out: Rich Rodriguez and the Michigan Wolverines in the Crucible of College Football.” You can follow him on Twitter (@Johnubacon), and at johnubacon.com.

The Chronicle relies in part on regular voluntary subscriptions to support our publication of columnists like John U. Bacon. Click this link for details: Subscribe to The Chronicle. And if you’re already supporting us, please encourage your friends, neighbors and colleagues to help support The Chronicle, too!

John U. Bacon

On Tuesday night, the Michigan men’s basketball team beat Illinois to earn its first outright Big Ten title in almost three decades. What’s more impressive is how they’ve done it.

Michigan’s famous Fab Five left the stage 20 years ago, and were replaced by Tom Izzo’s Michigan State teams a few years later. For more than a decade, the Spartans dominated the state.

Izzo’s teams have earned 16 straight NCAA invitations – and they’ll get another one next week – seven Big Ten titles, five Final Fours, and one national title, in 2000, and he’s done it the right way. His players graduate at roughly an 80% clip, higher than the student body at large. Along the way, Izzo took 18 of 21 against the Wolverines, who have had four different head coaches during his tenure.

But what a difference a few years make. Michigan basketball coach John Beilein has beaten the Spartans in six of their last eight meetings, and returned the long dormant Michigan program to its previous heights.

And by previous heights, I mean 1986, which is the last time Michigan won the Big Ten title outright. I was a senior that year – about the same age as the parents of Michigan’s current players.

This is just the latest of a lifetime of upsets for Beilein, starting with his coaching career itself. He was working in a sewer – literally – when his father’s face appeared in the light of the manhole above. He asked John if he wanted a job at the local high school, which was looking for a social studies teacher who could coach three sports. John didn’t think too long before he decided perhaps that was a better career path, and climbed out of the sewer.

At the next six stops before Michigan – which included one high school, one community college, two four-year colleges and three Division I universities before Michigan came calling – Beilein’s players were always smaller than their opponents, so he created a system that stressed movement, passing and outside shooting. In other words, skill and savvy over size.

Beilein’s unconventional approach worked at every stop, but he was never part of the fraternity of coaches. It wasn’t because they didn’t like him, but because they didn’t know him. While they were assisting legends like Bob Knight and Dean Smith, and getting to know their network of friends, Beilein skipped the assistant step altogether, leading smaller schools in the middle of nowhere on his way up. That was just one more reason why so many people doubted his unique system would work on the Big Ten’s big stage.

After Beilein’s third season in Ann Arbor, when his Wolverines couldn’t manage to win even half their games, a lot of folks concluded he wasn’t ready for prime time. Beilein didn’t listen, sticking to his system, but overhauling his staff.

Those were two big time, gutsy moves – and both worked. The next year, Beilein’s Wolverines won the Big Ten title. Last year, they got to the NCAA title game, and this week, they took another Big Ten title – the third straight banner they’ll be hanging in Beilein’s honor. Unlike a few Michigan banners from the ’90s, which were taken down due to NCAA sanctions, these will be up as long as the building.

Because Beilein’s system stresses brains over brawn, he can afford to pass up most of the five-star high school prospects other coaches salivate over, and take the players they don’t want. The list is long, and includes Zack Novak, Trey Burke, Caris Levert, and Nik Stauskas – smart, coachable kids who either graduate on time or go to the NBA. Then Beilein and his staff develop these overlooked players, turning them into Big Ten stars and, oftentimes, NBA regulars.

Beilein has also attracted the sons of NBA stars like Jon Horford, Tim Hardaway Jr. and Glen Robinson III. Their parents are rich, so their sons can’t be bought by unscrupulous coaches. They also know how slick other coaches can be, so they can’t be fooled, either. So when they pick John Beilein’s program to develop their sons as people and as players, that tells you something.

Beilein pulled off his latest surprise this season. In the off-season, Michigan lost two stars to the NBA, then first team pre-season All-American Mitch McGary had to bow out for back surgery in December. Most experts believed, without McGary, Michigan had no chance for another Big Ten title, and might even miss the NCAA tournament. Two months ago, I wrote: “Do not count them out.” But that’s a far cry from predicting a Big Ten banner. The team showed more guts than all of us watching them.

Even now, many naysayers believe Michigan won’t go far in the NCAA tournament. But do you really want to bet against Beilein…again? He has a history of proving the doubters wrong – a history that spans his entire life.

If John Beilein is not the Big Ten coach of the year, Michigan should demand a recount. Don’t be surprised if he wins the national award, too. It’s hard to imagine a more deserving recipient, on or off the court.

Not bad for a guy who started his coaching career by climbing out of a sewer.

About the writer: Ann Arbor resident John U. Bacon is the author of the national bestsellers “Fourth and Long: The Future of College Football,” “Bo’s Lasting Lessons” and “Three and Out: Rich Rodriguez and the Michigan Wolverines in the Crucible of College Football.” You can follow him on Twitter (@Johnubacon), and at johnubacon.com.

