Time Out with Andy Wilcox (Napa Valley Register sports reporter)

Vince D’Adamo: What have you enjoyed most about being connected with athletics throughout your life either as an athlete or journalist?

Andy Wilcox: It's an opportunity to live vicariously through athletes, meet interesting and highly motivated people, get involved in the community, and impact young lives and watch them grow up.

D’Adamo: Which sports did you play competitively in high school?

Wilcox: Golf -- which for boys was in the fall in Ohio, where I attended my first three years of high school -- and baseball.

D’Adamo: Even with the declining state of the newspaper industry, what keeps you coming back every year?

Wilcox: I enjoy the flexibility of my work schedule, the chance to be creative, and working mostly at night and not in the middle of the 9-to-5 rat race.

D’Adamo: What have you enjoyed most about covering athletics in the Napa Valley throughout the years?

Wilcox: Learning that some sports are as deeply rooted here as the vineyards, and learning about the new ones that seem to pop up every year.

D’Adamo: Within your family who have been the most influential people?

Wilcox: Mom loved writing and making people feel comfortable talking to her, so that gave me something to fall back on when Dad's profession of engineering didn't work out for me in college. But Dad, despite being very busy with work, put every bit as much time in raising me through golf and baseball as he did my three older brothers, which I'm forever grateful for. But probably the main reason I chose sports writing was remembering how fun it was watching my youngest brother Jack's high school football games and track meets and reading about them in the newspaper.

D’Adamo: Name a historical figure, dead or alive, in or out of sports, that you would most like to meet. What would intrigue you about meeting him or her?

Wilcox: It would be intriguing to meet Paul McCartney, who seems to have remained himself -- and creative -- over the decades despite being one of the most famous people to have ever lived. It would have been intriguing to meet Johnny Cash for the same reasons. I'd also like to meet Joe Montana, Jay Leno and Conan O'Brien. One of the perks of my profession is the access you have to famous people, which has allowed me to meet celebrities such as Jack Nicklaus, Wynonna Judd and Chris Webber.