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Changing sports

BEAR: You were watching a football game with the sound muted. Do you always do that?

HOOKER: Pretty much so. Not just football, all sports. They all have hosts -- I won't call them sportscasters -- who endlessly talk and talk, even with the game going on, and almost never say anything interesting to anyone with half a brain.  Worse, sometimes the screen is split down the middle, one side with the game and the other side is an interview with the coach or a player, even as the game is going on! If that isn't disrespect for the game, I don't know what is. Red Barber and Vince Scully are rolling over in their graves.

BEAR: My dad used to tell the story of how dramatic it was after the war when DiMaggio got a raise. One headline in very large letters read, DiMaggio gets 100 grand!

HOOKER: My dad had a sports story, too. About Hurricane Hugh.

BEAR: I need more.

HOOKER: Hugh McElhenny. All American at the University of Washington, drafted by the 49ers. After his rookie season he was asked to compare pro ball to college ball. McElhenny said pro ball was okay but he didn't like the salary cut.

BEAR: (Laughing) Great story.

HOOKER: It's laughable to imagine Hurricane Hugh doing a dance in the end zone after a touchdown. Or any of them. Jim Brown, Alan Ameche, Joe Perry, Deacon Dan Towler, Tank Younger. They'd call it show-boating and damaging to team morale.

BEAR: I think it was Doak Walker who in a post game interview was asked about his terrific running game. He had a very short reply. "That's what they pay me for."

HOOKER: And what does college football look like today? All but two teams in the Pac 12 sell out for better television bucks and abandon the conference for the Big Ten.

BEAR: That is so damn sad.

HOOKER: If there are aliens, I bet they study us the way we study dinosaurs: as a primitive life form.

BEAR: You believe in aliens?

HOOKER: I believe anything's possible. Well, except one thing.

BEAR: What's that?

HOOKER: The Golden Felon feels empathy.

(End)








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