Brutal week. We've lost so many....

It's been a Hell of a week...

And I don't really know what else can be said of it.

Two cities, two icons, two voices – and that's just the beginning of what we lost.

On Sunday, many came to to the tragic news that we lost Boston Celtics great Bill Russell.

Bill Russell, who did things certain foolish and wretched one-dimensional ballhogs only wish they could've dreamed, in a more legitimate NBA... If a one-sided one, yes...

Yes, they basically won all the titles in the 1960's. The real story, however, is that Russell won many of those with such a heavy heart that he once said that he was winning for the Celtics, but not for Boston.

Why? Because Boston was (and remains) one of the last sports cities to truly accept Black athletes.

Russell knew it, he experienced it, so he understood the fights of the likes of Muhammad Ali and the like in the politically-charged 1960's. And maybe Russell wasn't quite of draft age and in the circumstances Ali was, but he stood firm.

He also had a great ally in Red Auerbach. He didn't see Black or White, gay or straight, he only asked if they played to the standard of Celtic Green...

… and, boy, did he. And he didn't have to throw up 100 shots to do it.

Often, it was this innovation called the “blocked shot” – and it wasn't even the “GET THAT SHIT OUTTA HERE!” you often see in the last 20 years or so.

Russell would block it, be able to control it, hit an outlet pass, and start Auerbach's favorite offense: the fast break.

And when it was time for Auerbach to take his victory cigar away from the bench, he trusted Russell – not a White man who Boston may have been more comfortable with at the time, but Russell, to coach the team while he was playing it.

Put into the Hall of Fame in the minimum time, as deserved. Attended neither that nor his number retirement by the Celtics. The media made it too difficult, and I don't think I have to state why.

He saw the NBA change away from his style of play, so two coaching stints didn't go so well.

He fell out of public life (probably, again, racism), but was still instrumental in many things, including, surprisingly, being the man to aid the end of the Shaquille O'Neal-Kobe Bryant feud.

In the style which eventually led the NBA to name the Conference Finals MVP trophies after the Bird-Magic rivalry, thirteen years before, the NBA named the Finals MVP trophy after Russell.

Russell, like another major sports personality who left us this week, won the Presidential Medal of Freedom, as testament to his perseverance and contributions.

Russell was named the first winner of the NBA Lifetime Achievement Award.

He passed at 88.

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Later that same day, we lost a television legend: Nichelle Nichols, Uhura from the Star Trek franchise.

Much of her work was some of the first starring work that a Black woman had in television – and, in the spirit of Gene Roddenberry, some of the first which was neither stereotypical nor mocking.

The greatest example of this was in 1968. Originally intended to be taped with and without the action, William Shatner and Nichols deliberately made unairable (and Shatner doing even more to make it so than Nichols – imagine Kirk insisting he would not kiss her in that staccato scream Kirk would sometimes do!) every attempt to tape a scene without the two kissing – which was believed for many years to be the first in the history of television of an interracial couple. The kiss aired.

She would inspire Whoopi Goldberg in her role in Next Generation.

She had some music experience as well as work with NASA. President Obama was proud to admit a crush on Uhura!

She was 89. Heart failure along with age.

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But that was not all for Sunday: Emmy and Grammy winner Pat Carroll, the voice of Ursula in The Little Mermaid, also passed at 95 from pneumonia. Largely a Broadway actress back in the day and a voice-over actress for animation later, she was also a standard on many of the 1970's celebrity game shows.

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Little, however, could prepare me for the one sentence I received in the eight o'clock hour on Tuesday night:

“We lost Vin.”

Not that I can, honestly, say that I am surprised – Vin Scully had lost his wife about nineteen months before, and, as many of us know, losing that kind of a soulmate at his age would be devastating.

But nowhere near as devastating as the entirety of Dodger Nation when they had to process that their voice and muse – the man basically MADE baseball in Los Angeles – had left to join her, many of the men whom he was certain were laughing at him at various points, and The Great Scorer, whom one can only hope he is sitting next to in the Stadium of Heaven where all the greats play forever.

As early as the Dodgers' first year in LA, fans brought radios to the stadium to listen to Vin. At first, probably a necessity, given the odd dimensions the LA Memorial Coliseum used. But, as time went on, it became a homage to the voice of the team.

So much so, many cried when, in 2016, Vin wrapped it up. In his few appearances after, Vin was revered, and his cracks were still as wise then as they were when Sandy Koufax was on the mound.

To list Vin's achievements would swamp this blog for weeks. Basically, if there was an achievement in sports broadcasting, he won it. And they made a few more for him. And he also won the Presidential Medal of Freedom.

He also had universal respect – even from some of the announcers Dodgers fans hated. In the 2017 World Series, Joe Buck begged Vin to take his place for some of it. Vin, having done TWENTY-FIVE World Series, declined. Three years later, when the Dodgers won it, between strikes one and two of the final strikeout, Buck said Vin was “the greatest to ever do it” as he ran off a lot of the Dodger greats and owners who were about to gain a long-awaited Commissioner's Trophy.

And it went far beyond baseball. The call of “The Catch”, that classic Montana-to-Clark you see a zillion times in the Niner-jocking years of the NFL? Vin. Eight years of the Masters on CBS? The class that was Vin – the smooth voice almost TOO appropriate for Augusta National Golf Club.

Something I didn't know until Wikipedia, and a “What Would've Happened If?” Moment: He was offered Monday Night Football at it's inception. Had to turn it down because of the MLB/Dodgers overlap.

He was 94. And, as I typed this article, the fans at Dodger Stadium were asked to show up and be in the stadium, seated, at 6:30 Pacific for a 7:10 game with the Padres for a tribute ceremony.

First pitch was almost 7:20.