Work at too many stadiums for too long and what you lose in patience you gain in perspective. Eventually you can tell the difference between an OK place, a semi-bad place and a truly awful place.

Here's an example: Aztec Stadium, Mexico City. It seats 115,000 and is probably best-known as the track and field venue for the 1968 Summer Olympics, the field upon which John Carlos and Tommie Smith mounted the award podium and stuck black-gloved fists into the thin, dirty air and then everybody sort of went nuts about it.

I was at that stadium for a sold-out soccer World Cup qualifier a few years ago between the U.S. and Mexico. I don't remember much about the game -- probably a tie -- but found the restroom facilities unique. Because of balky plumbing, the toilets at Estadio Azteca would not tolerate the placing of any paper products (or much else) into the system. Next to each toilet there was a small wicker basket into which customers were to put their soiled toilet paper. By halftime, as you can imagine, the atmosphere in the bathrooms was quite ripe.

On its worst day, the Vet had nothing on this place. I would rather eat Thanksgiving dinner off the floor of the men's room in the New York Port Authority bus station than visit the facilities at Aztec Stadium again. (And the next time you think you have a bad job, consider that at the end of the day it was someone's task to go around and empty all those wicker baskets.)

So when someone asks which stadium has been my least favorite to work, I don't answer lightly. Shea Stadium. Not even close.

They knocked down the last remaining bit of Shea last week, making way for the parking lot it should have been for the last 30 or so years. They could have turned it into a dump, but that would have been redundant.

Shea was awful on two levels: It was difficult to get to, and a filthy pit once you arrived. Wrigley Field can be a pain to get to, but it's a baseball palace when you finally find a place to park. The Astrodome was a dump, but it was an easy drive from downtown and you could get good barbeque afterward.

Shea? Inaccessible, ominous and covered in grime. I don't know if the Mets just stopped maintaining the place or if the general squalor of the surrounding area overtook them.

Whatever the case, farewell Shea. Don't let the bulldozer hit you in the concourse on the way out.

Maybe the 76ers organization wasn't slamming Sammy Dalembert, but general manager Ed Stefanski was definitely trying to get rid of him before Thursday's trade deadline, league sources confirmed to the Inquirer's Kate Fagan.

The team was unsuccessful -- no kidding -- but the attempt is an interesting look into how the front office views the current situation. There is no getting rid of Elton Brand and his contract any time soon, so he'll be back next season.

Rather than have two ponderous big men on the court a year from now, slowing things down and eating minutes better given to Thad Young, Marreese Speights and (possibly Jason Smith), the Sixers were looking to move past Dalembert. With Sam gone, Brand could play more at the center position, perhaps in the high post, which would give him a fighting chance to get back on defense.

They tried it the easy way. In the offseason, the Sixers might have to find a new home for Dalembert -- who has two more years and $25 million left on his contract -- the more difficult way. Either way, however, it seems the Sixers have made a decision about their future direction and it won't include Sammy.

Mike Whitmarsh was funny and self-deprecating and among the most talented and most appealing athletes I've covered in the last 30 years.

He was ridiculously gifted, a great-looking guy who had women draped all over him, a multi-sport athlete who had the world at his feet.

I got to know him during the U.S. trials that preceded the first beach volleyball competition in the Olympics. The trials were in Baltimore's Inner Harbor in 1996, leading up to the Atlanta Olympics where Whitmarsh and teammate Mike Dodd would win the silver medal.

In beach volleyball, the athletes are from California except where noted, as they like to say. Whitmarsh and Dodd were the classics. Both had been basketball players at San Diego State (Dodd's shooting guard was Tony Gwynn), and Whitmarsh had been drafted by the Trail Blazers (they kept Jerome Kersey instead) and he played three years in Germany. He came back, got a tryout with the Timberwolves and swapped collisions with the big boys before becoming Minnesota's last  cut. He treasured a picture of himself defending Magic Johnson in the paint during that exhibition season.

Whitmarsh, all 6-foot-7 of him, drifted quite naturally into beach volleyball and he was a star for more than a decade. He slammed over the top while Dodd dug the ball out of the sand and the two of them were a spectacular team for quite a while.

I can't say I really knew Whitmarsh, but I can say that I envied him. He appeared to have it all, and that's a good reminder right now that we never really know.

Whitmarsh, at 46, committed suicide this week, inhaling carbon monoxide in the garage of a friend. He left behind a wife and two daughters.

It would be too easy to say that Whitmarsh, who retired five years ago from the professional volleyball tour, couldn't adjust to the second act of his life. Maybe it is far more complicated than that. Maybe not.

