Rick Pedone
Sports Editor

We’ll mangle some football picks in a bit, but first a sad announcement that some of you may be aware of.

Ken Jackson’s position here was eliminated Oct. 14.

Ken wrote sports for the News-Gazette since 1999, and he’ll tell you that he did a pretty good job.

And, he did. He’s got a pile of awards from the Florida Press Association for tangible proof, but more importantly, the people he wrote about often expressed their appreciation to me for his efforts.

We alternated writing the football picks column, and this would have been Ken’s week to handle it, so I thought it appropriate to re-member his time here today.

Ken graduated from UCF and worked at the Orlando Sentinel sports department before he came here.

He grew into his job at the News-Gazette and became both a very good writer and a very good friend. I can’t remember how many times he bailed me out, like when I had the Jacksonville quarterback identified as Blaine Gilbert instead of Gabbert in this football column last month.

While Ken was here he was married (we still don’t know how that happened) and with his wife, Carrie, he has a wonderful daughter, Mckenzie, who soon will turn 3 and long ago surpassed her father in the gray matter area.

Ken’s greatest attribute for this job is that he loves sports. Pros, colleges, high schools – he talked and wrote about them with energy, wit and enthusiasm. He talked about a bunch of other stuff, too. So much so that we often had to tell him, usually unsuccessfully, to shut up about it already! He’s an excitable boy.

As for his personal rooting interests, woe to us all when his beloved UCF and native Philadelphia teams did well – or worse – badly.

Ken golfs well enough to win a few bucks at his club tournaments, and badly enough to keep at it.

To those of you who know Ken, he passes along this message: “Why are the %#$*ing Cardinals in the World Series instead of the Phillies????”

Just kidding. He really says, “Hello? Helloooooooooo? I’m existing, I won at the club championship last week, but if I had to rely on golf winnings to eat, I’d get real skinny real quickly. I do need to thank a lot of people who trusted me while taking me with a grain of salt. Or seven.”

Ken is known in this column as “Young” Jackson, mainly because he’s young enough to be my son, and at times it felt that way. Like when he showed up late to work because his alarm clock was accidentally set to Maldavian Central Time.

It’s not going to be the same here without him. Bob Hope said it best: Thanks for the memories, pal.

In honor of Ken, this week’s Mighty News-Gazette Divine Nine is all about Jackson:

No. 1: The Flyers. No. 2: The Phillies. No. 3: The Eagles. No. 4: Stogies. No. 5: Three putts. No. 6: Royal flushes. No. 7: Cheesesteaks. No. 8: UCF. No. 9: The Colonial High Grenadiers.

To the picks:

Maryland at FSU (-16): Terrapins beat Miami and nearly upset Clemson, and they are 16-point dogs? Must be those awful uniforms. Not even Jackson would wear them. Noles by 7.

Georgia Tech at Miami (-3): Tech should win, but it won’t. Canes by 4.

USC at Notre Dame (-8.5): Once a great game, now so mundane that Jackson doesn’t even wear his leprechaun suit for it. Irish by 10.

The paid professionals:

Chicago (-1) vs. Bucs: Two games for the Bucs in London over the past three years. What, they can’t get fish ‘n chips in Tampa? Foggy Bucs by 3.

Denver at Miami (-1.5): The Timmy Tebow Show. No other reason to watch, unless Jackson gets the Miami coaching job. Tebows by 2.

Baltimore (-7) at Jacksonville: Jags almost beat the Steelers last week. That’ll have to do for now. Ravens by 40.

Pittsburgh (-3.5) at Arizona: They call Arizona Pittsburgh West because of many ex-Steelers coaches and players there. OK. East Stillers by 1.

San Diego (-2) at Jets: Weird things seem to happen to the Jets when they play the Chargers. Bolts by 3.

Brian “Big Man” McBride’s Super Sniffer Upset Special: Broncos by 1.

Young Jackson, who agreed to continue this folly, said it actually was Tanzanian Central Time. And: Bears by 5 passports, but who knows? And, the Sanchize by 3 in an Upset Special.

Last week: Senile Survivor (8-2, 47-25) gained on Phantastic Phillie (7-3, 49-23).