The Chronicle relies in part on regular voluntary subscriptions to support our publication of columnists like John U. Bacon. Click this link for details: Subscribe to The Chronicle. And if you’re already supporting us, please encourage your friends, neighbors and colleagues to help support The Chronicle, too!

John U. Bacon

The year in sports, 2013, started out with the Detroit Lions missing the playoffs, and hockey fans missing the entire National Hockey League season.

The NHL hadn’t played a game since the Stanley Cup Finals that spring. The lockout started the way these things usually do: The players thought the owners made too much money, and the owners thought the players made too much money. And, of course, both sides were dead right.

On one side, you had NHL Commissioner Gary Bettman, widely considered the worst commissioner in sports today – and maybe ever – who gets booed by the fans whenever he shows up. On the players’ side, you had union chief Donald Fehr, who led the baseball players union to cancel the 1994 World Series.

Well, you can guess what happened: a game of chicken between two stubborn leaders bent on self-destruction.

Fortunately, a government mediator – yes, you heard that correctly – saved the day, and hockey resumed. All of it only goes to prove my theory: hockey is the greatest sport, run by the dumbest people.

Things picked up after that.

Ann Arbor’s own Harbaugh brothers, John and Jim, coached their teams into the Super Bowl. Their dad, Jack, coached under Michigan legend Bo Schembechler, and Jim was his star quarterback, and played in the NFL. But on this day, John – the older, quieter, less celebrated brother – was the star, with his Baltimore Ravens holding off Jim’s San Francisco 49ers, 34-31.

The bigger surprise: On the one day we actually look forward to watching TV ads, they were so bland and boring and just plain bad, we had no choice but to turn our attention to the actual football game.

Michigan basketball coach John Beilein, the eighth of nine kids, started his career when he literally climbed out of a sanitation sewer to teach high social studies and coach three sports. Four decades and eight teams later, the 60-year old coach led his Wolverines to the NCAA Final Four, then the finals. It was the feel-good story of the spring.

After Michigan fired its last four basketball coaches, three in the wake of scandals, Michigan just might have finally gotten the right guy. He just took a little while to get there.

Andy Murray became the first British tennis player to win Wimbledon since 1936, and the first Scotsman since 1896 – something to savor.

Jim Leyland’s Detroit Tigers won the division title for the fourth time in eight years, then retired. He had plenty of critics, but I couldn’t help but notice his teams always won. Everywhere. In the minors. In the majors. In the National League. In the American League. At every level, in eight different states, and five different decades. Leyland must have done something computers can’t. I’m glad that still matters.

Ohio State University president Gordon Gee’s ability to put money in the bank was equaled only by his ability to put his foot in his mouth. In politics, they say, when your opponent is shooting himself in the foot, don’t grab the gun. His final gaffe: “The Fathers are holy on Sunday, and they’re holy hell the rest of the week. You just can’t trust those damn Catholics on a Thursday or a Friday, and so, literally, I can say that.” Yes, and so, literally, Ohio State can ask you to leave.

The NCAA decided to reduce the sanctions against Penn State’s players, who didn’t know who Jerry Sandusky was until he was arrested. The same month, Grambling’s players boycotted a mid-season game. College players have no power, until they sit down. Then they have all the power.

The Michigan football team’s dreams of a division title ended with five league losses. The Wolverines best game was a one-point loss to hated Ohio State, the first time I have ever seen Michigan fans feeling better about their team after a loss than before it.

While the Wolverines were stumbling, up the road Michigan State quietly won the division to face those same Buckeyes, leaving Wolverine fans to wish for the lights to go out, a la the Super Bowl. No luck. The Spartans beat the Buckeyes 34-24, to win their first trip to the Rose Bowl in a quarter century.

In the 80th annual Mud Bowl, played in a mucky swamp in front of Michigan’s Sigma Alpha Epsilon house, an estimated 2,000 fans showed up to watch. But it’s hard to say, because the Mud Bowl doesn’t have turnstiles, ticket scanners or seat licenses – or TV timeouts, for that matter.  It was cold, it was chaotic, it was crazy, but the pure energy pulled the crowd in, just as it surely did when students played the first game in 1869.

The players weren’t battling for money or fame, just pride. They showed all of us why football had caught on in the first place. It was a nice reminder.

About the writer: Ann Arbor resident John U. Bacon is the author of the national bestsellers “Fourth and Long: The Future of College Football,” “Bo’s Lasting Lessons” and “Three and Out: Rich Rodriguez and the Michigan Wolverines in the Crucible of College Football.” You can follow him on Twitter (@Johnubacon), and at johnubacon.com.

The Chronicle relies in part on regular voluntary subscriptions to support our publication of columnists like John U. Bacon. Click this link for details: Subscribe to The Chronicle. And if you’re already supporting us, please encourage your friends, neighbors and colleagues to help support The Chronicle, too!

