Two years ago, LeBron James, Chris Bosh and Dwyane Wade joined forces in South Florida to get what every professional basketball player wants to do. Win championships. When they first came together, the whole world was against them. At every turn, their actions on the court, how they interacted with one another was looked at with a fine tooth comb from each and every angle, James especially. Despite all of that they went 58-24 on the season, winning the Southeast Division and finishing second in the Eastern Conference standings. In the playoffs, they defeated in five games the Philadelphia 76ers in the first round; the took care of the Boston Celtics in the Conference Semis and they knocked off the No. 1 seeded Chicago Bulls in the Conference Finals. In the NBA Finals however they lost to the Western Conference champion Dallas Mavericks 4-2 and a season which was considered by many championship or failure became reality. With the scrutiny even higher this season and the lens magnified even closer, the Heat this time came through led by James.
On Thursday night, the Miami Heat defeated the Western Conference Champion Oklahoma City Thunder 121-106, winning the series 4-1 to capture the team’s second title, the first in the “Big 3” era of James, Wade and Bosh. More than anything they as a team silenced a lot of critics and demons that plagued them a year ago.
James was the main catalyst as the Bill Russell NBA Finals Most Valuable Player had his 8th triple double of his playoff career with 26 points, 11 rebounds and 13 assists. He averaged 28.6 ppg, 10.2 rpg and 7.4 apg in the Finals. It is a far cry from the 19.5 ppg and 7.1 rpg averages he garnered combined in the 2007 Finals with the Cleveland Cavaliers who were swept by the San Antonio Spurs and the aforementioned Mavericks a year ago.
James with his performance in Game 5 became just the 5th player in NBA postseason history to have a triple double in the clinching game of the Finals. He joined ESPN/ABC NBA studio analyst and Los Angeles Lakers Hall of Famer Earvin “Magic”’ Johnson who had 13 points, 13 boards and 13 assists in Game 6 of the 1982 Finals versus the Sixers in a 114-104 victory. Johnson did it again three years later with 14 points, 10 rebounds, 14 assists in Game 6 at the rival Celtics in the old Boston Garden as the Lakers won 114-97. One year later, Hall of Famer Larry Bird put the Celtics on the winning side of the equation with 29 points, 11 rebounds and 12 assists as the Celtics won Game 6 of the 1986 Finals 114-97 versus the Houston Rockets. In the 1988 Finals in the winner take all Game 7 at the Great Western Forum, Lakers forward James “Big Game” Worthy had 36 points, 16 rebounds and 10 assists as the Lakers beat the Detroit Pistons 108-105. The last triple-double in a title clinching game in the Finals prior to last Thursday came nine years ago when Spurs forward Tim Duncan had 21 points, 20 rebounds and 10 assists in a 88-77 victory over then New Jersey Nets in Game 6.
“It means everything,” James, who also became the 7th player in NBA history to have multiple triple doubles in his Finals career told ESPN/ABC’s Doris Burke after the game.
In being self reflective about his journey to being a champion, James also told Burke, “I made a difficult decision to leave, but I understood what my future was about and I understood coming to Miami and being a part of this organization and then being able to put together this team, I knew we had a bright future. This is a dream come true for me. Been through a lot the last two years, but this is definitely the way that it pays off.”
This was more than just a victory that gave James his first title as well as Bosh, Wade his second, it was also the culmination a long journey for the Heat as a whole.
After the team won its first title six years ago in defeating the Mavs 4-2, the Heat (44-38 in 2006-07) lost in the first round to the Bulls 4-0. The next season, they missed the playoffs entirely going just 15-67 for the 2007-08 campaign. They made the playoffs the next two season going 43-39 and 47-35 respectably, but they lost in first round first to the Atlanta Hawks 4-3 and the next season to the Celtics 4-1.
In this postseason alone, the Heat on three occasions saw their dream of winning a title hanging in the balance. They trailed the Indiana Pacers 2-1 in the Conference Semis, but won the last three games to reach the Conference Finals. James began that three-game stretch with 40 points, 18 rebounds and nine assists in a 101-93 victory Game 4 to tie the series 2-2. In Game 5 James had 30 points, 10 boards and eight assists, while Wade had 28 points as the Heat’s 115-83 win gave them a 3-2 lead in the series. Wade propelled Miami in the closeout victory in Game 6 with 41 points and 10 boards. James had 28 points, six boards and seven assists as the Heat won 105-93 to take the series 4-2.
After the Heat won the first two games of the East Finals, they lost the next three, which included a devastating loss at home in a Game 5, they trailed 3-2 and stood one loss away having their championship dreams go up in smoke.