But Mike Whitmarsh, one of the greatest U.S. athletes of the last 20 years -- even if you never heard of him -- is dead by his own hands. That makes no sense.

Figuring that someone up there at the podium, someone who looks like they have it all, and is definitely happier in his or her life... that makes no sense, either.

Because you can't know. The most talented and most appealing among us can end up in a garage with an exhaust pipe. Explain that. I can't.

Celebrated National Hockey Column Month, which is February, at the Skate Zone in Voorhees on Wednesday. Walked into the press room and the regulars looked at each other and said, "Oh, man. Is it February already? Where did the season go?"

They pretended they were joking, but you know how those guys are. Post-sarcasm, I talked to Marty Biron for a column in Thursday's editions of The Inquirer and Philly.com. The goaltender, so great in last year's playoffs, has been sort of average this season and it's time to hit the gas -- which he did in two wins over the weekend.

The Flyers have been using both Biron and Antero Niittymaki recently and the old saying is that a hockey team with two goaltenders has no goaltenders.

A couple things Biron said that didn't make the column, but were interesting, include how slumps happen during the long, 82-game season.

Biron: "Sometimes, you get an average game and you say, 'Ah, you know what? Bad bounces. And you keep going and the next one you say, 'Ah, another one, just OK, but I wasn't lucky here and there.' Then you realize it's three or four games down the road and it's been two weeks and you've got to put a stop to it... You look at what makes you successful and it's because you created the good bounces, you created the luck, you created the effort saves and all that. That's what makes a difference."

The Flyers are the fourth seed in the Eastern Conference, but only nine points ahead of the ninth seed, so it's time for a difference-maker. Last season, that was Biron. This season? We'll find out. 

Mike Jensen and I sneaked away from the office Monday afternoon to watch Old Fashioned, the local Kentucky Derby hopeful, take his next step toward Churchill Downs in the $250,000 Grade III Southwest Stakes at Oaklawn Park.

We had put in a long day and felt we deserved it. Plus, it could be marked down as research and mileage to the Turf Club in Brandywine is no small thing.

The dark grey colt, owned by Rick Porter's Wilmington-based Fox Hill Farms and trained at Delaware Park by Larry Jones, is trying to take the same Arkansas path to the Derby that was previously trod by Smarty Jones, Afleet Alex, Curlin and Eight Belles.

The Porter/Jones partnership has come close to glory before, sometimes tantalizingly, sometimes tragically. Hard Spun was second in the Derby and second in the Breeders Cup Classic in 2007. Eight Belles was runner-up in last year's Derby, but broke down just past the finish and was lost.

Old Fashioned is a handsome horse, but far from a monster. He is more of a lean whippet, with speed to burn and a nice pedigree (Unbridled's Song-Collect Call) for the distances that lie ahead.

On Monday, he hooked up in an early speed duel with Silver City, another colt sired by Unbridled's Song who is trained by Oaklawn-based Bret Calhoun. The early fractions were blazing: 22.2 for the quarter and 45.4 for the half-mile. (By comparison, the next-best race on the card was a sprinter's race -- albeit fillies and mares -- and they bettered those fractions.)

Detractors can pick apart the race and say the two colts backed up a bit in the final half-mile and weren't chased by much. True and true. But Old Fashioned, with Ramon Dominguez up, went past Silver City on the second turn and opened up what became a finishing gap of 3 1/4 lengths. The final time for the mile was 1:37.2 and that's a pretty good tuneup.

Old Fashioned is now 4-0 and will stay at Oaklawn in preparation for the March 14 Rebel Stakes. If all goes well there, he will take on the Arkansas Derby and then move to Kentucky. The colt remains one of the top choices among early Derby candidates and maybe Porter and Jones will get luckier this time.

Jensen and I weren't that lucky, but at least we didn't have to go back to the office. And we got mileage.

The ferry boat was pitching and rolling in the choppy depths between the islands where the Atlantic meets the Caribbean and I was looking at the life preservers suspended from the roof of the dank, oily cabin.

"Inspected by Authority of the British West Indies, February 1987," was stenciled on each in block letters that had faded over time.

The man sitting next to me, a native of one of the islands, was reading a local newspaper and I glanced at it over his shoulder. I hadn't seen a newspaper for a week -- which makes me an average American these days -- and found it more comforting to read the recent fish catch report than to give further study to the onboard safety equipment.

He grinned at me when he finished the paper and handed it over. "Here you go, mon. Enjoy," he said, and grinned again, showing as many gaps as teeth.

