Coordinates | 12°58′0″N77°34′0″N |
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Name | Roone Arledge |
Birth name | Roone Pickney Arledge, Jr. |
Birth date | July 08, 1931 |
Birth place | Queens, New York City, New York, U.S. |
Death date | December 05, 2002 |
Death place | New York City, New York, U.S. |
Death cause | Prostate cancer |
Resting place | Sacred Hearts of Jesus & Mary R.C. CemeterySouthampton, New York, U.S. }} |
Upon graduation, he decided that sportswriting was what he wanted to do in life, and applied to Columbia University. There, he discovered that Columbia's journalism program was a graduate program, not an undergraduate one. Even so, Arledge liked what he saw and enrolled in a liberal-arts program. He also served as President of the Omega Chapter of the fraternity of Phi Gamma Delta. His classmates included Max Frankel, who would eventually win a Pulitzer Prize in 1973 for his work as editorial page editor of the New York Times; Larry Grossman, who became president of the Public Broadcasting Service in 1976 and later went on to head NBC News; and Richard Wald, another president of NBC News that Arledge would later persuade to come over to ABC News as a senior vice-president.
After receiving a bachelor's degree in 1952, Arledge enrolled in graduate studies at Columbia's School of International Public Affairs. Restless with graduate studies, he went looking for a job where he could use his college degree and obtained an entry-level job at the DuMont Television Network. Military service intervened, and after Arledge's discharge, he learned the network had folded and he had no job to return to.
Even with that success, Arledge wanted to tinker with programming ideas. Using the avante-garde magazine ''Playboy'' as his model, Arledge convinced his superiors at WRCA to let him film a pilot of a show he called "For Men Only." While his superiors liked the pilot, they told him WRCA couldn't find a place in the programming schedule for it. But the WRCA weatherman, Pat Hernon, who hosted the pilot episode of "For Men Only", began showing the kinescope to people around New York City who might want the program. One of them was a former account executive at the ad agency Dancer Fitzgerald Sample, Edgar J. Scherick, who as far as Hernon knew, was doing something at ABC.
While Scherick wasn't interested in "For Men Only," he recognized the talent Arledge had. Arledge realized ABC was the organization he was looking to join. The lack of a formal organization would offer him the opportunity to claim real power when the network matured. So, he signed on with Scherick as an assistant producer.
Several months before ABC began broadcasting NCAA college football games, Arledge sent Scherick a remarkable memo, filled with youthful exuberance, and television production concepts which sports broadcasts have adhered to since. Previously, network sporting broadcasts had consisted of simple set-ups and focused on the game itself. The genius of Arledge in this memo was not that he offered another way to broadcast the game to the sports fan. The genius was to recognize television had to take the sports fan to the game. In addition, Arledge was intelligent enough to realize that the broadcasts needed to attract, and hold the attention of women viewers. At age 29 on September 17, 1960 he put his vision into reality with ABC's first NCAA college football broadcast from Birmingham, Alabama, between Alabama Crimson Tide and the Georgia Bulldogs won by Alabama, 21–6. Sports broadcasting has not been the same since.
So in January 1961, Scherick called Arledge into his office, and asked him to attend the annual AAU board of governors meeting. While he was shaking hands, Scherick said, if the mood seemed right, might he cut a deal to broadcast AAU events on ABC? It seemed a tall assignment, but as Scherick said years later, "Roone was a gentile and I was not." Arledge came back with a deal for ABC to broadcast all AAU events for $50,000 a year.
Next, Scherick and Arledge divided up their NCAA college football sponsor list. They then telephoned their sponsors and said in so many words, "Advertise on our new sports show coming up in April, or forget about buying commercials on NCAA college football this fall." The two persuaded enough sponsors to advertise, though it took them to the last day of a deadline imposed by ABC programming to do it.
''Wide World of Sports'' suited Scherick's plans exactly. By exploiting the speed of jet transportation and flexibility of videotape, Scherick was able to undercut NBC and CBS's advantages in broadcasting live sporting events. In that era, with communications nowhere near as universal as they are today, ABC was able to safely record events on videotape for later broadcast without worrying about an audience finding out the results.
Arledge, his colleague Chuck Howard, and Jim McKay (who left CBS for this opportunity) made up the show on a week-by-week basis the first year it was broadcast. Arledge had a genius for the dramatic story line that unfolded in the course of a game or event. McKay's honest curiosity and reporter's bluntness gave the show an emotional appeal which attracted viewers who might not otherwise watch a sporting event.
But more importantly from Arledge's perspective, ''Wide World of Sports'' allowed him to demonstrate his ability as an administrator as well as producer. Arledge did not gain a formal title as president of ABC Sports until 1968, even though Scherick left his position to assume a position of vice president for programming at ABC in 1964.
Arledge personally produced all ten ABC Olympic broadcasts, created the primetime ''Monday Night Football'' and coined ABC's famous "Thrill of victory, agony of defeat" tagline — although ABC insiders of that era attribute the authorship to legendary sports broadcaster Jim McKay.
Previous to that time, the only news experience Arledge had was providing ABC's coverage of the tragedies during the '72 Olympics in Munich. Other than that, he had no other major experience in news.
