A SIGN OF THE (L.A.) TIMES: CAN WE TALK ABOUT TALKING ABOUT BASKETBALL HAS LED TO ANN MEYERS DRYSDALE IN ANOTHER HALL OF FAME?

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Ann Meyers Drysdale wasn’t an accidental broadcaster when she pivoted from a ground-breaking Basketball Hall of Fame playing career in the 1970s and ’80s, looking for a meaningful way to stay involved in the sport.

Her dedication has brought more Hall of Fame recognition. The Southern California Sports Broadcasters organization, which has included three dozen men in its Hall of Fame since founder Tom Harmon was first recognized in 1992, will give Meyers Drysdale another historic embrace with her inclusion in its Jan. 28 ceremony at Lakeside Country Club in Toluca Lake.

“Honestly, I never imagined something like this, and it’s important to me to be grateful for so many who have opened doors for me, many without me even knowing about it,” Meyers Drysdale said during a break in a four-game trip she took with NBA’s Phoenix Suns as a Fox Sports Arizona analyst.

Here’s more from our weekly piece in the L.A. Times sports section at this link.

THE MLB NET AT 10: IT’S IN A LEAGUE OF ITS OWN

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By Tom Hoffarth
We had the pleasure of reminiscing with Tony Petitti and Rob McGlarry about the first 10 years of the MLB Network’s existence — it launched on Jan. 1, 2009, with a record 50 million homes that could access it. The result is a post this week at The Hollywood Reporter.
There was no crying in their baseball remembrances. Only a lot of laughs and memories of the many highs that came from becoming the fourth of the four major sports leagues to put up their own 24/7 cable channel. Read more

A SIGN OF THE (L.A.) TIMES: BILL WALTON AND HIS OWN SOCIAL MEDIA EXPERIMENT

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By Tom Hoffarth
Here’s an illustration of Bill Walton from the esteemed Jim Thompson, who drew it up to help set the tone for a piece we did on the former UCLA star and broadcaster in 2016  entitled “Bill Walton’s long, strange trip inside his reconstructed soul”
THOMPSON WALTONIt was right about the time his new book, “Back From The Dead” came out — if you’re wise you’ll get the audio version read by the author. He revealed how he almost ended everything because the pain in his back was too much to bear.
You see him now with photos of outstretched arms, embracing the world … like above.
“It’s because I can now do that,” he said then. “For so many years, I couldn’t even lift my arms because my spine was so bad. It is a very celebratory pose that people use when things are going great. And right now I’ve never been better or busier. Or this healthy since I was 13 years old. Both ankles are fused. Got a new knee. A new spine. I never thought I would be pain free. I’m lucky.”
We are lucky to have a pipeline into Walton’s world, and we reconnected for a story about how, whenever he’s on an ESPN or Pac-12 Network telecast, the social media world embraces him, often in very opposite ways.
Some call him insufferable.
We align with those who refer to him as a “national treasure” and example of “a sonic voyage … of cosmic exploration.”
As we talked to Walton recently, he was in the passenger seat of his car with his wife, Lori, doing the driving. We asked if he was aware of the volatile social media debate he sparks every time he’s on TV.
“Lori, do I pay attention to social media?” he asked.
Probably not a good time to ask. As they were driving from Death Valley to Westwood on Interstate 15, a dust storm was amidst and visibility was limited.
After a long pause, Bill came back on the line: “Lori says no!”
He seemed to be howling in concert with the winds whipping outside his window.
“The world we live in now .. for so long, we have had dreams, and worked hard and tried to be intelligent about them,” he continued. “Today, if you have a thought, in literally the shortest period of time, that nano second, it becomes reality and part of a larger collaborative community. I take my responsibility very serious and take pride in it.”
We could fill a whole new post with just the outtakes from that discussion. But for now, here’s the piece we had in the L.A. Times about Walton’s social media experience that we swear most times he’s just messing with us …

UPDATE 12.15.18: Five letters to the editors included in the Saturday edition of the L.A. Times as it relates to this, linked here ….

 

 

It’s boxing day: A state of the sport, its heavyweight division, and how movies still love it, from one who lives for it

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By Tom Hoffarth
The Deonatay Wilder-Tyson Fury heavyweight unification bout at Staples Center on Saturday is said to be the most influential of its class held in the U.S. since Mike Tyson took on Lennox Lewis in 2002, an event held in Memphis because Tyson couldn’t get a licence in Nevada in the aftermath of biting Lewis on his leg during a press conference mess in the months before. Read more

A SIGN OF THE (L.A.) TIMES: BABE RUTH HAS BEEN FRAMED … AS THE ORIGINAL ATHLETE-ENTERTAINER (WITH THE HELP OF A SPORTSWRITER)

