To Absent Friends - Carl Reiner

Carl Reiner

1922 - 2020

I don't remember the first time I ever saw Carl Reiner on TV.  It was probably on the Ed Sullivan Show or some other variety show doing his "2,000 Year Old Man" bit with Mel Brooks.  I was probably ten or twelve years old at the time, and I knew one thing:  That Carl  Reiner was funny.  Very funny.  Everything that I ever saw from him over the next 50 or so years did nothing but confirm that not only was he funny, he was an authentic comic genius and a true American treasure.  He died today at the age of 98, and what a legacy he leaves.

His first major breakthrough came as both a writer and a performer on Sid Caesar's "Your Show of Shows" and "Caesar's Hour" in the 1950's.  I don't remember those shows, but the stable of writers that worked on those shows with Caesar and Reiner are legendary - Mel Brooks, Larry Gelbart, Neil Simon, Woody Allen among others.  It was in those writers' rooms that the 2,000 Year Old Man was born when Reiner and Brooks just started riffing the bit.  

Reiner: You must have know Jesus.

Brooks:  Oh sure.  Nice young man.  Always wore sandals.  Hung around with the same twelve guys all the time.  They came into the store a lot, but they never bought anything.

Reiner tried to fashion a sitcom starring himself as a suburban husband who worked in a variety show writers' room, based on his experiences with Caesar.  The pilot for that one went nowhere, but producer Sheldon Leonard approached Reiner and asked him to rework it with him.  They did, and "The Dick Van Dyke Show", one of television's all time classics, was born.  The show ran for six seasons, won a slew of Emmys and made stars out of Van Dyke and Mary Tyler Moore.

Reiner would go on to win nine Emmys, five for the Van Dyke Show alone, as an actor, a writer, and a producer.  He also won two Writers Guild Awards, the Directors Guild of America Lifetime Achievement Award, and the Mark Twain Prize for American Humor.  IMDB notes over 100 acting credits, 25 writing credits, 12 Producer credits, and 25 director credits for him.  

When director Steven Soderbergh and George Clooney decided to remake Frank Sinatra's  "Ocean's 11" movie as "Ocean's Eleven" in 2001, they cast Reiner, then 79 years old, as one of Danny Ocean's (Clooney) crew.  If you own a copy of the DVD for that movie, watch some of the extra features on the disk, and you will hear the other actors, Clooney, Brad Pitt, Matt Damon, and Julia Roberts talk about what an honor and a privilege it was to work with "the great Carl Reiner."  They were in awe of him.

The last time I saw Carl Reiner was just last week on a 2012 episode of Jerry Seinfeld's "Comedians in Cars Getting Coffee."  In that seventeen minute episode, it was revealed the Brooks would visit Reiner's house every night, where the two of them would have dinner off of TV tray tables and watch "Jeopardy."  Like everything that Reiner and Brooks did, it was hilarious.  If you have access to Netflix, look it up and watch it.

I will close this post with the same video clip that I used three years ago on my Absent Friends post for Mary Tyler Moore.  It was from the Van Dyke Show episode where Laura appeared on a televised game show and was tricked by the smarmy host into admitting that Alan Brady was bald.  Moore was great in the scene, and Reiner was, well, fantastic.

RIP Carl Reiner.  

Show Biz and American Humor will not see his like again.

With son Rob Reiner.

A Chip off the Old Block. 

 Mel Brooks and Carl Reiner

 With Brad Pitt in "Ocean's Eleven"

They're laughing in the Afterlife today!

American Sports Story of the Year?

On a Facebook post earlier this week, my pal Dan postulated on what he felt could be the #1 Sports Story of the 2020 in the United States.  At first, I wasn't so sure that I agreed with him, but upon several days of reflection, I believe that he may very well be correct.

The story in question?  The display of solidarity by NASCAR drivers, crew members, and executives behind driver Bubba Wallace at Talladega, Alabama this past Monday.  It can only be described as uplifting and heartwarming during a time when there is a distinct scarcity of those qualities in our society.

The fact that the FBI determined that the noose (and that is the exact term used in the FBI report: "noose") was already in place, and was not a hate crime specifically detected at Wallace, does not lessen the meaning of the actions by all of NASCAR in support of Wallace on Monday.  The quick reaction of NASCAR officials in having this matter investigated promptly is also to be commended.

And am I the only one troubled by the idea that someone in the heart of Alabama several months ago thought that it was a cute and clever idea to fashion a noose to use as a garage door pull down?

It Looks Like Baseball Is Coming Back!