Arledge's first major creation for ABC was ''20/20'', which premiered in June 1978. The first iteration of this program fared badly, and resulted in the firing of the original hosts, with Hugh Downs chosen as the new anchor beginning the second week of the program.
Shortly thereafter, Arledge reformatted the network's evening newscast with many of the splashy graphics he had developed at ''Wide World of Sports'', and created'' World News Tonight''. The program was unique not only because it was anchored by three newsmen, but because each of them were located in separate cities. The lead anchor became Frank Reynolds, who was based in Washington, with Max Robinson based out of Chicago, and Peter Jennings reporting from London. The program expanded to weekends in 1979. In 1983, Reynolds died of bone cancer, and Robinson departed the network, and ABC made Jennings the sole anchor of ''World News Tonight'' on September 5, 1983. Jennings anchored the broadcast until April 5, 2005, when he announced that he had been diagnosed with lung cancer, to which Jennings would succumb on August 7, 2005.
In 1979, the U.S. Embassy in Tehran, Iran was taken over by Iranian students, creating the Iranian Hostage Crisis. And on November 4, 1979, Frank Reynolds began anchoring a series of special reports entitled ''America Held Hostage''. Several nights later, Ted Koppel, then the network's Diplomatic correspondent to the U.S. State Department, took over as anchor. The special reports led to the creation of ''Nightline'', which premiered on March 24, 1980. Koppel anchored the broadcast with Chris Bury, and served as its managing editor. Koppel retained the position until his retirement in November 2005.
In 1981, Arledge brought David Brinkley to ABC from NBC, and created the Sunday-morning affairs program ''This Week'' for Brinkley. Brinkley would retire from the program in 1996.
The last major news program created during Arledge's reign at ABC News was ''Primetime Live'', in 1989. The program was originally anchored by Sam Donaldson and Diane Sawyer.
In 1986, Arledge stepped down as president of ABC Sports. That same year, ABC's ''World News Tonight'' began a ten-year domination of the network news ratings.
In 1998, Arledge retired from ABC News.
Arledge died on December 5, 2002 in New York City, New York, at the age of 71, following a battle with prostate cancer. He was buried in Southampton Cemetery.
His autobiography, ''Roone: A Memoir'', was published posthumously in 2003.
He was the winner of 37 Emmy Awards and in 1990 was inducted into the Television Academy Hall of Fame. In 2001, he was given the Pete Rozelle Radio-Television Award by the Pro Football Hall of Fame. In 2007, The Walt Disney Company posthumously named Arledge a Disney Legend for his contributions to ABC News and ABC Sports (now ESPN on ABC), both (along with the ABC Network) now owned by Disney.
The Roone Arledge auditorium located in student center Alfred Lerner Hall of Columbia University, Arledge's Alma Mater is named in his honor.
Category:1931 births Category:2002 deaths Category:American Broadcasting Company executives Category:American television executives Category:Columbia University alumni Category:Deaths from prostate cancer Category:Peabody Award winners Category:People from Nassau County, New York Category:People from New York City Category:Wide World of Sports (U.S. TV series)
es:Roone Arledge fr:Roone Arledge id:Roone Arledge fi:Roone ArledgeThis text is licensed under the Creative Commons CC-BY-SA License. This text was originally published on Wikipedia and was developed by the Wikipedia community.
Coordinates | 12°58′0″N77°34′0″N |
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name | Barbara Walters |
birthname | Barbara Jill Walters |
birth date | September 25, 1929 |
birth place | Boston, Massachusetts, U.S. |
occupation | JournalistTelevision talk show host |
years active | 1961–present |
religion | Judaism |
spouse | Robert Henry Katz(1955-1958; annulled)Lee Guber(1963-1976; divorced)Merv Adelson (1981-1984; divorced)Merv Adelson(1986-1992; divorced) |
children | Jacqueline Dena Guber Danforth |
credits | ''Today'' show anchor (1961–1976)''Not For Women Only'' host (1971–1976)''ABC Evening News'' anchor (1976–1978)''20/20'' host (1984–2004)''The View'' creator/co-host (1997–present) |
salary | $12 million (2007) }} |
Walters was first known as a popular TV morning news anchor for over 10 years on NBC's ''Today'', where she worked with Hugh Downs and later hosts Frank McGee and Jim Hartz. Walters later spent 25 years as co-host of ABC's newsmagazine ''20/20''. She was the first female co-anchor of network evening news, working with Harry Reasoner on the ''ABC Evening News'', and continuing as a contributor to the network news division and its flagship program, ''ABC World News''.
According to Walters, being surrounded by celebrities when she was young kept her from being "in awe" of them. When she was a young woman, Walters' father lost his nightclubs and the family's penthouse on Central Park West. As Walters recalled, "He had a breakdown. He went down to live in our house in Florida, and then the Government took the house, and they took the car, and they took the furniture." Of her mother, she said, "My mother should have married the way her friends did, to a man who was a doctor or who was in the dress business."
After attending Ethical Culture Fieldston School and Birch Wathen Lenox School private schools in New York City, Walters graduated from Miami Beach High School in 1947. In 1951 she received a B.A. in English from Sarah Lawrence College.
