IT’S not that TV cameras lie, it’s more that they don’t necessarily tell the truth.
The next time you’re the least bit inclined to advocate the installation or perpetuation of replay rules in any sport, consider the foul called on Dan Majerle with 17.6 seconds left in Friday’s Heat-Knick Game 6. The game was tied at the time.
This was a play that, every time you looked at it, you saw something different until night became day, white became black and left became right.
At first, it looked like a good call. Majerle slapped at Allan Houston as he was about to dribble past him and toward the basket. Majerle’s incredulous response to the call was gratuitous. He fouled Houston, and he knew it.
On second viewing, however, it looked like a bad call, only because there shouldn’t have been one. The contact was so light and insignificant that it wasn’t worth the air used to blow the whistle.
On third viewing the call, which originally appeared to be just, seemed wholly unjust. Oh, well, it’s late. Off to bed.
But the next day, on the fourth and fifth viewings, we saw the exact opposite of what we’d seen the night before. Houston hadfouled Majerle, surging past him with a push from his free arm. Strange brew.
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FRIDAY, prior to the Heat-Knicks on WFAN, Mike Francesa and Chris Russo interviewed John Thompson. As the Q & A was wrapping up, Francesa tried to get a firm answer from Thompson as to whether he would agree to coach an NBA team.
But before Thompson answered the question, Russo broke in with another question: Which was the tougher Georgetown NCAA Final loss for Thompson to swallow, Villanova or UNC? Either Russo wasn’t listening to Francesa’s question, or he thought his was more important.
In the end, because Francesa returned to the question, Thompson said that if the money’s right, he’d give NBA coaching a shot.
Two-on-one interviews, as so often heard on FAN, have a habit of losing focus due to the conflicting agendas of the interviewers.
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ABC race-caller Dave Johnson, before Saturday’s Preakness, recognized that Fusaichi Pegasus was both the class of the field and, at 2-5, hardly worth standing in line for. “The only reason to bet Fusaichi Pegasus is to sell the ticket on E-Bay in about 20 years,” he cracked.
At the time, there was little reason to disagree. Now, or 20 years from now, Johnson couldn’t get two bucks for it.
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YEP, another warm and fuzzy week in sports. A Devils’ fan was stomped at a Stanley Cup game in Philly, the Dodgers brawled with fans in Wrigley and every time you tuned to an NBA playoff game you got to hear fans chanting obscenities.
Not that teams aren’t trying to instill civility. At Shea Stadium, yesterday, a sign at a concession stand read: “No alcohol sold after the conclusion of the eighth inning.” Yep, that oughta do it.
Kinda makes you wanna stay home. Home, by the way, is where fans in Portland are charged $25 to watch the Trail Blazers’ home playoff games on pay-per-view.
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IT’S playoff time, when cable systems’ usual negligence is extra aggravating.
Because the Knicks were home, Friday, local cable systems blacked out TNT, which nationally carried the Heat-Knick game. No problem there. TNT was supposed to be blacked out when the Knick game began.
But at least one Cablevision system – the one serving the Hackensack, N.J. area – operated under the false assumption that the Knick game began at 8 p.m. It began at 9:10. Consequently, viewers were unable to watch the second half of the Pacers-Sixers finale, played on TNT prior to Heat-Knicks.
NBC’s NBA telecasts are so much cleaner, so much easier on the senses, when needless and mindless graphics don’t appear over live play. Yesterday’s Knicks-Heat was a particularly good watch, primarily because NBC eliminated its obstructed views.
The most consistent element of the NBA’s halftime draft lottery show has been Elgin Baylor.
That the Knicks can pick up two technicals (Kurt Thomas, Larry “The Big L” Johnson) for dissent in a Game 7 is beyond comprehension, but par the Knicks’, as well as the NBA’s course.
Howard David, although this column predicted otherwise, will return as Jets’ radio play-by-player.
Bobby Murcer, during Yanks-Indians on Ch. 5, Saturday, spoke endlessly about the unusually cold weather in Cleveland. Wild weather, here in Cleveland – that was Murcer’s theme for the day. Apparently, it didn’t strike him that it was the same weather being experienced by his audience in New York.
Steve Levy, play-by-play man on ESPN’s Flyers-Devils series, seems to be working in a constant state of amazement. His calls are so filled with excited wonder that he doesn’t leave himself a lot of space to go to when a exciting and wondrous play occurs.
The Marty Lyons Foundation will host a dinner to raise money to grant “special wishes” to seriously ill kids, tomorrow night at Mulcahy’s Sports Bar in Wantagh, L.I. Ex-Jets scheduled to attend include Lyons, Boomer Esiason, Kenny Schroy, Emerson Boozer and Wesley Walker. For details, call 212-560-9474.
