Saturday's Internet Edition, July 05, 2008.
Commentary by Dr. Don Newbury
‘Knight-less’ Basketball…
|
Assuring his successor, son Pat, and other coaches that he will “still be around,” it will be interesting to see how he handles the transition from coach to fan.
This could result in an attendance boost. There may be “new” fans attending now just to watch Bob, or, as he is aptly nicknamed, “The General”….
* * * * *
Millions marvel at Knight’s NCAA record of 902 collegiate victories. The meter started at age 24 when he was named basketball boss at West Point. He remains the youngest hire in history for a Division I head coaching assignment in a major sport.
Knight claims baseball to be his favorite sport, and my faulty memory linked him to a golf-coaching position in his early years. It wasn’t he.
Maybe it was veteran basketball Coach Jim Boeheim of Syracuse. He was indeed golf coach there almost a half-century ago. Anyway, whoever it was realized that collegiate golf was rarely headlined on the sports page. So, he called in tournament results to the newspaper only when the team won. “At season’s end, what few fans we had thought we had made it through the season undefeated,” the coach laughed….
* * * * *
Much has been made of Super Bowl TV numbers that rubbed against the 100 million mark. But on the same weekend, 200 million fans watched the Houston Rockets beat the Milwaukee Bucks, 91-83, in what was called the “Chinese Super Bowl.”
The basketball game was beamed to China for fans there to see two of their “favorite sons,” the Rockets’ Yao Ming and Milwaukee’s Yi Jianlian.
‘Course, those 200 million Chinese didn’t get to see the Dalmations, Clydesdales and assorted other animals featured in Super Bowl XLII commercials…..
* * * * *
Uncle Mort called from the thicket, talking about nothing but the parking prices proposed for the Dallas Cowboys’ new stadium. “I can’t believe they can make ends meet just charging 75 cents,” he blurted.
I suggested that he re-read the newspaper. I told him that I feared that a decimal point had been overlooked.
I heard papers shuffling, then came a long pause. Then, his voice stiffened….
* * * * *
“$75 to park is an outrage,” Mort fumed, launching his litany about what it would take to get him to a game.
First off, he’d have to be the winner of a free ticket or luck into one from a friend.
Then he would deal with the parking. “If mineral rights come with the parking, fine,” he added, “If not, they’ll have to give me a pass up to my doctor’s suite. I’m sure he would validate the parking….”
* * * * *
Retired NFL official and career educator Jim Tunney is busy on the speaking circuit.
One of his claims is that he made the highest score in history on the football officials’ entrance exam. He says he got 98 out of 100 right.
“The only two things I failed were eyesight and judgment,” he jokes….
* * * * *
A long-time big-time coach is Joe Paterno at Penn State. Pressure groups there finally dislodged his annual salary info: $512,000 and change. “I’m well-paid, not overpaid, and it’s more than I need,” he said.
Responding to whether he felt son Jay, now an assistant at Penn State, is ready for a head-coaching assignment, Paterno answered: “He has the ability to be a head coach, but it would be tough to take over at Penn State because it would be as if I programmed the whole thing.”
Refreshing….
* * * * *
Two of my favorite pets are “peeves.”
Before TV came along, radio broadcasters at football games told me nothing when they mentioned teams “moving left to right on your radio dial.” What if my radio happened to be configured vertically, or I happened to be upside down?
During the Super Bowl, analyst Troy Aikman spoke of “unchartered” waters. Aren’t such waters “uncharted?”…
* * * * *