College
Hoops Rule By George Stahl March Madness infects Real Sports with Bryant Gumbel, as the HBO sports magazine devotes much of its latest edition to college hoops. This month's show includes a look at the "Game of the Century" between UCLA and Houston in 1968, a profile of ESPN college hoops analyst Dick Vitale and an probe into the messy divorce between Lester Earl and LSU. And, finally, with spring training as its backdrop, Real Sports also squeezes in a report on the economics of Major League Baseball. Here are my reviews of the four segments. (Note: I have only seen the four taped segments and none of the studio stuff with host Bryant Gumbel):
It's hard to imagine today, when there are hundreds of regular-season college basketball games on national television each year, but that was the first nationally televised regular-season game ever - and the sport's most important one. It also was a pretty significant day for the local UCLA announcer doing his first national broadcast. "It was the most important telecast of my career," Dick Enberg said. HBO's James Brown does an excellent job revisiting this classic game and exploring the social and historical ramifications of the contest, which Houston won 71-69 thanks to 39 points from its best player, Elvin Hayes, who scored most of those points over Lew Alcindor, now known as Kareem Abdul-Jabbar. "[The game] was important to the game of college basketball because UCLA did not win," Enberg said. A year later, NBC gave the sport its first national television contract, and college basketball began its trek up sports' totem pole. And despite the fact that UCLA dominated Houston in the Final Four the year before and after this regular season game, Hayes still cherishes his team's win, which ended UCLA's 47-game winning streak. "[UCLA] accomplished all of the things they accomplished as a great basketball team - except one. One they can never get back. They lost the greatest game in the history of college basketball. They could not beat history." Unanswered question: Why was Jabbar shot from the side during his interview, instead of head-on like everyone else? Grade: A. It's the best segment in the show.
Everybody knows the disparity between baseball's haves and have-nots, but Whitaker says nobody knows a solution. Six teams will begin this season with payrolls of $75 million or more; meanwhile, six others will begin the season with payrolls of $23.5 million or less and with little hope of winning the World Series. In the piece, Whitaker talks to Pirates owner Kevin McClatchy, a representative of the have-nots; Rangers owner Tom Hicks, a member of the haves; and former commissioner Fay Vincent. While McClatchy and Hicks defend their respective camps, Vincent offers some blunt, insightful perspective on the sad state of the game. On Commissioner Bud Selig's task force to study baseball's economics: "I did that, too. It was a very good idea, but like many of my ideas it turned out to be a disaster. It was a waste of time. This problem is bigger than any committee." Selig declined to talk to Real Sports. On possible help from the union: "The union is simply not going to do anything. Look, this offseason made the case. Why would [the union] change anything when Kevin Brown got what he got. When Piazza got what he got. When Mo Vaughn got what he got. Players would say, 'You're out of your mind. Why would you change a system that's producing these results?'" On revenue-sharing: "Why would a big-market owner subsidize a small-market owner? It seems sort of un-American, almost socialist. We're supposed to destroy our competitors, that's what capitalism is all about. "[The Haves] are destroying the other competitors, but in the process, the game is in peril because a lot of these small market teams can't succed. Fundamentally, as a business, it doesn't make sense." Grade: A-. Vincent's candor is refreshing, but more time needs to be devoted to this topic.
Burwell talks to the main players involved - former LSU coach Dale Brown, Kansas coach Roy Williams and NCAA violations official David Swank - except for one, Lester Earl. Burwell does talk to Earl's brother, Louis. Not speaking with Lester is unfortunate, though, because the piece mainly questions how a player can partially ruin a school's basketball program and walk away not only with immunity but with all of his years of eligibility - despite transferring in the middle of the season. "[Earl] used the system to his advantage and, when he got that advantage, everybody else fell by the wayside," said Thad Foucher, Earl's former summer league coach. I also had a problem with the sympathetic tones that the piece seemed to harbor toward LSU. While the severity of LSU's penalty from the NCAA can be debated, there is no doubt that LSU commited violations in its recruiting of Earl. And for that, the NCAA should have penalized the school. Grade: B. Although not HBO's fault, the piece suffers without Lester's voice.
Merchant tries to determine if Vitale is really the man we see and hear on television or if he is a marketing and promotional genius. The HBO reporter also talks to sports media critic Phil Mushnick, who compares Vitale to an "eccentric uncle" and basically criticizes him for being a shill for college basketball. Vitale, of course, denies all accusations and defends himself. "I mean, there are times I come and I listen to the tape and I go, 'What did you say that for? My God, you're loud. My God, you're screaming. What are you? You violate every rule of television.' But you know what? That's me, man." Grade: B-. Merchant lets Vitale go fairly lightly. Show's overall grade: B+. Brown's Houston/UCLA story and Whitaker's baseball piece are the class of this field. Real Sports premieres 10 p.m. Monday. It also will air noon and 8 p.m. Thursday; 11:30 a.m. March 28; 8 a.m. and 4 p.m. March 30; 8 a.m. April 3; and 6 a.m. April 5. All times Eastern and Pacific. Back
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UCLA
vs. Houston - On Jan. 20, 1968, No. 1 UCLA and No. 2 Houston
played in front of 52,693 spectators at the voluminous Houston Astrodome
and millions more watching on television in what is now considered
by many to be the greatest game in college basketball history.
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