Ex-Sentinel sportswriter ‘paid to do what others did for fun’

Herky Cush called his job as a sports reporter for the Orlando Sentinel “pure bliss.”

Cush even gushed on Facebook recently that he was glad his bosses at the Sentinel “didn’t know how much I loved it, or they might have never given me a raise. Paid to do what others did for fun, can’t get any better than that.”

Harry L. “Herky” Cush, an Orlando Sentinel sportswriter from 1973 until 2002, died Friday of sepsis caused by a fall at his home in his native Munhall, Pa., according to family members. He was 78.

“The guy lived, breathed, ate sports and everything and anything that was about sports,” Cush’s great-nephew Dave Palloff of Munhall, a borough just southeast of Pittsburgh, said Monday. “He loved the Pirates, and he loved the Steelers.”

After graduating from Munhall High School, Cush covered sports for the Daily Messenger in Homestead, Pa. He later headed south to Central Florida, where he eventually took a job at the Sentinel’s Sanford bureau and then in the Lake County bureau, covering mainly high school and recreational sports.

“Herky earned the trust of the coaches and athletes he covered,” former Sentinel assistant sports editor Creig Ewing said. “He was looked on as not just a reporter covering sports, but a resource on what the teams had done in the past. It was not uncommon for Herky to have written about three generations of athletes during his long tenure with the Sentinel.”

In July 2002, Cush retired and headed back to his hometown in Pennsylvania. However, he longed for sitting back in front of a keyboard and typing sports stories.

A year later, Cush suffered a stroke and doctors told him it would benefit his recovery if he kept active, family members said.

“He said, ‘I can’t not write. It’s my passion,’’’ said his niece Heidi Fonzi of Pittsburgh.

So Cush became a sportswriter for The Valley Mirror, a weekly distributed in Pittsburgh’s southeastern suburbs, where he continued working until his death.

“He was so serious about sports that he would finish one sports story and then quickly look for another story,” Fonzi said. “Before one sports season was over, he was looking for the next sports season.”

Friends and family members said Cush had a warm personality and quirky sense of humor. He loved playing golf, hitting the links and swinging clubs almost daily.

He also inspired his great-nephew Ben Bobick — now a sports anchor for WRCB-TV Channel 3 in Chattanooga, Tenn. — to pursue a career in sports journalism.

Cush is also survived by his stepdaughter, Kimberly Ranalla; brothers, Kooter Anderson, William Cush, Raymond Cush and James Cush; sisters, Joy Kardos, June Brown and Shirley Pido; and four grandchildren.

Services were held Monday in Munhall. Arrangements are being handled by Savolskis-WasikGlenn Funeral Home, in Munhall.