MEMO TO: Bobby Ross
FROM: William Clay Ford, Owner
Eureka, Bobby! I think you’ve found it.
Remember that team you talked about when I hired you? The kind of team you wanted to build here, the kind that hits and makes plays and beats teams it’s not supposed to beat? Freeze it right there, Bobby, my boy. Freeze it on this victory against the Packers. You’re onto something here. As my granddaddy said, “I think they’ll buy this model.”
Set ’em up. Pull the trigger. Knock ’em down. Start over.
It sure feels like ducks in a penny arcade, this business of watching celebrities tumble. Marv Albert is the latest. Finished now. A good sportscaster, a pioneer in many ways, gone, history, see ya. And while I have no doubt, after a week’s worth of kinky stories and gasping courtroom revelations, that Albert is, as they say in the sex biz, a freak, I’m still not exactly sure what he’s guilty of.
They may be good, bad, glorious or depressing. But you have to admit, the Michigan-Notre Dame game will always give you memories.
Gary Moeller has memories. Five memories from five autumn afternoons when it seemed like the whole world was watching. Moeller was head coach of U-M from 1990 to 1994, which was the last time the Wolverines and Irish met.
A lot has changed since then. Neither Moeller nor Lou Holtz is in charge of those teams anymore. Neither man left under happy circumstances. Both will be working other jobs when the two football teams reunite Saturday.
Down on the bayou, they have this tradition: When their football team stinks, they wear bags over their heads.
Grab a bag, Lions fans.
Cut out one eye to see the gaping holes of the Lions’ defensive line Sunday. Cut another out to see Scott Mitchell throwing the ball to the wrong team. Cut a mouth so you can scream “NOT AGAIN!” when a New Orleans never-heard-of-him waltzes into the end zone.
Then pull that sack over your head so no one can identify you.
By the time you read this, I will be home. At least I should be home. On a book tour, you never know. I might be stuck in a St. Louis radio station, between Oasis records.
Which is not an exaggeration. There I was, out on tour for “Tuesdays With Morrie” — which is a small, inspirational book about an old man who is dying talking to a young man about what’s really important in life — so naturally I was ushered into an FM alternative rock station, where a disc jockey introduced me by fading down the volume on — I’m not kidding here — the new Oasis single.
If you’ve ever wondered how much of sports is hype and how much is achievement, look no further than the man who said good-bye Saturday. He was the greatest athlete of our time. Quick. Do you know his name?
He dominated his game like no one before, but his name is not Michael Jordan. He lasted a near eternity in his sport, but he is not Cal Ripken. He was the champion of the world, but he is not Muhammad Ali. He excelled in more than one discipline, but he is not Deion Sanders.
The newspaper near his chair has a photo of a Boston baseball player who is smiling after pitching a shutout. Of all the diseases, I think to myself, Morrie gets one named after an athlete.
You remember Lou Gehrig, I ask?
“I remember him in the stadium, saying good-bye.”
So you remember the famous line.
“Which one?”
Come on. Lou Gehrig. “Pride of the Yankees”? The speech that echoes over the loudspeakers?
“Remind me,” Morrie says. “Do the speech.”
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