In Game 6, James flexed his MVP muscles to the tune of 45 points, 15 rebounds and five assists as the Heat tied the series 3-3 to send it to a decisive Game 7. In Game 7 James came through again with 31 points and 12 rebounds and Wade had 23 points six boards and six assists and Miami won 101-88 winning the series 4-3.
Then after losing the first game of the Finals at the Thunder 105-94, the Heat won a close Game 2 100-96. They proceeded to win Games 3, 4 and 5 and as mentioned beat the Thunder in the Finals 4-2 to win the title.
Two win it all was very important especially for Heat Managing General Partner Micky Arison, Team president Pat Riley, who garnered his 8th title as a player,
coach (Lakers and Heat) and executive and head coach Erik Spoelstra, who was an assistant coach on that 2006 title team.
“But for the grace of God I go. That’s what stands out about it,” Riley told ESPN/ABC’s Stuart at the trophy presentation after Thursday’s victory.
“This is a great, great, great group. This is right now not about anybody else, but the coaches, the players, the staff, the employees that work for the Heat.”
Wade a major part of these rough times as he went from being MVP of the Finals in 2006 at age 24 to going through the lows of injuries, problems in his personal life and then having to be the true leader of the team both on and off the court.
Thursday was the completion of his journey back to the top with another championship. He can also say now that he has his family in tact with custody of his two children, an wonderful relationship with actress and Susan G. Komen ambassador Gabrielle Union, his two good friends and teammates in James and Bosh who he hopes to win more titles.
“I’m speechless,” Wade, who averaged 22.6 points, six rebounds and 5.2 assists per game in the Finals, said to Scott after the game on Thursday.
“Winning the championship in 2006 was amazing, but I didn’t go through nothing yet. Six years after that, I’ve been through a lot in my personal life and I’ve been through a lot in my professional life and this means so much more.”
In speaking about how he, James and Bosh joined forces Wade also said to Scott on Thursday, “We made a decision two years ago to become a team. LeBron, Chris and myself and other guys decided to come together. So you got to do what you got to do to make sure you reach your goals and I had a position I had to play. It might have changed a little bit, but at the end of the day we all have one common goal and that was becoming champions.”
The one person of the big three that had to sacrifice the most was Bosh, whose value to the team showed when he was absent for nine games in this playoff run because of a strained abdominal muscle that he suffered in Game 1 of the East Semis versus the Pacers. In his absence the team went 5-4.
He came through big time though in Game 7 of the East Finals with 19 points, eight boards going 8 for 10 from the floor, which included 3 for 4 from 3-point range in the aforementioned 101-88 victory.
In the Game 7 clincher on Thursday, Bosh scored 24 points, going 9 for 14 from the field and pulling down seven boards.
“The reality is a lot better, but you know what all those times we were working hard in the gym. Working hard together. Suffering through everything together. It’s all worth it,” Bosh told Scott after the game on Thursday.
While the greatness of James, Wade and Bosh is a big reason why Miami has its second title in franchise history, this is not possible if it not for the supporting cast of Mike Miller, Shane Battier, Udonis Haslem and Mario Chalmers.
After the first four games of the Finals, Miller in 21 total minutes had scored just eight points, shot 40 percent from the floor and had made no three point field goals. In Game 5 he had 23 points in 23 minutes off the bench and made seven 3-point field goals in eight attempts. The team hit 14 three pointers in Game 5, which tied the record with the Rockets and Magic who accomplished that feet in the 1995 Finals. Not bad for a guy that since he came to the Heat in free agency last season has been battling one injury after another.
When you think of a teammate that is all about the team. Will do whatever is necessary to win and makes others better, you think of Shane Battier. In one game, he can give you 10 points and 10 rebounds, which he did in Game 1 of the East Finals versus Boston. In another he can go 4 for 9 from 3-point range, which he did in Game 7 of the East Finals. In the first two games of the Finals, Battier went 9 for 13 from behind the arc. In the close out game, he had 11 points and went 3 for 7 from the 3-point line.
When it comes to big moments and taking the moment and rising to it, two players who epitomized that are Chalmers and Haslem.
While James and Wade played big in Game 4 of the Conference Semis at Indiana, it was the play of Haslem that made the difference. By the numbers he played well scoring 14 points and pulling down four boards off the bench, but it was his effort and presence on both ends that helped the Heat pull out the win and tie the series 2-2.
In the pivotal Game 4 of the Finals, Chalmers who is no strangers to making big plays in big times games was incredible in Game 4 of the Finals with 12 of his playoff career high 25 points in the fourth quarter to help the Heat win Game 4 104-98 to take a 3-1 series lead.
The greatness of the big three and the valuable contributions of the role players is not possible without the steady hand of coach Spoelstra.
