Turning Backtime: The Road Not Taken

Above is the most famous sports broadcast team in history. Eighteen years ago, I worked one game as their stat guy in the booth at Skydome in Toronto for a preseason game between the Dallas Cowboys and the Buffalo Bills.

Long before Backtime's Executive Editor was a "full-time decision maker," the gig represented the first real career choice I ever had to make.

1995

I had grown up as an unparalleled sports fan, and a full-time gig at ESPN had been beyond my wildest dreams until I got it. Then I was introduced to overnight clip sessions, office politics, and The X-Games.

Don't get me wrong, I was doing well at 26 years old as an associate producer on a pet project like the inaugural X-Games. But the days were long and miserable. Newport, Rhode Island in June was a great place to be, but I got to enjoy none of it.

One miserable night (they all were) I returned to my hotel around Midnight, and the phone rang in my room - it was before most people had cell phones - so it wasn't all that unusual. What was unusual was who was on the other end, NFL on Fox producer Bob Stenner. He was calling from his summer home in Hawaii, so it wasn't even night where he was.

They had to fill their lead statistician position and he got my name from Pat Haden, whom I had worked with on radio, and had put me in the mix for a similar gig on TNT the year before. As it turned out I wasn't needed because Major League Baseball went on strike in 1994 and there were a flood of established guys available.

So that's how Stenner got my name. How he got my number at some rinky-dink hotel in Rhode Island is a mystery. I didn't ask, the butterflies in my stomach were fluttering.

Stenner offered me the opportunity to work with Pat & John. I would audition on a preseason game in Tornoto on August 12th, and if I met their approval I would stay on and do the season. Of course I said yes, but in the next 6 weeks I went back and forth on whether this was the right move.

It was a classic "short-term, long-term" dilemma. The NFL gig would give me a measure of status and a great note on my resume' (I was only 26), but it would derail my career goals in production. And from everything I had heard about John Madden, he wasn't about to stand for someone who was using their show as a stepping stone.

I decided to do the game. So I went to Toronto and I attended the production meeting, where I was introduced to Pat Summerall and John Madden. It might be the only production meeting in my career I didn't say a word in. Madden was abrasive (to put it kindly) with the underlings in the room and I wasn't looking to be roadkill on Day 1.

Several hours later, I was in the booth when the announcers arrived. Madden never made eye contact with me. Summerall, on the other hand, was a gentleman. We had one pre-game conversation as I stood side-by-side with him looking out to the field. I don't remember what we talked about - I was probably just thinking how cool it was that I was talking to Pat Summerall.

When the game began, the Bills sacked Troy Aikman on the second play from scrimmage. I held up a card I had ready - the Bills had 5 sacks in the first half of their last preseason game. I thought Pat & John would be so impressed with my preparation and timing. Instead, SWAT! Madden backhanded the index card right out of my hand. So that was my first on-air moment with those guys. It didn't look good. Though ask anyone who's worked with John Madden, and that outburst wasn't anything extraordinary.

As the game went on, things were better but pretty mundane. Madden referenced a few of my notes. Summerall gave me several very subtle nods of acknowledgment, just as elegant and understated as you would imagine.

But ultimately it was a 9-7 Bills win in a preseason game. Jim Kelly took 9 snaps. Aikman and Emmitt Smith only played a quarter. There was no chance for me shine.

Even at a young age, I was able to step back after the fact and weight the pros and cons. Ultimately there was only one positive about the gig: I would be on the signature NFL broadcast every week.

There were too many minuses. ESPN was at war with Fox after they had come on the scene just a year earlier and poached some big-time people. I wasn't big-time, but I would be joining the enemy. And being a stat guy would be a step backwards if I really wanted to be a producer. And John Madden was a dick who might take the joy out of my job, or simply pull the plug on me at a moment's notice.

I got back home on Monday and called Stenner. Even though my audition went fairly well, my mind had been made up. I quit even before I could get fired, though I was honored to be considered in the first place.

My phone rang the next day, it was a producer from NBC offering me the rest of the season as an associate producer on baseball. I worked the National League Pennant race and ultimately the 1995 NLCS. The Braves swept the Reds and headed onto their only World Series title.

As for me, I left ESPN but continue in a freelance role to this day. I produced my first game in December 1996. But my career and my life could have turned out very differently if I'd followed the stars in my eyes.

Backtime Dateline: Providence

Woke up this morning, the first day of December, to a "dusting" of snow in Providence - a cold kick in the gut to tell me that college basketball season is upon us.

It was a nice reminiscence to see four Dunkin' Donuts establishments between the gate at the airport and the hotel. In fact the hotel was about 100 feet from the Dunkin' Donuts Center, the site of the PC/Mississippi State hoops game, making it the easiest work commute of this or any other year.