Walters has seldom minced words when describing the visible, on-the-air disdain her co-anchor, Harry Reasoner, displayed for her when she was teamed up with him on the ''ABC Evening News'' in 1976-78. Reasoner had a difficult relationship with Walters because he disliked having a co-anchor, even though he worked with former CBS colleague Howard K. Smith nightly on ABC for several years. In 1981, five years after the start of their short-lived ABC partnership and well after Reasoner returned to CBS News, Walters and her former co-anchor had a memorable (and cordial) ''20/20'' interview on the occasion of Reasoner's new book release.
Walters is also known for her years on the ABC newsmagazine ''20/20'' where she joined host Hugh Downs in 1979. Throughout her career at ABC, Walters has appeared on ABC news specials as a commentator, including presidential inaugurations and the coverage of 9/11. She was also chosen to be the moderator for the third and final debate between candidates Jimmy Carter and Gerald Ford, held at Phi Beta Kappa Memorial Hall in Williamsburg, Virginia, during the 1976 Presidential Election. In 1984, she moderated a Presidential debate held at the Dana Center for the Humanities at Saint Anselm College in Goffstown, New Hampshire. Many of her regular and special programs are syndicated around the world. As of 2004, she is in semi-retirement as a broadcast journalist, but remains a correspondent for ABC News as well as a host of ABC's special programs.
On June 14, 2007, Walters received a star on the Hollywood Walk of Fame. She has won Daytime and Prime Time Emmy Awards, a Women in Film Lucy Award, and a GLAAD Excellence in Media award. Her impact on the popular culture is illustrated by Gilda Radner's "Baba Wawa" impersonation of her on ''Saturday Night Live'', featuring her idiosyncratic speech with its rounded "R."
In the fall of 2008, she was honored with the Disney Legends award, an award given to those who made an outstanding contribution to The Walt Disney Company, which owns the network ABC. That same year, she received the Lifetime Achievement Award from the New York Women's Agenda.
On September 21, 2009, Walters was honored with a Lifetime Achievement Award at the 30th Annual News and Documentary Emmy Awards at New York City's Lincoln Center.
In a November 2010 episode of ''The View'', while interviewing Larry King on his retirement from CNN, Walters alluded to her impending retirement, stating, "I know when my time's coming."
Walters is known for "personality journalism" and her "scoop" interviews. In November 1977, she achieved a joint interview with Egypt's President, Anwar Al Sadat, and Israel's Prime Minister, Menachem Begin. Her interviews with world leaders from all walks of life are a chronicle of the latter part of the 20th century. They include the Shah of Iran Mohammad Reza Pahlavi and his wife the Empress Farah Pahlavi; Russia's Boris Yeltsin; China's Jiang Zemin; the UK's Margaret Thatcher; Cuba's Fidel Castro, as well as India's Indira Gandhi, Václav Havel, Muammar al-Gaddafi, King Hussein of Jordan, King Abdullah of Saudi Arabia, Venezuelan President Hugo Chavez among many others. Other interviews with influential people include pop icon Michael Jackson, Katharine Hepburn, Anna Wintour, and in 1980 Lord Olivier. Walters considered Dr. Robert Smithdas, a deaf-blind man who spent his life improving the life of other individuals who are deaf-blind, as her most inspirational interview.
Walters was widely lampooned in 1981 (and often since) for having posed the question, during an interview with actress Katharine Hepburn: "If you were a tree, what kind would you be?" But as she has often pointed out (and the video clips confirm) Hepburn initiated the discussion by saying that she would like to be a tree, and Walters merely followed up with the question, "What kind of a tree?"
During a story about Cuban leader Fidel Castro, Walters claimed that "for Castro, freedom begins with education." Some critics point to her characterization of Castro as freedom-loving and argue that it painted an inaccurate picture of his government.
On March 3, 1999, her interview of Monica Lewinsky was seen by a record 74 million viewers, the highest rating ever for a journalist's interview. Walters asked Lewinsky, "What will you tell your children about this matter?" and Lewinsky replied, "I guess Mommy made some mistakes," at which point Walters brought the program to a dramatic conclusion, turning to the viewers, saying, "And that is the understatement of the century."
In 2007 Barbara defended co-host O'Donnell about remarks the latter made against Donald Trump and the winner of the Miss USA pageant. Trump firmly responded by saying, "Barbara is off the list..."
She reportedly dated gay lawyer Roy Cohn in college, and the lawyer said that he proposed marriage to Walters the night before her wedding to Lee Guber, but Walters denied this. She explained her lifelong devotion to Cohn as gratitude for his help in her adoption of her daughter, Jacqueline. In her autobiography, Walters says that Cohn got her father's warrant for "failure to appear" dismissed.
Walters, dated former U.S. Federal Reserve Chairman Alan Greenspan in the 1970s, and was linked romantically to United States Senator John Warner in the 1990s.
In Walters's autobiography, ''Audition'', she claimed that she had an affair in the 1970s with Edward Brooke, then a married United States Senator from Massachusetts. It is not clear whether Walters also was married at the time. Walters said that the affair ended to protect their careers from scandal.
She announced on the May 10, 2010 episode of ''The View'', that she would be undergoing open heart surgery to replace a faulty heart valve; the aortic valve, which pumps blood from the heart to the rest of the body. Walters added that she knew for quite a while that she was suffering from aortic valve stenosis, even though she was symptom-free.