In the best of times or in the toughest of times that the Heat have gone through the last two seasons, their head coach has never changed. He has been steady, never getting too high or too low. He always stayed the course and had the kind of faith and belief that rose him from video coordinator with the Heat in 1995 to assistant
coach/video coordinator, assistant coach/advanced scout, assistant coach/director of scouting to assistant coach and now head coach, who has a record of 194-118 in the regular season and his 34 postseason wins tie the Heat record of Riley who named him as his successor back in April of 2008.
Asked about what it was like to get to this point one year later and this time coming through by Scott, Spoelstra said “A lot pressure. Probably a lot more gray hairs, but this one was so gratifying.”
Addressing the crowd, Spoelstra said, “We love you Miami. Thank you for your patience. We remember last year. We wanted to make up for it.”
The question now is can this Miami Heat team with the “Big 3’ of James, Wade and Bosh under the guidance of Spoelstra win more titles?
Coming into next season they are the clear cut favorites in their conference with the Celtics getting older, the Bulls will start next season without Derrick Rose, who suffered a major leg injury in the first round of their series with the Sixers in Game 1. The West will still be formidable with the Thunder, the Lakers to name a few.
The best way to describe the true meaning of the Heat becoming NBA champions is that James stared into the face of adversity and took it on and won. He put to rest the fact that he shrinks in the biggest of moments. More than anything else, he got back to playing the game with the kind of joy, confidence and relentlessness that made him the player that we have come to know him his nine seasons in the NBA and not being the selfish person he was perceived to be.
“That’s the only thing that bothered me that a lot of people said I was selfish and I strive on being a team player,” James, who averaged 30.5 points, 9.7 rebounds and 5.6 assists in 23 games this postseason, said after the game.
“Doing whatever it takes to help this team win, but at the same time I use it as motivation. I’m happy I was able to make enough plays to put ourselves in a position to win this championship.”
The Heat also showed in capturing this title that Wade, who has always been the face of the franchise from the day he was drafted nine years ago was able to take a step back in order for James to flourish and be the player we saw this postseason and allowed the team to make up for how last season ended.
“This team we had so much pain. So much hurt. So much embarrassment from last season that it was nothing needed to be said,” Wade said after the game.
“From the first day. From Christmas Day we was on a mission and that mission was not complete until tonight.”
When Bosh came to Miami, he had not gotten out of the first round of the playoffs in his career with the Toronto Raptors. He had to sacrifice most in terms of shot attempts to fit in with his new team and teammates in James and Wade. It took him missing a nine-game stretch this postseason for those that watch to see his value and when he did come back, he played a big role in the Heat capturing the title.
“This city and my teammates, they were they’ve supported me all along,” Bosh, who averaged 14.6 points, 9.4 rebounds on 45 percent shooting in the Finals said after the game.
“We came here to win a championship. We came here to win a championship and we got it done.”
As for the aspect of what will happen in terms of winning more titles, Riley answered that after the game by saying, “We believe that we built a team that’s going to be around for a while and our goal is to hopefully come back every year. It’s always started out as an upstart. You become a team. You become a winner. A contender and then one day you might be something special and that’s what were shooting for.”
Information, quotes and statistics are courtesy of www.nba.com; 6/21/12 9 p.m. edition of Game 5 of the NBA Finals between the Oklahoma City Thunder vs. Miami Heat on ABC, commentators Mike Breen and Jeff Van Gundy, sideline reporter Doris Burke; 6/21/12 edition of ABC News “Nightline” with Bill Weir; 6/22/12 6 a.m. edition of ESPN’s “Sportscenter” with Neil Everett and Robert Flores; 6/22/12 6 p.m. edition of ESPN’s “Sportscenter” with John Anderson and Jonathan Coachman, report from Rachel Nichols; 6/25/12 6 p.m. edition of ESPN’s “Sportscenter”with John Anderson and Cindy Brunson; en.wikipedia.org/wkik/Erik_Spoelstra; en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Chris_Bosh; en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_Toronto_Raptors_seasons;
en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_Miami_Heat_seasons.
Monday, June 25, 2012
Monday, May 21, 2012
J-Speaks: A Legend of The Disco Era Passes Away
She had the most unique voice that defined an era of music. Her songs were symbol of amazing passionate nights of romance and love. At some of her concerts, people in the audience would wear symbols of that era on their ears and around their necks. Her music garnered her many awards and her songs have stood the test of time. She started her amazing journey in the church and it led her to superstardom across the world. This past week however, this legendary artist that defined an era had her “Last Dance.”
This past Thursday, Donna Summer, the five-time Grammy Award winner and woman who defined the era of Disco passed away from lung cancer at her home in Naples, FL. She was 63 years old.
Summer had been diagnosed as having lung cancer despite reports of being a non-smoker. The cancer was in no relation to smoking.
She is survived by her husband of 32 years to Brooklyn Dreams member Bruce Sudano and her three children Mimi Sommer, who she had with ex-husband Helmuth Sommer, Brooklyn Sudano and Amanda Sudano.