I haven't been in The Ocean State in close to 10 years. I had a number of good times back in the day on Providence College hoops games, and of course the most miserable professional experience of my life, in production of the first X-Games in the summer of 1995.

I swore I'd never do the event again until they asked again, and in 1998 I spent 3 more miserable weeks on the event before swearing it off for good. They managed to ruin both Newport RI and San Diego CA trips. In an ironic twist, my former roommate, who is more of a baseball nut than I am, is now in charge of something called X-Games Global. Godspeed.

Despite all of the upheaval in college conference positioning, The Big East offices of course remain in Providence, where Dave Gavitt organized seven northeast basketball schools in 1979.

In an ironic twist, that was the same year ESPN was launched. Nobody possibly could have envisioned the type of growth that would take place on either front, and a lot would go hand-in-hand. Though now, the Big East is fighting for survival and/or relevance. And one would have to wonder if the Providence headquarters is the right fit for the future of the new Big East.

But then again, the basketball schools that forged the Big East still remain: Georgetown, St. John's, UConn, Providence, Seton Hall and Villanova. So maybe they can survive on that level, even with football driving the bus.

The Big East did well to hire network programming honcho Mike Aresco as Commissioner, but it may be too little too late. The Big East may find themselves in the same boat as the Republican Party, re-brand to survive.

And that would likely mean a move to New York or Philadelphia or even Cincinnati, and the end of an era.

Can't Forget Paris

It never fails. This time of year, I turn on the TV in the morning and I see the red clay and I can only think of one thing (and it's not the Garth Brooks song).

I was one year out of college and bouncing around the country working on baseball, football, basketball, boxing, and tennis, trying to get my foot in the door of the TV business.

Then I had an opportunity to go to Paris and work for ESPN on the 1992 French Open. No flight, no hotel, just $175 a day for 3 weeks. For a 23 year-old single guy, I thought it would be a great experience.

It turns out that I wasn't as ugly an American as I thought. My burgeoning coffee addiction and pack-a-day cigarette habit fit right in. I enjoyed sitting at cafes and partying at discotheques. I loved staying at the flat of a friend-of-a-friend in Monmarte and riding the Metro to work each day.

When you got your change at the grocery store, the cashier actually said voila, and the moped rider on the opposite side of the street would actually stop for an attractive woman, whistle, and shout ooh la la!

Mind you, this was before the internet, cell phones, ESPN2, and before Derek Jeter and Mariano Rivera changed history. I was wide-eyed and wasn't distracted.

That year, I was in the stands to see one of the great events as Monica Seles defeated Steffi Graf in the Women's Final 10-8 in the final set. Jim Courier was at the peak of his career, winning his second straight Men's title, quickly dismantling Petr Korda. Courier thanked the adoring crowd by accepting his trophy and addressing the Court Central faithful in French. A nice touch.

These days, the French Open isn't much of a mystery, at least on the men's side. I saw an article recently titled: French Open Preview - What's The Point?

That's because Rafael Nadal has never lost a single match at Roland Garros. He's won 4 straight titles, including 3 in a row over Roger Federer.

But mostly I remember my experience there for the work. I didn't know what I was going to do there, but somehow wound up in a great spot.

I sat in front of a computer that was spitting out real-time scores all over the grounds. I had a walkie-talkie with two channels - one for each camera crew I was directing to various locations on the outer courts. And it was mostly based on my instincts.

If there was a great match, upset brewing, American result on the line, or we just needed video on an up-and-comer, it was my job to send the crews to the right spot, then inform the producer when they were in position. He would determine whether to go live or roll it back as a taped highlight.

Pretty heady stuff for a guy who was essentially an extra to start. But after returning home and getting back into the grind, I now realize I didn't have the maturity or the people skills to handle my new-found success and responsibilities. My career changed direction, and it wasn't exactly my decision.

By the next year I was on the inside, but working my way up from the bottom.

I worked at HQ for 3 years, but decided to go free-lance and move to New York to improve my life if not my career. You can't fret about the life decisions you make when you're young and a little impulsive. Everything leads to where you are.

Captain James T. Kirk had the best quote, ironically from the worst Star Trek Movie - Star Trek V: The Final Frontier, when Dr. McCoy suggested that he give his life's pain over to an empathic cult leader and his emotional healing powers...

"I've made the wrong choices in my life. That I went left when I should've gone right? I know what my weaknesses are...You know that pain and guilt can't be taken away with the wave of a magic wand. They're things we carry with us
– If we lose them, we lose ourselves."

Experience dictates everything. And I have a lot more to remind me of my one spring in Paris than just a Roland Garros necktie.