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Costas, Vincent Talk SportsBy Matt Rodovick - October 23, 2007
 | | Bob Costas (Photos by Paul Guillotte) |
WILLIAMSTOWN - A sports legend becomes a legend because of his or her superlative skills in a respective field. Legends seem to be born to do what they do - Michael Jordan in basketball, Babe Ruth in baseball, Lance Armstrong in cycling. And when it comes to sports broadcasting, there is no bigger star than Bob Costas.
Over the last three decades, Costas has reported on some of the most significant moments in sports for NBC Sports - from seven Olympics to World Series and Super Bowls. He's racked up a range of awards, including 17 Sports Emmys.
The man frequently mentioned for baseball commissioner joined the stage at Williams College last Thursday with former Major League Baseball commissioner and college alum Fay Vincent for a "Conversation on Sports." The wide-ranging discussion in Chapin Hall was moderated by Williams professor Will Dudley.
The start time for Game 5 of the American League Championship was rapidly approaching that night, and Costas endeared himself to the crowd with a reference to the Red Sox fan base in attendance.
"I think we can enjoy our time here and then go watch the Sox," he said. "At least that's what I plan to do."
Costas and Vincent, friends for nearly 20 years, elaborated on topics that ranged from steroids to economic disparity in baseball and the racial complications of America's pastime. However, stealing the show was each man's sharing of their favorite memories in sports.
For Vincent, the most memorable moment was Game 3 of the 1989 World Series, when an earthquake shook Candlestick Park in San Francisco, just a month into his tenure as commissioner. (The 6.9 earthquake delayed, but did not cancel, the series between, coincidentally, the San Francisco Giants and Oakland A's. The A's swept in four.)
"It was like having 55,000 people over to dinner and having your wife say 'I burned it,'" he said.
However, Vincent was playing lead-off hitter to Costas' cleanup man when it came to sharing memorable sports stories. From such events as Muhammad Ali lighting the torch at the 1996 Olympic Games, being in the corner of the dugout for Kurt Gibson's improbable homerun in the 1985 World Series and Michael Jordan's winning shot for the Chicago Bulls in the 1998 NBA Finals, Costas seemed to be a travelogue of sports history.
Costas then went on to tell a story, like only he can, about the depressing defeat of the Red Sox in the '86 World Series to the New York Mets. Much to the appeal and dismay of the audience, he described what it was like to be in the clubhouse preparing for postgame interviews, when Bill Buckner cemented his place in baseball history by letting a ground ball - and the Series - slip away.
Fay Vincent |
"As the crew constructed the podium and placed plastic over the lockers in anticipation of celebratory champagne," he said. "Red Sox officials wheeled in 80-something-year-old owner Jean Yawkey, who looked as if she would blow back to Boston with one soft breeze. I thought to myself 'what happens if the Mets tie it?'"
Costas immediately placed a call to his producer and posed that question.
"Then get the hell out of there," the producer told him.
The capacity crowd roared with laughter over that long-lost Series. Then the realization hit that the Sox were on another Series quest, hoping to repeat that magical moment three years ago when the 86-year-old curse was finally broken.
But the victory that cheered Sox fans saddens the baseball historian in Costas.
"I'm sad that the drama and disappointment isn't with us anymore. It was a defining aspect of our national pastime." |
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