In a statement from the Summer family, “While we grieve her passing, we are at piece celebrating her extraordinary life and legacy.”
Many in the music industry expressed their feelings about Summer’s passing on Thursday.
Via Twitter Kylie Minogue said that Summer was “one of my earliest musical inspirations. R.I.P. Donna Summer #BadGirlsForEver.”
Quincy Jones said of Summer, “Your voice was the heartbeat and soundtrack of a decade.”
“Few singers have impacted music & the world like Donna Summer! It is the end of an era.”
To fully understand the kind of career Donna Summer had and what made her one of the very best to hear these two facts.
She was the first artist to have three straight double albums reach No. 1 on the U.S. Billboard chart as well as chart four No. 1 singles in the country within a span of 13 months. She also had 19 No. 1 dance hits over her legendary career.
Summer, whose real name is LaDonna Adrian Gaines was born on Dec. 31, 1948 in Boston, MA to Andrew Gaines a butcher and his wife Mary, who was a schoolteacher. She was one of seven children raised in a Boston’s Dorchester. The family lived on the first floor of a three-decker home.
Mary recalls that from the first time her daughter could speak, she loved to sing. She would often go through the house singing. So much so that she sang for breakfast, lunch and dinner.
Summer first performance came at age 10 when she replaced a vocalist who failed to show up.
“I opened up my mouth and this voice just shot out of me. It shocked me and it shocked everyone in the room and I started crying and everyone in the room started crying,” Summer said once about that moment.
“I heard the voice of God saying to me you got to be famous. This is your power and your never to abuse this power.”
She used that power to become a popular figure in performing in school musicals at Boston’s Jeremiah e. Burke High School.
In 1967 just weeks before her graduation, Summer left for New York where she became a member of the blues-rock band Crow. The group unfortunately did not get signed to a record label and they broke up.
Summer stayed in New York and auditioned for a role in the counterculture musical Hair. She agreed to take the role in the Munich, Germany production of the show and moved there after getting the blessing of her parents.
Four years later she released her first single, a cover of The Jaynetts’ “Sally Go ‘Round the Roses,” from one-off European deal with Decca Records.
In 1975, Summer was approached by legendary music producer Giorgio Moroder with the idea for a song that she and Pete Bellotte were working on for another singer. She had come up with the lyric, “love to love you, baby.”
Summer said that she wanted her voice to sound like Marilyn Monroe cooing the words.
To get into the mood of recording the song, she requested that Moroder turn the lights off while they sat on a sofa with inducing her moans and groans.
After hearing the playback of the song, Moroder felt that Summer’s song should be released.
The song was sent to Casablanca Records president Neil Bogart in hopes of getting it released in the U.S. He informed Summer and Moroder that he would release the song, but he requested that it needed to be a longer version with discotheques. They returned with a 17 minute version and Summer was signed and the song was released in November of 1975. The shorter version of the “Love To Love You Baby” was promoted to radio stations while clubs regularly played the longer version.
By early 1976 “Love To Love You Baby” had reached No. 2 on the U.S. Billboard Hot 100.
Two years later Summer acted in the film Thank God It’s Friday, playing a singer determined to perform in at a hot disco club. The film had modest success, but the song from the film, “Last Dance” reached No. 3 on the Hot 100 and resulted in Summer winning her first of five Grammy awards. The writer of the song Paul Jabara won an Academy Award for the composition.
“A lot of clubs had disco balls and being sort of ‘The Queen of Disco,’ made me that synonymous sort of with me and people would come to the show with disco ball earrings and disco ball necklaces,” Summer once said.
Summer followed with the album Bad Girls. The album was so successful that it spawned the number one hits “Hot Stuff” and title track and the number two “Dim All the Lights,” With the songs “MacArthur Park,” “Hot Stuff,” “Bad Girls” and the duet with Barbara Streisand “No More Tears (Enough is Enough),” Summer achieved four No. 1 hits in a 13-month span.
"I loved doing the duet with her. She had an amazing voice and was so talented,” Streisand said last Thursday.
In 1979 Summer released On the Radio; Greatest Hits Volume I & II, her first (international) greatest album. It reached No. 1 in the U.S. becoming her third straight No. 1 album. The new song from the compilation, “On the Radio,” reached the top in the U.S. selling over a million copies in the states alone.
Wanting to branch out from disco, Summer signed with Geffen Records, a new label started by David Geffen and her first album released was The Wanderer. The album which had more of the burgeoning New Wave sound and some elements of rock achieved gold status in the U.S. and the title track, which was released as the first single peaked at No. 3 in the U.S. but subsequent singles only became moderate hits.