The procedure to fix the faulty heart valve "went well, and the doctors are very pleased with the outcome" Walters' spokeswoman, Cindi Berger, said in a statement on May 14, 2010.
On July 9, 2010, it was announced that Barbara Walters would return to ''The View'' and her Sirius XM satellite show ''Here's Barbara'' in September 2010.
Walters has been close friends with Fox News head Roger Ailes since the late 1960s.
In 2008, she published her autobiography, ''Audition: A Memoir''.
Women in Film Crystal + Lucy Award 1998 Lucy Award in recognition of her excellence and innovation in her creative works that have enhanced the perception of women through the medium of television.
Category:1929 births Category:Living people Category:People from Brookline, Massachusetts Category:ABC News personalities Category:Alumni of women's universities and colleges Category:American Jews Category:American memoirists Category:American television news anchors Category:American television personalities Category:American television reporters and correspondents Category:Emmy Award winners Category:Ethical Culture Fieldston School alumni Category:Miami Beach Senior High School alumni Category:NBC News Category:People from Miami, Florida Category:People from New York Category:Sarah Lawrence College alumni Category:American women journalists
de:Barbara Walters et:Barbara Walters es:Barbara Walters fa:باربارا والترز fr:Barbara Walters id:Barbara Walters it:Barbara Walters he:ברברה וולטרס nl:Barbara Walters no:Barbara Walters pl:Barbara Walters pt:Barbara Walters ru:Уолтерс, Барбара simple:Barbara Walters fi:Barbara Walters zh:芭芭拉·沃尔特斯 sv:Barbara WaltersThis text is licensed under the Creative Commons CC-BY-SA License. This text was originally published on Wikipedia and was developed by the Wikipedia community.
Coordinates | 12°58′0″N77°34′0″N |
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{{infobox person| name | Hugh Downs | birth_name Hugh Malcolm Downs | imageHugh downs 1960s.JPG| captionDowns in the 1960s.| birth_date February 14, 1921 | birth_place Akron, Ohio, U.S. | death_date | death_place | occupation Television broadcaster, host, producer, author | years_active 1945—1999 | }} |
Downs appeared as a panelist on the television game show ''To Tell the Truth''.
Downs earned a postgraduate degree in gerontology from Hunter College while he was hosting ''Over Easy'', a PBS television program about aging that aired from 1977 to 1983.
He was probably best known as the Emmy Award-winning co-anchor (again paired with Walters) of the ABC news TV show ''20/20'', a primetime news magazine program, from the show's second episode in 1978 until his retirement in 1999. His closing tagline "We're in touch, so you be in touch", was written by Brock Brower.
In 1985, he was certified by the ''Guinness Book of World Records'' as holding the record for the greatest number of hours on network commercial television (15,188 hours), though he lost the record for most hours on all forms of television to Regis Philbin in 2004.
A published composer himself, Downs hosted the PBS showcase for classical music, ''Live from Lincoln Center'' from 1990 to 1996.
Downs made a cameo appearance on ''Family Guy'' in addition to other TV shows.
Downs can currently be seen in infomercials for Bottom Line Publications, including their ''World's Greatest Treasury of Health Secrets'', as well as another one for a personal coach. He did an infomercial for ''Where There's a Will There's an A'' in 2003. His infomercial work since then has aroused some controversy, with many arguing the products are scams. As of the summer of 2008, Downs can also be seen in regional public service announcements in Arizona, where he currently lives, for that state's Motor Vehicles Division, as well as in many public, short-form programs in which he serves as host of educational interstitials.
On October 13, 2007, Downs was of the first inductees into the American TV Game Show Hall of Fame in Las Vegas, Nevada.
Downs wrote a column for ''Science Digest'' during the 1960s. He was Science Consultant to Westinghouse Laboratories and the Ford Foundation and an elected member of the National Academy of Science. He is a Board of Governors member of the National Space Society and was a longtime president and chairman of the predecessor National Space Institute. The asteroid 71000 Hughdowns is named after him.
The auditorium of Shawnee High School in Lima, Ohio and the Hugh Downs School of Human Communication at Arizona State University are named in his honor.
Downs has expressed public praise for many libertarian viewpoints. He opposes the U.S. "war on drugs". He did several pieces about the war on drugs and hemp. On his last ''20/20'' he was asked if he had any opinions of his own that he would like to express: he responded that marijuana should be legalized.
Category:1921 births Category:Living people Category:ABC News personalities Category:American game show hosts Category:American libertarians Category:American television news anchors Category:Wayne State University alumni Category:Radio personalities from Detroit, Michigan Category:Hunter College alumni Category:Columbia University alumni Category:NBC News Category:People from Akron, Ohio Category:People from Lima, Ohio Category:People from Paradise Valley, Arizona Category:Space advocacy Category:American television reporters and correspondents Category:Bluffton University alumni
fr:Hugh Downs pt:Hugh Downs simple:Hugh Downs fi:Hugh DownsThis text is licensed under the Creative Commons CC-BY-SA License. This text was originally published on Wikipedia and was developed by the Wikipedia community.
