Murtaugh

Murtaugh ran 13 issues, edited by Spike Vrusho as an amalgam of punk rock and baseball angst based on the resilient career of former Pittsburgh Pirates manager Danny Murtaugh. It began in Columbus, Ohio, but boredom forced it to move to Brooklyn, NY and enjoy Red Hook and Williamsburg in the late 1980s. The unproduced Issue 14 was to feature the truck Billy Martin died in as presented by the voluptious Queen Itchie in an eerie upstate New York setting. Bands such as Cell, The Trick Babys, Mark Mothersbaugh, Idaho, Crawlpappy, The Hangdogs, the Astro Zombies and others were interviewed in the pages of Murtaugh. Cartoonist Tony Millionaire contributed a legendary strip called "Batty" centered on a boozy geriatric player/manager. Other contributors included the graphic artist Shawn Wolfe, Selwyn Harris, author Bart Plantenga, artists Jim Gibbs and Zeet Peabody, D.R. Stewart, Marc Blubaugh (both West Coast based), printmaker Daisy DeCapite, Jon Sarkin, Ray Ecke, Brian Krall, Helena Harvilicz, Nina Ascoly, Kevin Baier, Bonnie Pfister, the Bronx-based poet Prologue.

Spike Vrusho, who wrote for New York Press back in the William Monahan days and later edited the New York Sports Express weekly that was criminally exterminated by idiots at Avalon Equity Partners, can be reached at spikevrusho@earthlink.net