Summer’s second Geffen release I’m a Rainbow was shelved by the label, although two of the album’s songs would be on soundtracks of the films Fast Times at Ridgemont High and Flashdance.
After parting ways with Moroder after seven years of working together, Geffen recruited super music producer Quincy Jones to produce Summer’s 1982 album Donna Summer. The album’s single “Love is in Control (Finger on the Trigger) was an top 10 hit on the American Hot 100, followed by moderate hits “State of Independence,” which reached No. 41 on the pop charts and “The Woman in Me,” which was at No. 33.
Her landmark album of the decade came in 1983 when she delivered the album She Works Hard for the Money, which Polygram Records released on its Mercury imprint. The title song reached No. 3 on the U.S. Hot 100 and would provide Summer with a Grammy nomination.
You would think with the talent and ability that Summer has that the title song from this album came out of thin air, but it actually came from the most inopportune place.
“I was at the Grammy’s Party and I went to the ladies room and on my way in I saw the bathroom attendant and my first thought was she works hard for the money and I ran in the room and I got my manager and we back into the bathroom, got some toilet paper and we wrote ‘She Works Hard for the Money,’ and started writing the concept on a piece of toilet paper.”
I guess sometimes the best inspirations come from in the simplest forms and they turn into anthems.
This anthem has stood the test of time so much so that in my exercise class that I attend on Tuesdays and Thursday in the fall and spring the last two years when we jog that song is played most of the time.
In the years that followed Summer would continue to create solid music like the compilation The Best of Donna Summer, which was released on Warner Bros. Records (1990); a new jack swing style album Mistaken Identity (1991); The Donna Summer Anthology (1993); a gospel-influenced Christmas album entitled Christmas Spirit (1994) that included classic songs like “O Holy Night,” “Joy To The World“ and “O Come All Ye Faithful.”
Along with her album in 1994, Summer was offered a guest role on the sitcom Family Matters, which was on ABC at the time. She played the role of Steve Urkel’s (Jaleel White) Aunt Oona. She made a second appearance on the show in 1997
In 1998, Summer received a Grammy Award for Best Dance Recording for the remixed version of her 1992 collaboration with Moroder, “Carry On,” which was released one year ago.
In 1999 Summer taped a live special for VH1 titled Donna Summer-Live and More Encore. It produced the second highest rating that year for the network, after their annual Divas special. Epic Records produced a CD of the event and the two featured studio recordings, “I Will Go with You (Con te partiro)” and “Love Is The Healer” reached No. 1 on the Billboard Dance Charts.
In 2004 Summer was inducted into the Dance Music Hall of Fame alongside the Bee Gees and Barry Gibb. Her classic song “I Feel Love” was also inducted that night.
Four years ago Summer released her first studio album of full original material entitled Crayons, which was released on the Sony BMG label Burgundy Records. The album peaked at No. 17 on the US Top 200 Album Chart, which was Summer’s highest placing since 1983. The album itself achieved modest international success and the songs “I’m a Fire,” “Stamp Your Feet” and “Fame (The Game)” reached No. 1 on the U.S. Billboard Dance Chart.
On Dec. 11, 2009 backed by the Norwegian Radio Orchestra, Summer performed at the Nobel Peace Prize Concert in Oslo, Norway in honor of our U.S. President Barack Obama. One of the songs she performed was the classic “Last Dance.”
While on the stage or in the studio Summer seemed she could never do anything wrong, that was not always the case.
At the height of her success in the 1970s, Summer suffered through anxiety and depression.
“The more successful I became, the less I slept and it just kept getting worse and worse to the point that I just felt like I was never really awake or never really sleeping. Like I was dreaming all the time,” she told Entertainment Tonight (ET) back in 2003.
She also told ET that on one occasion in New York she was so out of it that she wanted to commit suicide. She was going to fall out from a window. Her foot got caught on the curtain of the window and just before she was about to fall the made came into the room and saved her.
“Thank God that lady came because I’d be gone today,” Summer said about that moment.
For a two-year period she was on medication. She was able to get off of it and never went back.
Summer addressed all of this in her 2003 memoir “Ordinary Girl The Journey.”
She told back then current WCBS entertainment reporter Katie McGee, “I’m a very private person by nature and so just talking about all of that stuff wasn’t easy, but I think that part of the reason for writing the book I just wanted it to be like a mirror. A reflection to them that they can see their own lives in my life and different things that I’ve been through. Maybe their going through and they know they can overcome it and they can go on.”
In the mid 1980s she was embroiled in controversy having allegedly making anti-gay remarks regarding the then relatively new disease AIDS. Summer, who by then had become a born-again Christian was alleged to have said that AIDS God’s way of punishing the lifestyle of homosexuals.
Summer denies ever making such s comment and in a letter that she wrote to the AIDS campaign group ACT UP in 1989, she said that it was “A terrible misunderstanding. I was unknowingly protected by those around me from the bad press and hate letters… If I caused you pain forgive me.”