During these last several months, we have all wanted to see our favorite team sports in the worst possible way, and if you have been following the negotiations between MLB owners and players these last two months, you know that that is exactly how MLB has arrived at an agreement to stage a season:  In just about the worst possible way.

What we are going to get is a sixty game season.  As I understand it, each team will play forty games within their own division, and four games each with teams in the other league's corresponding division (NL East vs. AL East etc). Still not sure if  the playoff fields will be expanded from 10 to 12 or 14.  Looks like they're gonna make it up as they go along.  We get the DH across the board, which I like.  We also get extra innings starting with a runner on second base, which I am not so sure about.  No world about double headers with seven inning games. But you know what?  If ever there was a year to throw anything, and I mean anything, up against the wall, then a sixty game pandemic shortened season is it.  Hell, institute a mercy rule while you're at it.

While I said last week that I fall into the category of "I Don't Care" if there is a season, I also fall into a sub-category.  Call it "I Don't Care, But Now As Long As They're Going To Play, I'll Look Forward To Watching The Pirates Again."

I will also tell you the one guy for whom I am really happy.  Pirates new manager Derek Shelton.

I mean, here was a guy who has waited his whole life to get his shot at being a major league manager, only to see it waylaid by the unimaginable circumstances of the corona virus pandemic.  I will be really happy to see him get the chance to finally walk a lineup card out to an umpire as a Manager in the Big Leagues.  He has been  regular weekly guest over the last three months with Ron Cook and Joe Starkey on 93.7 The Fan, and he seems like a genuinely good guy.  As a Pirates fan, I hope that he succeeds beyond all of our wildest expectations.  Working for Bob Nutting's Pirates, he's going to need a lot of luck.

Let's hope that we can all get some joy out of this bastardized season of Major League Baseball.  Enjoy it while we can before those negotiations for a new CBA begin in 2021, because we all know how really, really ugly those are going to be.

#letsgobucs #raisethejollyroger 

To Absent Friends - Dame Vera Lynn

Vera Lynn

1917 - 2020

Dame Vera Lynn died yesterday at the age of 103.  The name may not mean anything to you, although you might be familiar with her most famous song, "We'll Meet Again", and until I read an interesting factoid about her earlier this year, the name wasn't familiar with me either.

Vera Lynn was a band singer of some moderate success in Britain during the 1930's.  When Britain entered into World War II in 1939, her thought was, "Well, I'll be working in a munitions factory soon.  There goes my singing career."  Instead, Vera Lynn began singing to entertain British troops during the war, and as a result, she became one of the most famous and beloved singers in all of British history.  From her obituary in today's Washington Post:

For many Britons, Ms. Lynn’s voice and songs are closely entwined with their memories of World War II and evoke the deep patriotism of that era. The late British comic entertainer Harry Secombe once said, “Churchill didn’t beat the Nazis. Vera sang them to death.”

In 1939, she was voted the "Forces' Sweetheart."

In 1975, she was made a Dame of the British Empire.

As could be expected, her career waned in the 1950's with the rise of Rock 'n Roll, but the British people, and especially British soldiers of the WWII era, never forgot her.  She came out of retirement once in 1995, to sing once again upon the 50th Anniversary of VE Day.

That interesting factoid I referenced in the first paragraph?  In 2009, a retrospective of her singing career, a Greatest Hits compilation, rocketed the then 92 year Vera Lynn to the Number One spot on the British musical charts.  The group that she had unseated in that position was another band who was riding at #1 with a digital re-release of their great hits.  You may have heard of them: The Beatles.  The Beatles themselves resented that fact not one little bit.  Yesterday, no less than Paul McCartney issued this statement:

Dame Vera Lynn was a strong and inspiring lady who has done so much for Britain. I am so sad to hear of her passing but at the same time so glad to have met her and experienced first-hand her warm, fun-loving personality. Her voice will sing in my heart forever. Thanks Vera. Paul

As mentioned above, Vera Lynn's most famous song was "We'll Meet Again." Seeing her perform it before an audience of British soldiers might begin to give you some idea of the effect that Vera Lynn had on the British public at the time.

RIP Vera Lynn.

To Absent Friends - Jean Kennedy Smith

Jean  Kennedy Smith

1928 - 2020

With her brother, The President

Today we note the death of Jean Kennedy Smith, the youngest sibling of President Jack Kennedy, and the last of the generation of Joe and Rose Kennedy's children.  It is notable to me when the last member of the remarkable generation of the Kennedy family, with all of their triumphs and tragedies, leaves us.  She was, of course, the sister of a US President and two US Senators, but she had a pretty remarkable and accomplished life of her own.