A week without cell phones, email, the internet, television, radio, and shoes is a good thing. On a sports writer's schedule, there is a name for when this is possible. It is called, "February."

I got to take advantage of that last week, spending days on perfect beaches, hiking, snorkeling, eating and drinking cheaply at night in the open-air beach bars where the band is noddily dreamily through the same five Marley (the musician, not the dog) songs over and over. Step off the plywood floor toward the water and the locals are playing soccer in the sand, to the beat of the music, not spilling a bit of the rum as they do. And, look at that, a sunset. Not bad.

The illusion of getting away is a good one to maintain as long as possible. For me it lasted until the ferry ride to the next island where the little airport would begin the journey home.

"Where you from, mon?" the man with the newspaper said.

"Philadelphia."

His eyes widened and he said, "Do you like American football?"

I told him that I did follow the game a little and he said, "They got get McNabb receivers." When he said it, through the many doorways in his mouth, it sounded like "retheefers," but I knew what he was talking about. I told him that there are other Eagles fans who would agree.

"Me, mon, I want Gonzalez (Gunthaleth) from Kansas City. And Boldin from Cardinals," he said. "You tell them when you are home."

I said that I would and we shook hands. And now I have. Somewhere in the Leeward Islands there is a man who wants the Eagles to upgrade their receivers. It was good advice, but also a good reminder that, just as you can never go home again, when it comes to the Eagles, you can never really leave home, either. 

Post Patterns is going to shut it down for a few days, and the Philly.com experts said that hanging a sign on the door is a good idea.

Paul Gallico, one of the great sportswriters of a generation ago, was once asked why he finally retired from the profession. "February," Gallico said.

It's still true now, and getting away from the nothingness between football and serious spring training is a fine idea. The college hoops will begin to really heat up in a couple of weeks, the hockey games may start to point somewhere, and that will be something to look forward to.

For now, enjoy the solitude. My column on Donovan and Could-He-Have-Won-It? will be in Sunday's editions of the Inquirer. Let me know your opinion, but it might be a while before I get back to you.

I know this must be very disappointing, but my Donovan McNabb/Choker/Hero/Super Bowl/Last-Minute-Drive column has been reslotted for the Sunday paper and the Sunday editions of Philly.com, to make room for the breaking news that Elton Brand might not be an effective player this season.

EB is, in fact, done for the season. A torn labrum in his right shoulder that was either ignored or undiagnosed when he hurt himself Dec. 17 has brought to an end the fabulous 2008-09 debut of the power forward who was going to transform the 76ers.

I have a few thoughts about this, and those will have to carry you over until Sunday (I know, I know, it's a long time) when the Donny Mac column will appear. Trust me, it wasn't that great a piece of news for me, either.

And, no, it probably isn't Donovan McNabb, when you get down to it. But McNabb is neither as good as his worshipful legions would suggest nor as bad as his detractors insist.

Everyone else has had a swing, so you can read, judge and react to my take on McNabb/Super Bowl Failure/Last-Minute Drives/And So On in Friday's editions of the Inquirer and online at Philly.com.

Doing the research I came across some interesting things about other quarterbacks and their Super Bowl histories. It's true that nine Super Bowl MVPs are quarterbacks who went on to make the Hall of Fame (Starr, Namath, Dawson, Staubach, Bradshaw, Montana, Aikman, Young, Elway), but this list was also the SB MVP: Jim Plunkett, Phil Simms, Doug Williams, Mark Rypien.

Overall -- not just on that one day, because Simms and Williams had career days in the Super Bowl -- would you take any of those four over McNabb? I wouldn't. But they not only won the SB, but were considered Most Valuable. That is the line missing from McNabb's resume, and, until he fixes it, that is all that matters.

How often does a Super Bowl win require a last-minute drive? Only nine Super Bowls in the last 25 years were decided by seven points or less, but six of those occasions came in the last 10 years. So, perhaps as a result of greater parity, the games are getting closer and teams are within a late drive of becoming champions. It happend that way for the Giants last year, obviously, and both Kurt Warner and Ben Roethlisberger were up to the challenge this past Sunday.

Guys who didn't get it done late in games, along with McNabb, include Jim Kelly (1991) and Brett Favre (1998). Kelly got the Bills close enough for the 47-yard field goal that Scott Norwood famously missed, but McNabb would have been ripped for not moving the ball further.

Jim Kelly and Brett Favre. That's not terrible company. Better than Jim Plunkett and Mark Rypien. Right?