In that same year, she also told The Advocate magazine that “A couple of the people that I write with are gay, and they have been ever since I met them. What people want to do with their bodies is their personal preference.”
She was “The Queen of Disco” who gave us songs that made us feel good and made us groove unlike any other. Her style and how she performed were second to none. She showed individuality and allure while at the same time showing off a unique voice that touch all those that watched her.
“Her music sounds as good as it ever did,” Sir Elton John said last Thursday.
Information and quotations are courtesy of 5/17/12 4 p.m. edition of WABC’s “Eyewitness News First at 4” with David Navarro and Liz Cho, report from Entertainment reporter Sandy Kenyon; 5/17/12 5 p.m. edition of WABC’s “Eyewitness News at 5” with Diana Williams and Sade Baderinwa, report from Entertainment reporter Sandy Kenyon; 5/17/12 6 p.m. edition of WCBS “2 News at 6” with Chris Wragge and Dana Tyler, report from Entertainment reporter Katie McGee; 5/17/12 6:30 p.m. edition of ABC “World News” with Diane Sawyer, report from David Wright; 5/18/12 7:30 p.m. edition of “Entertainment Tonight” with Mark Steines and Nancy O’Dell on WCBS; en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Donna_Summer.
This past Thursday, Donna Summer, the five-time Grammy Award winner and woman who defined the era of Disco passed away from lung cancer at her home in Naples, FL. She was 63 years old.
Summer had been diagnosed as having lung cancer despite reports of being a non-smoker. The cancer was in no relation to smoking.
She is survived by her husband of 32 years to Brooklyn Dreams member Bruce Sudano and her three children Mimi Sommer, who she had with ex-husband Helmuth Sommer, Brooklyn Sudano and Amanda Sudano.
In a statement from the Summer family, “While we grieve her passing, we are at piece celebrating her extraordinary life and legacy.”
Many in the music industry expressed their feelings about Summer’s passing on Thursday.
Via Twitter Kylie Minogue said that Summer was “one of my earliest musical inspirations. R.I.P. Donna Summer #BadGirlsForEver.”
Quincy Jones said of Summer, “Your voice was the heartbeat and soundtrack of a decade.”
“Few singers have impacted music & the world like Donna Summer! It is the end of an era.”
To fully understand the kind of career Donna Summer had and what made her one of the very best to hear these two facts.
She was the first artist to have three straight double albums reach No. 1 on the U.S. Billboard chart as well as chart four No. 1 singles in the country within a span of 13 months. She also had 19 No. 1 dance hits over her legendary career.
Summer, whose real name is LaDonna Adrian Gaines was born on Dec. 31, 1948 in Boston, MA to Andrew Gaines a butcher and his wife Mary, who was a schoolteacher. She was one of seven children raised in a Boston’s Dorchester. The family lived on the first floor of a three-decker home.
Mary recalls that from the first time her daughter could speak, she loved to sing. She would often go through the house singing. So much so that she sang for breakfast, lunch and dinner.
Summer first performance came at age 10 when she replaced a vocalist who failed to show up.
“I opened up my mouth and this voice just shot out of me. It shocked me and it shocked everyone in the room and I started crying and everyone in the room started crying,” Summer said once about that moment.
“I heard the voice of God saying to me you got to be famous. This is your power and your never to abuse this power.”
She used that power to become a popular figure in performing in school musicals at Boston’s Jeremiah e. Burke High School.
In 1967 just weeks before her graduation, Summer left for New York where she became a member of the blues-rock band Crow. The group unfortunately did not get signed to a record label and they broke up.
Summer stayed in New York and auditioned for a role in the counterculture musical Hair. She agreed to take the role in the Munich, Germany production of the show and moved there after getting the blessing of her parents.
Four years later she released her first single, a cover of The Jaynetts’ “Sally Go ‘Round the Roses,” from one-off European deal with Decca Records.
In 1975, Summer was approached by legendary music producer Giorgio Moroder with the idea for a song that she and Pete Bellotte were working on for another singer. She had come up with the lyric, “love to love you, baby.”
Summer said that she wanted her voice to sound like Marilyn Monroe cooing the words.
To get into the mood of recording the song, she requested that Moroder turn the lights off while they sat on a sofa with inducing her moans and groans.
After hearing the playback of the song, Moroder felt that Summer’s song should be released.
The song was sent to Casablanca Records president Neil Bogart in hopes of getting it released in the U.S. He informed Summer and Moroder that he would release the song, but he requested that it needed to be a longer version with discotheques. They returned with a 17 minute version and Summer was signed and the song was released in November of 1975. The shorter version of the “Love To Love You Baby” was promoted to radio stations while clubs regularly played the longer version.