Coordinates | 12°58′0″N77°34′0″N |
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name | Jim McKay |
birth name | James Kenneth McManus |
birth date | September 24, 1921 |
birth place | Philadelphia, Pennsylvania, U.S. |
death date | June 07, 2008 |
death place | Monkton, Maryland, U.S. |
occupation | Sportscaster, sportswriter, actor |
years active | 1955–2000 2002 2006 |
spouse | Margaret Dempsey (1948–2008); his death |
children | Sean and Mary }} |
James Kenneth McManus (September 24, 1921 – June 7, 2008), better known by his professional name of Jim McKay, was an American television sports journalist.
McKay is best known for hosting ABC's ''Wide World of Sports'' (1961–1998). His introduction for that program has passed into American pop culture. He is also known for television coverage of 12 Olympic Games, and for his reporting on the Munich massacre at the 1972 Summer Olympics.
McKay covered a wide variety of special events, including horse races such as the Kentucky Derby, golf events such as the British Open, and the Indianapolis 500. McKay's son, Sean McManus, a protégé of Roone Arledge, is president of CBS Sports and News divisions.
He moved on to ABC and was the host of ABC's influential ''Wide World of Sports'' for 37 years.
While covering the Munich massacre at the 1972 Summer Olympics for ABC, McKay took on the job of reporting the events live on his only scheduled day off during the Games, substituting for Chris Schenkel. He was on air for fourteen hours without a break, during a sixteen hour broadcast. After an unsuccessful rescue attempt of the athletes held hostage, at 3:24 AM German Time, McKay came on the air with this statement:
Although McKay received numerous accolades for his reporting of the Munich hostage crisis (including two Emmy Awards, one for sports and one for news reporting), he stated in a 2003 HBO documentary about his life and career that he was most proud of a telegram he received from Walter Cronkite praising his work he received the day after the massacre.
In 1994, he was the studio host for the FIFA World Cup coverage, the first ever held on American soil. McKay also covered the 2006 FIFA World Cup for ABC. In 2002, ABC "loaned" McKay to NBC to serve as a special correspondent during the Winter Olympic Games in Salt Lake City. In 2003, HBO released a documentary by McKay called ''Jim McKay: My World In My Words'', tracing his career. This film outlines McKay's personal and professional accomplishments.
Category:1921 births Category:2008 deaths Category:American people of Irish descent Category:American horse racing announcers Category:American journalists Category:American military personnel of World War II Category:American television sports anchors Category:American television sports announcers Category:Association football commentators Category:Baltimore, Maryland television anchors Category:Baseball announcers Category:Eclipse Award winners Category:Figure skating commentators Category:Golf writers and broadcasters Category:Loyola University Maryland alumni Category:Motorsport announcers Category:National Basketball Association broadcasters Category:National Football League announcers Category:Peabody Award winners Category:People from Philadelphia, Pennsylvania Category:Sports Emmy Award winners Category:Tennis commentators Category:United States Navy officers Category:Wide World of Sports (U.S. TV series) Category:American Football League announcers
de:Jim McKay es:Jim McKay (periodista) pt:Jim McKay fi:Jim McKayThis text is licensed under the Creative Commons CC-BY-SA License. This text was originally published on Wikipedia and was developed by the Wikipedia community.
Coordinates | 12°58′0″N77°34′0″N |
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name | Al Michaels |
birth date | November 12, 1944 |
birth place | Brooklyn, New York, |
occupation | Sportscaster |
spouse | Linda Michaels |
parents | Jay and Lila |
children | Steven and Jennifer }} |
Michaels resumed his professional broadcasting career in 1968, calling the games of the Hawaii Islanders baseball team in the Pacific Coast League. He also called play-by-play for the University of Hawaii's football and basketball teams as well has high school football games, and was named Hawaii's "Sportscaster of the Year" in 1969. In 1970, Michaels appeared as attorney Dave Bronstein in an episode of ''Hawaii Five-O'' called "Run, Johnny, Run" (Air date: January 14, 1970); the episode also featured a young Christopher Walken.
In 1971, Michaels moved to Cincinnati, Ohio, where he became the lead announcer for the Cincinnati Reds of Major League Baseball. In 1972, the Reds won the National League Championship Series and advanced to the World Series. Michaels helped cover the Fall Classic for NBC, and also was the network's play-by-play man for the hockey coverage at the 1972 Winter Olympics in Sapporo, Japan.In 1973, two days before he was assigned to call the regular-season NFL finale between the Houston Oilers and Cincinnati Bengals, Bill Enis died from a heart attack at the age of 39. NBC proceeded to bring Michaels in to replace Enis in the booth with Dave Kocourek.
In 1974, Michaels left the Reds for a similar position with the San Francisco Giants, and also covered basketball for UCLA. He left NBC that year and announced regional NFL games for CBS Sports in 1975 before signing with ABC Sports in January 1977.
Episodes of ''Wide World of Sports'' featuring Michaels early in his ABC career have been featured at least two occasions on the ESPN Classic comedy series ''Cheap Seats''. At one point on ''Cheap Seats'', Michaels' then dark, curly hairstyle drew sarcastic comparisons to Quiet Riot lead singer Kevin DuBrow.
While at ABC, he aired many prominent events including serving as the studio host for the Stanley Cup Finals. Also, he served as host for the yearly Tiger Woods Monday night specials that aired in July or August.