John U. Bacon

It wasn’t that long ago that Michigan’s basketball program was not merely unsuccessful, but the shame of the athletic department, if not the university.

Bo Schembechler, then Michigan’s athletic director, fired basketball coach Bill Frieder after he found out Frieder had flown out to accept the coaching job at Arizona State just a few days before the NCAA tournament was to begin. Schembechler famously barked, “A Michigan Man will coach Michigan!” Assistant Coach Steve Fisher filled in, and the team “shocked the world” by winning Michigan’s first-ever national title in basketball.

But, on the eve of Fisher’s ninth season, he, too, was fired, because some of his players had been paid by a booster. Another assistant coach, Brian Ellerbe, was named the interim coach, which usually is a mistake – and this proved no exception. At Ellerbe’s first Big Ten tournament, in 1998, the Wolverines pulled a rabbit out of a hat to win it, and Ellerbe was named the permanent head coach. But three years later he was also fired, partly because of a bad record, but mainly because some of his players had been paid by the same booster.

The NCAA launched an investigation that lasted years. Tommy Amaker, the next coach, had to deal the investigation, the probation that followed, and subpar facilities. He never made the tournament, but he left Michigan’s program much better than he found it.

Former athletic director Bill Martin started raising the money and making the plans for a new practice facility and a complete renovation of Crisler Arena – which ultimate cost about $100 million when it was finished in 2012 – and hired Michigan’s current coach, John Beilein, to take advantage of it. Beilein came to Michigan with a strong resume, having taken three different schools to the big dance, but not a high profile.

Beilein is the eighth of nine children, all of whom had to find their own way to college. For Beilein, basketball was the ticket. After he graduated from Wheeling College (now Wheeling Jesuit University) he took a job back home – in sanitation. One day, he was working in a sewer, knee deep in you-know-what, when his father’s face appeared in the light of the manhole above. He asked John if he wanted a job at the local high school, which was looking for a social studies teacher who could coach three sports. Beilein gazed about his surroundings, then looked up at his father, and said, “Yes.  Yes, I believe I would be interested.”

When Beilein told this story to my class a few years ago, they laughed. But a moment later, with the image of his father still in his mind, the coach briefly choked up, and had to take a moment before moving on. That this memory could make a millionaire basketball coach pause, almost four decades later, tells you something about Beilein’s family.

Basketball announcers love to mention that Beilein has never been an assistant coach – which sounds cool, because they don’t tell you where he was a head coach. How about Newfane Central High School in upstate New York, Erie Community College, Nazareth College, Le Moyne College, then finally Division I: Canisius, Richmond, West Virginia, and Michigan.

Along the way, Beilein developed his unconventional offense, which starts with four players on the outside, and one big guy near the basket. From there, they move and pass constantly, trying to get an easy basket inside, or more likely, a shooter open for a three-point shot. When I asked him how he came up with that, he said, “Easy. I was desperate!”

When your team is filled with short guys, as his usually were, how do you beat the big boys? You outwork them, you out-think them, you out-pass them, and you hope you outshoot them. That’s Beilein’s offense.

I’ve been even more impressed by Beilein off the court. In his second season in Ann Arbor, with his team on the verge of Michigan’s first NCAA tournament in 11 years, they traveled to Iowa for a crucial game. Going into overtime, his star, Manny Harris, started sulking – so Beilein benched him, risking everything they had worked for. The Wolverines lost, which meant they had to beat 16th-ranked Purdue on the road – and they did.

That same year, the men’s basketball team achieved the most improved grade-point average of Michigan’s 25 varsity squads.

Nonetheless, when Michigan failed to make the tournament the next year, some fickle fans were calling for his head. Good thing they didn’t get it. Beilein’s teams have made the tournament three straight years. They won Michigan’s first Big Ten title since 1986 last year, and got to the championship game on Monday, for the first time in two decades.

They came up a little short, but the vast majority of Michigan fans seem less upset than proud – not just of what they did, but how they did it. The Michigan basketball program has not been this healthy since – well, ever.

After firing the last four coaches, three in the wake of scandals, Michigan just might have finally gotten the right guy. He just took a little while to get there.

About the writer: Ann Arbor resident John U. Bacon is the author of “Bo’s Lasting Lessons” and “Three and Out: Rich Rodriguez and the Michigan Wolverines in the Crucible of College Football” – both national bestsellers. His upcoming book, “Fourth and Long: The Future of College Football,” will be published by Simon & Schuster in September 2013. You can follow him on Twitter (@Johnubacon), and at johnubacon.com.

The Chronicle relies in part on regular voluntary subscriptions to support our publication of columnists like John U. Bacon. Click this link for details: Subscribe to The Chronicle. And if you’re already supporting us, please encourage your friends, neighbors and colleagues to help support The Chronicle, too!