By early 1976 “Love To Love You Baby” had reached No. 2 on the U.S. Billboard Hot 100.
Two years later Summer acted in the film Thank God It’s Friday, playing a singer determined to perform in at a hot disco club. The film had modest success, but the song from the film, “Last Dance” reached No. 3 on the Hot 100 and resulted in Summer winning her first of five Grammy awards. The writer of the song Paul Jabara won an Academy Award for the composition.
“A lot of clubs had disco balls and being sort of ‘The Queen of Disco,’ made me that synonymous sort of with me and people would come to the show with disco ball earrings and disco ball necklaces,” Summer once said.
Summer followed with the album Bad Girls. The album was so successful that it spawned the number one hits “Hot Stuff” and title track and the number two “Dim All the Lights,” With the songs “MacArthur Park,” “Hot Stuff,” “Bad Girls” and the duet with Barbara Streisand “No More Tears (Enough is Enough),” Summer achieved four No. 1 hits in a 13-month span.
"I loved doing the duet with her. She had an amazing voice and was so talented,” Streisand said last Thursday.
In 1979 Summer released On the Radio; Greatest Hits Volume I & II, her first (international) greatest album. It reached No. 1 in the U.S. becoming her third straight No. 1 album. The new song from the compilation, “On the Radio,” reached the top in the U.S. selling over a million copies in the states alone.
Wanting to branch out from disco, Summer signed with Geffen Records, a new label started by David Geffen and her first album released was The Wanderer. The album which had more of the burgeoning New Wave sound and some elements of rock achieved gold status in the U.S. and the title track, which was released as the first single peaked at No. 3 in the U.S. but subsequent singles only became moderate hits.
Summer’s second Geffen release I’m a Rainbow was shelved by the label, although two of the album’s songs would be on soundtracks of the films Fast Times at Ridgemont High and Flashdance.
After parting ways with Moroder after seven years of working together, Geffen recruited super music producer Quincy Jones to produce Summer’s 1982 album Donna Summer. The album’s single “Love is in Control (Finger on the Trigger) was an top 10 hit on the American Hot 100, followed by moderate hits “State of Independence,” which reached No. 41 on the pop charts and “The Woman in Me,” which was at No. 33.
Her landmark album of the decade came in 1983 when she delivered the album She Works Hard for the Money, which Polygram Records released on its Mercury imprint. The title song reached No. 3 on the U.S. Hot 100 and would provide Summer with a Grammy nomination.
You would think with the talent and ability that Summer has that the title song from this album came out of thin air, but it actually came from the most inopportune place.
“I was at the Grammy’s Party and I went to the ladies room and on my way in I saw the bathroom attendant and my first thought was she works hard for the money and I ran in the room and I got my manager and we back into the bathroom, got some toilet paper and we wrote ‘She Works Hard for the Money,’ and started writing the concept on a piece of toilet paper.”
I guess sometimes the best inspirations come from in the simplest forms and they turn into anthems.
This anthem has stood the test of time so much so that in my exercise class that I attend on Tuesdays and Thursday in the fall and spring the last two years when we jog that song is played most of the time.
In the years that followed Summer would continue to create solid music like the compilation The Best of Donna Summer, which was released on Warner Bros. Records (1990); a new jack swing style album Mistaken Identity (1991); The Donna Summer Anthology (1993); a gospel-influenced Christmas album entitled Christmas Spirit (1994) that included classic songs like “O Holy Night,” “Joy To The World“ and “O Come All Ye Faithful.”
Along with her album in 1994, Summer was offered a guest role on the sitcom Family Matters, which was on ABC at the time. She played the role of Steve Urkel’s (Jaleel White) Aunt Oona. She made a second appearance on the show in 1997
In 1998, Summer received a Grammy Award for Best Dance Recording for the remixed version of her 1992 collaboration with Moroder, “Carry On,” which was released one year ago.
In 1999 Summer taped a live special for VH1 titled Donna Summer-Live and More Encore. It produced the second highest rating that year for the network, after their annual Divas special. Epic Records produced a CD of the event and the two featured studio recordings, “I Will Go with You (Con te partiro)” and “Love Is The Healer” reached No. 1 on the Billboard Dance Charts.
In 2004 Summer was inducted into the Dance Music Hall of Fame alongside the Bee Gees and Barry Gibb. Her classic song “I Feel Love” was also inducted that night.
Four years ago Summer released her first studio album of full original material entitled Crayons, which was released on the Sony BMG label Burgundy Records. The album peaked at No. 17 on the US Top 200 Album Chart, which was Summer’s highest placing since 1983. The album itself achieved modest international success and the songs “I’m a Fire,” “Stamp Your Feet” and “Fame (The Game)” reached No. 1 on the U.S. Billboard Dance Chart.
