Your First Time

Yeah. When Jim Haslett, former Saints coach, told me that was a chicken shit question and I should be fired for asking it.

That was a great moment in my life.

 

Wasn't my first time in a lockerroom, but the image of Wake Forest's Frank Johnson being interviewed in the raw after the Deacs beat Duke is scorched into my memory. I don't remember a word he said; only that Johnson was an appropriate-as-hell name and he enjoyed fondling himself as he answered questions.

Also had a co-worker who went out to interview Andre the Giant when he was in town. He came back and reportedly that the man was proportionately gigantic. "Like an elephant" was the way he described it, as I recall.

 

In the back room of my high school job during office hours with an older woman. Oh, dangit. I answered the wrong question.

 

Way back when Ralph Sampson, all 7-4 of him, played for Virginia, we were in a post-game presser ande this young kid tried to ask a question, gets this "deer-in-the-headlights" look on his face with the SID recognized him and stammered through "Ralph ... your, uh, dunk ... uh ... do ... uh ... you practice it a lot?"

Everybody, and I mean, everybody started laughing. Even the kid.

I like Riddick's answer better.

 

Maybe it's because I had plenty of seasoning with preps before venturing into major college/pro locker rooms, but by far the biggest dickheads I ever had to interview were HS football coaches.

 

Not me, but someone I know...

Post game presser at a mid-major football school. Coach's team was on the 50-yard line with two seconds left in the first half. Student reporter asks the coach, "Hey, what was up with that pass at the end of the first half?"
Answer: "Bill, it's a Hail Mary."

 

I really can't even remember "the first time" because I started off my media career yukking it up on college radio and interning in a network sports operation watching others ask the questions.

By the time it was my turn to do the asking, I was completely comfortable. My early problem was more pissing interviewees off with pointed questions rather than stammering in front of them. I had to learn how to soften them up first.

 

I was working on a series for my college paper about sports rivalries, and since my school is in Philly, you gotta talk about Giants & Eagles. I was planning on going up to Giants training camp up in Albany in '03, but two days before I was set to go, I go under the knife for my first shoulder surgery.

Anyway, two days later and armed w/ a full script of pain-killer, my lame self takes a 7:30 am train out of Penn Station to Albany and then head out to UAlbany for the camp (PS: everyone on the Giants staff was very nice and accommodating. Caught me by surprise & thanx). The first guy I interview is Strahan, we talk for about 10 minutes & I even stump him a little on a question. Tiki was great, as was Dhani Jones who helped me get something to eat since I had only one working arm. Around 4:30, everything was wrapping up when suddenly the power cuts out. Newsflash: the entire Northeast is in the dark. IT'S THE BIG BLACKOUT! So here I am, not even a week out of major shoulder surgery, spending the night in the Albany train station, which thankfully had the power restored! To top it all off, some spaced-out chick from Montreal asked me not once but twice in a span of 15 minutes if I had any weed on me. This is by far my favorite story to tell.

 

I'm a summer intern at a paper in Ottawa, not even done with school yet. And after a summer of local stuff, I get a full-time gig. And I get to sidebar at a Senators' game, their first year in the NHL in 1992.

They were playing at the old Civic Centre then, which had fairly spartan accommodations.
The Calgary Flames are in town, and I'm off to the visitors' locker room to talk to Theo Fleury after the game.

There is one other woman around. She's got a pretty big tape recorder and she's talking enough smack that she seems like she knows her way around pretty well. So I figure I'll follow her lead before I head for the small, cramped room full of smelly, naked pucksters.

Well, girlfriend freezes at the door. I am not impressed. But we soldier on.

One of the other players is coming out the door, and I ask him politely if he could stick his head back in and warn the guys that the chicks are about to come in, and could they please cover up. He thought that was pretty funny, but he did it, going back in and yelling "Fire in the hole" or whatever other clever stuff players do in that situation.

We go in. Fleury was very accommodating. Girlfriend just stood there with her microphone in his face, asking no questions whatsoever (my first piggyback experience). The only problems were the following:

Fleury is wearing just a towel around his waist, which was fine but for the fact that it was slung pretty low. I expected it to drop to the floor any minute and, given that he's probably 5-foot-5 without his skates and I'm close to 5-10, I had no choice but to look down to talk to him. So there's no way I would have missed the show.

The other problem was that we were standing right next to what I can only describe as the "pissoir". To call it a room of toilets would be to upgrade it beyond what it was: a small, putrid-smelling room where guys were basically just going in and out and practically taking a leak in a trough.

Fleury was great, got what I needed, gave the evil glare to radio girl.

After that "first time", pretty much everything seemed like a piece of cake.

 

First time I stepped into a major league stadium was my personal shrine, Fenway, when I was 16, attempting to do a radio interview for my rinky-dink radio station of a player who was from the area.

First boo-boo I made was cutting across the outfield grass to the cages, where I was told I could interview said player by some PR person. The irascible Joe Mooney wanted me thrown out; someone else took mercy on me and let me stay.

Player ultimately blew me off in the cages and afterward, and I didn't opt in for the post-game buffet, but I'm glad I had the experience. Has made the occasional major assignment since then a bit more relaxing.

 

That's an awesome story about your grandson.

 

The Ralph Sampson story reminded me of an ACC media day when I was working for my college paper. They had the reporters at tables and rotated the players from table to table periodically (I don't recall how long -- 15-20 minutes maybe?). So Ralph sits at our table and one of us asks, ``So, Ralph, how do you think the new 3-point shot will affect your game? Will it open up the middle?''

Long pause. ``I don't know.''

``Ralph, with the expectations on your team, do you feel you have to get to the Final Four for the season to be a success?''

Long pause. ``No.''

``Uh, Ralph, who's the team to beat in the ACC?''

Long pause. ``I don't know.''

At this point, we were acutely aware that Ralph would rather be anywhere but at a table with reporters at ACC media day. We spent the rest of our time together staring silently at each other.

Good times.