In 1980, an unheralded group of college ice hockey players from the United States won the Gold Medal at the Olympic Winter Games. The medal round match on February 22—which, contrary to popular belief, did not yet assure the team of the gold medal—was of particular interest, as it was played against a heavily favored squad from the Soviet Union, and was in front of a partisan American crowd in Lake Placid, New York whipped into a patriotic fervor by the Cold War. Michaels' memorable broadcast of this game, including his interjection—''"Do you believe in miracles? YES!"''—as time expired on the 4-3 U.S. victory, earned the game the media nickname of ''The Miracle on Ice''.
Most assume that the game was broadcast live; but in reality, the game started at 5:05 p.m. Eastern Standard Time and ABC decided against pre-empting local and network news (on the East Coast) to carry the game live. Instead, most of it—including the entire third period—was broadcast within the regularly scheduled, prime-time telecast from 8:30 to 11 p.m. Eastern time (and on a six and a half hour delay on the West Coast from 8:30 to 11 p.m. Pacific Standard Time). Despite being on tape, the game was one of the highest-rated programs of the 1979-1980 television season and remains the most-watched ice hockey game in the history of American television.
Michaels along with broadcasting partner, Ken Dryden, recreated their Olympic commentary in the 2004 movie ''Miracle''. Although Michaels and Dryden recreated the bulk of their commentary for the film, the closing seconds of the game against the Soviet Union used the actual original ABC Sports commentary from 1980. Gavin O'Connor, the director of ''Miracle'', decided to use the last 10 seconds of Michaels' original ''"Do you believe in miracles?"'' call in the film because he felt he couldn't ask him to recreate the emotion he experienced at that moment. Thus they cleaned up the recording to make the transition to the authentic call as seamless as possible.
He later recalled, "When I look back, obviously Lake Placid would be the highlight of my career. I can't think of anything that would ever top it. I can't dream up a scenario."
Ironically, Michaels was only on this particular assignment because he had done one hockey game, eight years prior. The game in question was the gold medal game (the Soviet Union vs. Czechoslovakia) of the 1972 Winter Olympics (on NBC) in Sapporo, Japan. Other announcers on the ABC Sports roster such as Keith Jackson, Frank Gifford, and Howard Cosell had never done a hockey game before. Michaels recalled this during a ''Real Sports'' interview in January 2009. Michaels also apparently, beat out WABC-AM and New York Islanders commentator George Michael for the assignment.
Perhaps Michaels' first historic call with ABC Sports while covering Major League Baseball occurred in what is now known by many as the Don Denkinger game. The Kansas City Royals trailed the St. Louis Cardinals 3 games to 1 in a series that was being panned for being low-scoring and dull. After a Royals win in St. Louis forced the action back to Kansas City, the sixth game was also low scoring. However this contest grew into a tense pitchers duel.
In the bottom of the 9th, pinch hitter Jorge Orta led off for the Royals against Cardinals pitcher Todd Worrell with Kansas City trailing 1-0 and hit a ground ball to first baseman Jack Clark. Clark threw over to pitcher Worrell, who was running over to cover first base in time to beat the speedy Orta. Worrell appeared to do just that. Yet the call from first base umpire Don Denkinger was safe.
This infamous and controversial leadoff single led to the Royals putting the tying run on third base and the winning run on second with one out for Dane Iorg. A dramatic finish and a play at the plate ensued. The Royals went on to win Game 7 11-0 and complete the 3 games to 1 comeback. However it was Denkinger's dubious 'safe' call, and not Iorg's (or Jim Sundberg's for his difficult slide past catcher Darrell Porter for the winning run for that matter) heroics that were most remembered in years to come.
Even though the events of October 17, 1989 in San Francisco are widely considered to be the most memorable baseball-related moment of Al Michaels' career, three years earlier, he was on hand for what he says was ''"the greatest of all the thousands of games I've done."''
On October 12, 1986 at Anaheim Stadium, Michaels along with Jim Palmer called Game 5 of the American League Championship Series. The California Angels held a 3 games to 1 lead of a best-of-seven against the Boston Red Sox. In the game, the Angels held a 5-2 lead going into the ninth inning. Boston scored two runs on a home run by Don Baylor, closing the gap to 5-4.
When Donnie Moore came in to shut down the rally, there were two outs, and a runner on first base, Rich Gedman, who had been hit by a pitch. The Angels were one out from their first-ever trip to the World Series. But Dave Henderson hit a 2-2 pitch off Moore for a home run, giving the Red Sox a 6-5 lead. The Angels were able to score a run in the bottom of the ninth, pushing the game into extra innings. Moore continued to pitch for the Angels. He was able to stifle a 10th inning Red Sox rally by getting Jim Rice to ground into a double play. Nevertheless, the Red Sox were able to score off Moore in the 11th-inning via a sacrifice fly by Henderson. The Angels could not score in the bottom of the 11th, and lost the game 7-6.
The defeat still left the Angels in a 3 games to 2 advantage, with two more games to play at Fenway Park. The Angels were not able to recover, losing both games by wide margins, 10-4 and 8-1. Game 7 of the 1986 ALCS ended with Calvin Schiraldi striking out Jerry Narron.
Despite the fact that ABC Sports (which in September 2006, became ''ESPN on ABC'') and ESPN had been under the same corporate umbrella (i.e. the Walt Disney Company) since 1996, Michaels never served as a regular commentator for ''ESPN Major League Baseball''. The only time that Al Michaels appeared in an ESPN booth of any kind was as a guest commentator on ''Wednesday Night Baseball'' in 2003 as part of ESPN's ''Living Legends Series''.