I will let parts of the obituary from the Washington Post by Vincent Bzdek tell her story. 

Jean Kennedy Smith, a former U.S. ambassador to Ireland and the last of a generation of overachieving, tragedy-stalked siblings whose influence on American political life and culture has surpassed that of most any other single family, died June 17 at her home in Manhattan. She was 92.

Jean Smith went on to found and organization called Very Special Arts.  Per the Post obit, 

Very Special Arts, working closely with the Kennedy Center, now provides artistic outlets for disabled children and adults in 55 countries.

In 1993, President Bill Clinton appointed Mrs. Smith to be the United Sates Ambassador to Ireland, and it is here that she achieved something remarkable.  She began the process of opening peace talks between the Irish Republican Army and the governments of Northern Ireland and Great Britain.

The Irish Republican Army, which didn’t trust the British government, turned to the United States to broker the peace process between Northern Ireland and Britain. Mrs. Smith helped bring leaders such as Gerry Adams, president of Sinn Fein, the IRA’s political wing, and hard-line IRA activist Joe Cahill to the table in New York, where talks could be held on neutral ground and carry the imprimatur of the United States.

....But winning Adams’s trust changed the political climate, clearing the way for a cease-fire that laid the groundwork for the Good Friday peace agreement in 1998 that ended the long sectarian war.

One of the most moving parts of our trip to Great Britain last year was the day that we spent in Belfast, hearing about "the troubles" and about the relative peace that has existed in Northern Ireland over the last twenty or so years.  Until today, I had no idea that it was a member of the Kennedy Family that played such a significant role in that process.

Again, from the Post:

Much of Mrs. Smith’s life afterward was dedicated to filling her assassinated brothers’ interrupted promise, focusing on the care of the disenfranchised and disadvantaged.

She collected dozens of citations for her work with the disabled. In 2011, President Barack Obama awarded her the Presidential Medal of Freedom, the nation’s highest civilian honor.

In a video she made for the White House to commemorate the event, she summed up the ethos that bound her famous brothers and sisters.

“My parents felt very strongly, my mother in particular, if you have a happy home, much is given, much is expected,” she said, adding that she viewed the entirety of her adult life as “payback time.”

RIP Jean Kennedy Smith

Interesting Poll Results - MLB Division

MLBPA Head Tony Clark and 

MLB Commissioner Rob Manfred

It is beginning to appear that Major League Baseball will return to America's sporting stage at some point this summer in just about the worst possible circumstance:  At the point of a figurative gun held by Commish Rob Manfred.  We all know the circumstances surrounding the ugly labor negotiations between the MLB Punjabs and the MLBPA, so I won't restate them here.  What I will tell you about is a poll that I put out two days ago on a dedicated sports group page on Facebook that I co-administer and in which I actively participate.  

I posed three questions on the poll upon which I asked the members to vote:

1. At this point, I really don't care if MLB returns in 2020.
2. I really, really want MLB back in 2020. 
3. MLB owners and players can all rot in Hell.

After 48 hours on line, twenty-one people responded to this poll.  A very small sample size when one considers the entire universe of baseball fandom, but it represents  15% of the entire population of the Facebook group page, which I think is significant.  Keep in mind that these 21 respondents are true sports fans, too, or else they wouldn't be a part of the group.  Here are the results.

As to question #3, which I put in there as a bit of gallows humor, three people cast their votes for that option, and one of those guys was Dave Finoli, a friend, a SABR member, a local sports author of some note, and a dedicated baseball fan.  When a guy like Dave tells baseball to "rot in Hell", that's noteworthy.

Three people opted for the second option.  They really, really want MLB back this summer.  Okay.

Fifteen people, 71% of those who responded voted for the first option, they just don't care if MLB returns in 2020.  Among those who voted this way are people like Tim Baker, a Pirates full season ticket holder since the Three Rivers Stadium days, David Cicotello, a dedicated baseball and Pirates fan who has written a book on Forbes Field, Al Cotton, a friend of mine from fantasy baseball days who is as about as dedicated a baseball fan as I know, Elena Avlon, whose family has been full season ticket holders forever and to whom the word "passionate" doesn't even begin to describe her feelings about baseball and the Pirates, Rich Morgan, who is a part off the game day staff at PNC Park, and ME, whose love for the Pirates and the sport goes back over sixty years.  Think about people like that saying "I don't care."

It is an old saying in show biz, sports, and electoral politics that "apathy is worse than anger."  If that is indeed the case, and I believe it is, and if there is any validity at all in this one small admittedly unscientific poll, then MLB is in trouble.