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When the White House announced last week Babe Ruth would be a recipient of the Presidential Medal of Freedom at a ceremony this Friday, Jane Leavy couldn’t help but tweet out: “ ‘Bout time. Only been dead 70 years.”
81osohl-gAL (1)Comparably, it took Leavy just eight years of ruthless research, reflection and refinement before her 600-plus-page book entitled “The Big Fella: Babe Ruth and the World He Created” started thumping itself down in best-seller lists and renewing conversation about how media-based star power can be construed over the last century span.
Historical tomes about the Ruth as recently as Leigh Montville’s “The Big Bam” in 2006, playing off Robert Cremer’s “Babe: The Legend Comes to Life” in 1974, were not able to exhume as much about his true  childhood or debunk mythology as much as Leavy could do with modern forensic techniques.
Did this book’s well-received publication bring new veritas toward some Trump-endorsed recognition? If anything, it confirms Leavy’s refreshed narrative of how we continue to learn and marvel at Ruth’s launch angle for athlete/entertainer more than 100 years later.
Here’s the rest of the story we posted at the L.A. Times.
PLUS:
* Here’s also more Q&A we have with Leavy at FartherOffTheWall.com.
* A special historical-based piece for the Long Beach Post
* And here’s an excerpt of the book from SI.com.
Also did you know: Barnes & Noble has a special edition/signed copy of “The Big Fella” that includes an essay after the index about Leavy’s relationship with the late, great Red Smith. Order that one here or visit your local store.

A SIGN OF THE (L.A.) TIMES: HOW THE LANGUAGE OF HOCKEY TRANSLATES INTO SPANISH

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Not much gets lost in translation during a Kings Spanish-language radio broadcast.

Especially on a call like the one Francisco X. Rivera delivered on KWKW-AM (1330) during the second period of last Thursday’s Kings-Philadelphia Flyers game from Staples Center:

“Kovalchuk con el pase, el disparo que es interceptado, una vez mas Carter, otra vez Carter y el gol! Gol … Gooooool … Gooooool … anotado por Jeff Carter … Y que bonito se siente cantar el gol de los Kings!”

Got it? In the span of a couple of seconds, Ilya Kovalchuk takes a pass, a shot is blocked, Jeff Carter shoots again, then another shot, and Carter … puts the biscuit in the basket, right?

So there’s no confusion, Rivera holds that final note in an extended primal punctuation that mirrors Andres Cantor during a World Cup soccer match.

Listen to the full call here, and then read how Rivera explains the thinking behind it with our latest L.A. Times sports media column story. 

 

We love L.A., too … but when do the visuals become too cliche? Fox figures it out during the World Series ‘equinox’

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At some point, even the Hollywood sign sighs.
C’mon, do we have to spell this out for you — the nine giant white letters propped up in the Santa Monica Mountains don’t define Southern California. Nor does a glamour shot of Rodeo Drive. Nor something edgy like a Venice Beach skateboard park/tattoo parlor adjacent to an outdoor basketball court.
Sunday played out under the headline of Los Angeles’ “Sports Equinox”, and a lot of people across the country saw a lot of L.A. cultural touchstones if they were paying attention on TV.
Fox Sports, based in Century City, also stepped up its game.
For all it could control with its coverage of World Series Game 5 from Dodger Stadium, following its Rams-Packers NFL game from the Coliseum, the hometown network looked as if it wanted to flip the script for all those other cliché-laden visuals that others recycle in setting the stage for what they believe conveys L.A.
“Obviously, with people who live and work here knowing the ins and outs, we can show off this city in its true environment and not what a TripAdvisor might tell you about the top 10 spots to visit,” said Judy Boyd, Fox Sports’ senior vice president of production. “It’s not the Hollywood Walk of Fame or pop culture celebrities or what others may think.”
Here’s more from our L.A. Times piece in coordination with the conclusion of the World Series media coverage …

A SIGN OF THE (L.A.) TIMES: SORRY CHARLEY

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By Tom Hoffarth
We’ve had plenty of interesting feedback to our L.A. Times’ piece on Dodgers radio/TV play-by-play man Charley Steiner, with a generous amount of support in his favor.
Great.
We’ve also had plenty more examples submitted about things he’s flat-out misinformed listeners to from his past.
As we also do daily stories on the World Series coverage for the Times, we wanted to revisit this Steiner story because, frankly, he’s not in the equation when we assess how we’ll consume a game, with the Fox TV feed, the ESPN Radio audio and even a live computer recreation.
That said… One more Steiner story from a reader:
A few years ago I recall a game when Travis Shaw was playing for the Red Sox, and the Dodgers were playing them in an interleague game. Charley, clearly reading from the media guide, says: ‘Travis Show hails from Washington Courthouse, Ohio.’ Then after one of those long silences, he says, ‘If I’m not mistaken, that’s the same hometown as former Dodgers closer Jeff Shaw.’ The emphasis wasn’t on the last name — leading me to believe it didn’t even dawn on him they had the same last name. He certainly had no idea that Travis Shaw was Jeff’s son! A little basic research would be nice in that spot.

So it goes …
And then there’s his bizarre reaction:

 

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