According to Tim McCarver when the earthquake hit, he, Michaels and Jim Palmer immediately grabbed a hold of what they perceived to be the armrests. In reality, the announcers were clutching on each others' thighs and they were each left with bruises the next day. Years later (on a 1999 ''SportsCenter'' retrospective about the 1989 World Series earthquake to be exact), Al Michaels would boldly admit his strong belief that had the earthquake lasted much longer than 15 seconds, he would have been killed. Michaels added that the only time that he really had been scared during the earthquake was when he moved in a position which he perceived to be backward. The three announcers were sitting on a ledge with their backs turned and no bracing behind them.
The trio of Michaels, Dan Dierdorf (who joined ''MNF'' the year after Michaels' first), and Frank Gifford lasted until the 1997 season, when Gifford was replaced following disclosure of an extramarital affair. During the 1980s, Gifford would fill-in for Michaels on play-by-play whenever Michaels went on baseball assignments for the League Championship Series (1986 and 1988) or World Series (1987 and 1989).
Former Cincinnati Bengals quarterback Boomer Esiason (who had to personal conflicts with Michaels and therefore, left after the 1999 season) replaced Gifford in 1998, and Dierdorf was dropped after that season. Unexpectedly, comedian Dennis Miller joined the cast in 2000 along with Dan Fouts. In 2002, following Miller and Fouts' departure, John Madden joined Michaels in a well-received pairing.
In September 2004, during a New England Patriots game, Michaels commented on a coaching move, saying "After all, Massachusetts is home of the flip-flip." Michaels later apologized for the biased political comments.
For the first several weeks of the 2003–2004 season, Michaels had no partner. However, Doc Rivers, a critically acclaimed analyst when he worked with Turner Sports, became available after a 1–19 start by his Orlando Magic. Rivers was hired weeks before ABC's Christmas Day season opener. He and Michaels worked that game together, one of only six they did together during the regular season (all other games Rivers worked were with Brad Nessler). During the playoffs, the team worked every single telecast, including the 2004 NBA Finals, which saw great improvement in television ratings. During the 2004 NBA Playoffs, Doc Rivers was hired by the Boston Celtics. Though Rivers continued to work games with Michaels throughout the rest of the playoffs, ABC would have to find a new lead analyst for the 2004–2005 season.
Early in the 2004–2005 season, ABC found a new partner for Al Michaels. Memphis Grizzlies coach Hubie Brown, a broadcasting legend with CBS, TBS, and TNT, was forced into retirement due to health reasons and was soon after hired to replace Doc Rivers. Michaels and Brown began their partnership on Christmas Day 2004, working the highly anticipated Shaquille O'Neal-Kobe Bryant game. After that game, the two did not do a game together again until March 2005. Michaels became sporadic in NBA coverage, doing two games in early March, and then three more games in April. Brown worked every week of ABC's coverage, broadcasting some games with veteran broadcaster Mike Breen. For the 2005–2006 season, Al Michaels and Hubie Brown were slated to remain as ABC's number one broadcast team. The duo worked that year's Christmas Day game between the Los Angeles Lakers and Miami Heat and were expected to work the NBA Finals together as well. However, due to Michaels' impending departure to NBC, that plan did not come to fruition.
Replacing Michaels on ''The NBA on ABC'' was Mike Breen, who became the lead broadcaster for an over-the-air NBA package for the first time in his career. Breen worked 2006 NBA Finals with Hubie Brown, as well as all the main games ABC broadcast that year. This gave ABC its first consistent lead broadcaster since Brad Nessler, as Breen (unlike Michaels) did games every week.
Besides his inconsistent work, Michaels (despite being initially seen as adding credibility to ABC's NBA broadcasts in contrast to his predecessor, Brad Nessler) was criticized for apparently lacking the kind of enthusiasm and confidence (for instance, Michaels initially reacted to Amare Stoudemire's block of Tim Duncan's shot during the 2005 playoffs by calling it a "great, great contested shot") expected of a #1 play-by-play voice. Barry Horn of the ''Dallas Morning News'' said that Michaels was simply “not a basketball guy”. Meanwhile, Bill Simmons said during the 2005 Finals that Michaels “shows up for these games, does his job, then drives home thinking, "‘Only five weeks to the [NFL] Hall of Fame Game, I’m almost there!’"
In 2005, it was announced that ''Monday Night Football'' would be moving from ABC to ESPN beginning with the 2006 season, and partner John Madden announced he would be joining NBC Sports, which had acquired the rights to ''Sunday Night Football'' games. Despite speculation that Michaels might be joining NBC as well, Michaels stated that he would continue as the ''MNF'' play-by-play announcer, stating, "I feel like I'm a creature of Monday night. I'm home and I'm staying home." Plans were for Michaels to be teamed with Joe Theismann (who would be coming over from ''Sunday Night Football'') on the Monday night telecasts.
At the time, then-ABC Television President Alex Wallau said "For 26 years Al has played a pivotal role here at ABC Sports, and for 17 of those years he's been the face and voice synonymous with television's most successful sports franchise, ''Monday Night Football''... It's Al's outstanding play-by-play coverage, coupled with his breadth of knowledge, experience and enthusiasm, that keep ''MNF'' fans invigorated, excited and coming back for more."