"The Bill Buckner Game"

As many of you have no doubt been doing during these months of no live sports, I was twirling through the TV remote one night a week or so ago and saw that NBCSN was rerunning Game 6 of the 1986 World Series, Mets vs. Red Sox, or, as it has come to be known, "The Bill Buckner Game."   First off, the biggest shock to me was the realization that this game took place THIRTY-FOUR YEARS AGO.   That is half a lifetime ago for me.  Egads!

I tuned in during the eighth inning inning.  The Mets scored in that inning to tie the game 3-3 on a Gary Carter sacrifice fly.  As I watched the game unfold, I realized that some of my memories of that game had shifted over the years, and perhaps yours have as well, so here is how it all played out.

Neither team scored in the ninth, so the game went into extra innings. 

Faulty Memory # 1:  I thought the game ended in the bottom of the ninth.

The Red Sox scored twice in the top of the tenth on a Dave Henderson solo home run and a Marty Barrett single that scored Wade Boggs. 

Red Sox up 5-3 and only three outs away from winning their first World Series in sixty-eight years.

Bottom of the tenth, Calvin Schiraldi pitching for Boston.

• Wally Backman flies to left, Keith Hernandez flies to center.  Two outs in the blink of an eye. Davey Johnson wildly paces the Mets dugout, and they're getting ready to pop champagne in the Sox locker room.  Then......
• Gary Carter singles.
• Kevin Mitchell singles.
• Ray Knight singles, Carter scores, Mitchell to third, 5-4 Sox.
• Schiraldi yanked, Bob Stanley come in to face Mookie Wilson.
• Stanley throws wild pitch.  Mitchell scores, Knight to second.  Game tied 5-5.

We all know what happened next.

Wilson hits grounder to first, it goes through Buckner's legs, Knight scores, Mets win 6-5, setting up a Game Seven.

Now we come to some of the beliefs that have sprung up around that game over the last thirty-four years.

1. If Buckner fields the ball and retires Wilson, the Red Sox win the game and the World Series.  WRONG.  The game was tied at the time, and it would have forced an 11th inning.  Maybe the Sox recover and win the game and the Series, or maybe the Mets win and force a seventh game anyway.  We'll never know.
2. The Mets won the World Series on Buckner's error.  WRONG.  They had to play a seventh game.
3. The Red Sox lost the game because of Buckner's error.  MAYBE.  The Sox pitcher's could have  retired either Carter, Mitchell, or Knight, and Stanley could have not thrown that wild pitch, and Wilson would have never had the chance to hit that ground ball, but they didn't do any of those things.
4. The Red Sox lost the World Series because of Buckner's error.  WRONG.  They could have beaten the Mets in Game 7, but they didn't.

Anyway, it was mucho fun watching that game, and then listening to the commentary of Ron Darling in the studio with the NBCSN talking head.

Bill Buckner died in 2019 at the age of only 69. By any standard, he had a great career:  22 years, over 2,700 hits, 1,200 RBI, and 1,000 runs scored and a batting championship in 1980, but the first paragraph in all of his obituaries only mentioned that error in Game Six in 1986.  When I wrote an Absent Friends Post to him last May, this is part of what I wrote (you will note that I made some of the aforementioned errors at that time):

Yep, his error in the ninth inning (it was the bottom of the tenth) of Game Six of the 1986 World Series that allowed the Mets to tie (the game was already tied) and then win that game and then win the World Series in Game Seven the next night (I even got that wrong; due to bad weather, the game was played two days later).  Buckner came to terms with that error, and accepted it  as a sort of "shit happens" moment that can happen to any major league player.  He even teamed up with Mookie Wilson, the Met who hit that ground ball, in later years by selling signed copies of photos of that fateful play at card and memorabilia shows.  For sure he accepted it more readily than the Red Sox fans, who , in a classless manner typical of sports fans everywhere, excoriated him for years for that play.  

I can remember that when the Red Sox finally won a World Series in 2004, someone asked Buckner if he thought that Boston fans would now forgive him for that play in 1986.  I don't have the exact quote but Buckner said, in effect, "Forgive ME?  I never did anything that deserves forgiveness.  That's baseball."  As I said, not an exact quote, but you get the gist.  In the end, Bill Buckner was a classy guy.

To Absent Friends - Johnny Majors

Head Coach Johnny Majors

In his Salad Days at Pitt

Another all-time great in Pittsburgh sports has left the Departure Lounge today.  John Majors, two time head football coach at Pitt, died today at the age of 85, but his legacy stretches far beyond the University of Pittsburgh.  

The son of football coach, Majors was an All-American at the University of Tennessee.  In 1956, he finished second to Notre Dame's Paul Hornung for that year's Heisman Trophy, and after a stint in the Canadian Football League, he embarked on a coaching career that would land him head coaching positions at Iowa State, Pitt, and Tennessee, his alma mater.  His career record was 185-137-10.  He is in the College Football Hall of Fame, and he won four separate Coach of the Year Awards over the course of his career.  But since this is a Pittsburgh based Blog, let's talk about his time in this little corner of the sports world.

In 1973, he was hired by Pitt to rescue what was a moribund (to put a kind face on it) football program.  To do so, he scoured the country and brought in over 100 scholarship players for that first season (you could do that in the NCAA back in those days), one of whom was to become one of the greatest Pitt players ever and its only Heisman Trophy winner, Tony Dorsett.

He also changed the colors, logo, and font of the uniforms and helmets.

Subsequent decisions over the years to change colors, logos, and fonts have so roiled up the Pitt fan base that it probably cost at least one athletic director his job.

Anyway, the "Major Change In Pitt Football" that was predicted did occur and culminated in a 12-0 record and a National Championship for Pitt in 1976, the year Dorsett won his Heisman Trophy.

Following that magical season, Majors left for his "dream job" at Tennessee, where he coached for 16 seasons, won 116 games, and a couple of SEC titles.  By then Pitt Football had again fallen on hard times, and Majors, after being eased out in Knoxville, came back to Pitt as HC.  This "Back to the Future" stint didn't work out nearly as well: four losing seasons and a 12-32 record (as opposed to 33-13-1 from 1973-76) before he stepped aside.  No one at Pitt ever seemed to hold that second administration record against him, and Majors remained a part of the Pitt family right up until the end.  I honestly don't think that I've ever heard anyone say anything bad about him.

A couple of interesting notes I discovered while researching for this post.  One, a football player at Tennessee named Harvey Lee Yeary became fast friends with Majors during their time at Knoxville.  When Yeary decided to become an actor, he adopted the name of Lee Majors after his football playing buddy.  Two, Wikipedia lists a coaching tree for Johnny Majors that lists twenty-seven men who went on to become head coaches in college and the pros.  I won't list them all, but among them are Jimmy Johnson, Dom Capers, Jon Gruden, Jackie Sherrill, Dave Wannstedt, and Ron Zook.  Three, he has a street named after him, Johnny Majors Drive, on the campus at UT where the football team's practice facility is located.

Quite a legacy.

RIP Johnny Majors.

To Absent Friends - Herb Stempel

Herb Stempel

1926 - 2020

Herb Stempel died on April 7 at the age of 93.  His death was just made public yesterday.

Back in the nascent days of television, the 1950's, quiz shows were big, really big, and one of the biggest was a show called Twenty-One.  From October to December, 1956, the nation watched as Herb Stempel, an Army vet and New York City postal worker, won match after match and amassed winnings of close to $50,000.  It was TV ratings gold, but he eventually lost to a handsome and erudite college professor named Charles Van Doren, who went on to become a major celebrity of his own.  It all came crashing down - and I'm making a long story short here - when it became known that not only were Van Doren, Stempel, and other contestants were being given the questions in advance, they were also given the answers.  The whole television game show enterprise was rigged.  Grand juries were convened, congressional hearings were held, and Herb Stempel became one of the foremost whistleblowers about the whole scheme.  

Lives were changed, some lives were ruined, but television soldiered on, more or less unscathed.   Van Doren was convicted of perjury and lost his teaching job at Columbia University.  He spent his career working for Encyclopedia Britannia, wrote several scholarly books, and never talked about his experiences, save for an article he wrote in the New Yorker  in 2008.  He died last April 9, almost  year to the day ahead of Stempel, at the age of 92.  Stempel taught in the NYC public school system for a bit and then worked for the NYC Transit Authority.  He would talk to anybody willing to listen about his days in the limelight.

The story of the quiz show scandals of the 1950's is quite fascinating.  There have been books written on them, and in 1994, Robert Redford made a terrific movie about the whole affair called "Quiz Show."  Find it and watch it.  Ralph Fiennes played Charles Van Doren, and Herb Stempel was played brilliantly by John Turturro.  Van Doren turned down $100,000 to serve as an advisor on the film.  Stempel, still getting the short end of the stick, received $30,000 as an advisor on the movie.

RIP Herb Stempel.

In case you missed it, here is what I wrote last year upon Van Doren's death:

http://grandstander.blogspot.com/2019/04/to-absent-friends-charles-van-doren.html