Also, then-ABC Sports President Howard Katz said "Al Michaels has been invaluable to the Network and we are thrilled to have him remain in our family,[...] "Al is the consummate professional and makes everyone around him better."
However, in the weeks leading up to Super Bowl XL, it was widely speculated that Michaels was attempting to get out of his contract with ESPN to join Madden at NBC. By this time, it was clear that NBC's ''Sunday Night Football'' would be the NFL's premier prime-time package, with ESPN's ''Monday Night Football'' relegated to secondary matchups similar to that network's previous Sunday night telecasts. Michaels added fuel to the fire by refusing to state his future plans, and he couldn't "respond to rumors ... because that would become a distraction." On February 8, 2006, ESPN announced that its ''Monday Night Football'' team would consist of Mike Tirico on play-by-play, with Theismann and Tony Kornheiser as analysts. ESPN explicitly stated that Michaels would not return to either ''Monday Night Football'' broadcasts or ABC's NBA broadcasts (on which Michaels had been lead NBA play-by-play man).
Michaels had a bemused take on the "trade." After it was noted to Michaels that the Kansas City Chiefs gave the New York Jets a draft pick as compensation for releasing coach Herman Edwards from his contract, Michaels stated "Oswald is definitely worth more than a fourth-round draft choice. I'm going to be a trivia answer someday." However, in an article with the magazine ''Game Informer'', Warren Spector, a designer on the game ''Epic Mickey'', [slated for release on the Wii in 2010], stated that CEO Bob Iger wanted Oswald to be in the game so badly, he made this trade to get the rights of the character back.
Michaels began his new NBC tenure on August 6, 2006, with the network's telecast of the preseason Pro Football Hall of Fame Game, while his regular-season debut came on September 7 of that year. On February 1, 2009, Michaels called Super Bowl XLIII, his first Super Bowl telecast for NBC and seventh overall as a play-by-play announcer. Michaels is the third man to ever do play-by-play for an NBC broadcast of a Super Bowl, following the footsteps of Curt Gowdy and Dick Enberg.
Michaels has also called boxing matches, including exciting matchup of "Marvelous" Marvin Hagler vs. Thomas "The Hitman" Hearns for the undisputed middleweight championship of the world. In addition, Michaels has served as host for all three Triple Crown races and the Indianapolis 500. He also served as a fill-in commentator for ABC's ''Pro Bowlers Tour'' in the late 1970s when original commentator Chris Schenkel was on assignment.
Michaels currently resides in Los Angeles, California. Since August 27, 1966, Al Michaels has been married to his wife Linda. Al and Linda have two children together, Steven (President and CEO of Asylum Entertainment in Los Angeles) and Jennifer. He is a Los Angeles Kings season ticket holder.
Al's younger brother, David is a television producer. David Michaels has produced such programs as NBC's coverage of the Olympic Games, Triple Crown and Fox Sports Net's ''Beyond the Glory'' series.
As previously mentioned, Michaels had an acting role in a 1970 episode of ''Hawaii Five-O'', and has appeared as himself in the films ''Jerry Maguire'' and ''BASEketball'', as well as on several TV shows including ''Coach'' and ''Spin City''. Also as previously mentioned, his call of the U.S. hockey team's victory in the 1980 Olympics can be heard in the 2004 film ''Miracle''. Michaels re-recorded all his original play-by-play coverage for the film, except for the immortal line.
Brian d'Arcy James portrayed Michaels in the 2002 television movie ''Monday Night Mayhem''. Michaels has also been lampooned on several occasions by noted impressionists, Frank Caliendo and Billy West. Michaels, along with Harold Ramis, Ray Romano and Kermit the Frog, was briefly lampooned on the ''Family Guy'' episode "Mother Tucker", the joke being that all four have similar voices.
Al Michaels was also the featured voice in ''Hardball 4'', a popular computer baseball game for PC. Al Michaels along with John Madden, is featured on the ''Madden NFL'' series from ''Madden NFL 2003'' to ''Madden NFL 09''.
Category:1944 births Category:Living people Category:American horse racing announcers Category:American sports journalists Category:American radio sports announcers Category:American television sports announcers Category:Arizona State Sun Devils football Category:Arizona State University alumni Category:Boxing commentators Category:Bowling broadcasters Category:California Republicans Category:Cincinnati Reds broadcasters Category:College basketball announcers in the United States Category:College football announcers Category:Figure skating commentators Category:Golf writers and broadcasters Category:Hawaii Rainbow Warriors basketball Category:Hawaii Warriors football Category:Major League Baseball announcers Category:Motorsport announcers Category:National Basketball Association broadcasters Category:National Football League announcers Category:National Hockey League broadcasters Category:Los Angeles Lakers broadcasters Category:New York Republicans Category:San Francisco Giants broadcasters Category:Sports Emmy Award winners Category:Sportspeople from Brooklyn Category:UCLA Bruins basketball
de:Al Michaels he:אל מייקלס ja:アル・マイケルズThis text is licensed under the Creative Commons CC-BY-SA License. This text was originally published on Wikipedia and was developed by the Wikipedia community.
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