On Dec. 11, 2009 backed by the Norwegian Radio Orchestra, Summer performed at the Nobel Peace Prize Concert in Oslo, Norway in honor of our U.S. President Barack Obama. One of the songs she performed was the classic “Last Dance.”
While on the stage or in the studio Summer seemed she could never do anything wrong, that was not always the case.
At the height of her success in the 1970s, Summer suffered through anxiety and depression.
“The more successful I became, the less I slept and it just kept getting worse and worse to the point that I just felt like I was never really awake or never really sleeping. Like I was dreaming all the time,” she told Entertainment Tonight (ET) back in 2003.
She also told ET that on one occasion in New York she was so out of it that she wanted to commit suicide. She was going to fall out from a window. Her foot got caught on the curtain of the window and just before she was about to fall the made came into the room and saved her.
“Thank God that lady came because I’d be gone today,” Summer said about that moment.
For a two-year period she was on medication. She was able to get off of it and never went back.
Summer addressed all of this in her 2003 memoir “Ordinary Girl The Journey.”
She told back then current WCBS entertainment reporter Katie McGee, “I’m a very private person by nature and so just talking about all of that stuff wasn’t easy, but I think that part of the reason for writing the book I just wanted it to be like a mirror. A reflection to them that they can see their own lives in my life and different things that I’ve been through. Maybe their going through and they know they can overcome it and they can go on.”
In the mid 1980s she was embroiled in controversy having allegedly making anti-gay remarks regarding the then relatively new disease AIDS. Summer, who by then had become a born-again Christian was alleged to have said that AIDS God’s way of punishing the lifestyle of homosexuals.
Summer denies ever making such s comment and in a letter that she wrote to the AIDS campaign group ACT UP in 1989, she said that it was “A terrible misunderstanding. I was unknowingly protected by those around me from the bad press and hate letters… If I caused you pain forgive me.”
In that same year, she also told The Advocate magazine that “A couple of the people that I write with are gay, and they have been ever since I met them. What people want to do with their bodies is their personal preference.”
She was “The Queen of Disco” who gave us songs that made us feel good and made us groove unlike any other. Her style and how she performed were second to none. She showed individuality and allure while at the same time showing off a unique voice that touch all those that watched her.
“Her music sounds as good as it ever did,” Sir Elton John said last Thursday.
Information and quotations are courtesy of 5/17/12 4 p.m. edition of WABC’s “Eyewitness News First at 4” with David Navarro and Liz Cho, report from Entertainment reporter Sandy Kenyon; 5/17/12 5 p.m. edition of WABC’s “Eyewitness News at 5” with Diana Williams and Sade Baderinwa, report from Entertainment reporter Sandy Kenyon; 5/17/12 6 p.m. edition of WCBS “2 News at 6” with Chris Wragge and Dana Tyler, report from Entertainment reporter Katie McGee; 5/17/12 6:30 p.m. edition of ABC “World News” with Diane Sawyer, report from David Wright; 5/18/12 7:30 p.m. edition of “Entertainment Tonight” with Mark Steines and Nancy O’Dell on WCBS; en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Donna_Summer.
Wednesday, May 9, 2012
J-Speaks: A Pioneer and Brooklyn Native Passes
Back in 1979, four young men set off on a musical journey in which they became pioneers in breaking down barriers in Hip Hop and Rap. These three young men from Brooklyn, NY made music videos that when you saw them seemed like out of control mayhem, but they made them into an art form that built them a legion of fans that made them one of the finest groups of all-time. Together drummer Michael Diamond, also known as (a.k.a) Mike D; guitarist Adam Horovitz a.k.a Ad-Rock and leader Adam Yauch a.k.a MCA who played bass recorded formed the group The Beastie Boys. They recorded eight albums and they received many Grammy, MTV Video Music and MTV Europe Music Award nominations and they won a few of those. Last month they became just third Rap group to receive greatest honor of all. This past Friday however, the leader who formed this group that put their names into Hip Hop lure lost his life.
Yauch passed away on Friday from cancer. He was just 47 years old.
Back in 2009, Yauch was diagnosed and treated for a cancerous parotid gland and lymph node in his neck.
“It’s only localized in this one area and it’s not in the place that effects my voice. So that‘s nice,” Yauch said back then.
He became a vegan under the recommendation of his Tibetan doctors, meaning he abstained from eating any food that came from an animal.
While Yauch fought the cancer with great bravery, it did not allow him to appear in music videos for the album “Hot Sauce Committee Part Two” and the subsequent music tour. It also delayed the release of the aforementioned album.
The biggest disappointment though was that the cancer did not allow Yauch to be with his band mates when they were inducted into the Rock “N” Roll Hall of Fame on Apr. 14. They joined “Run-D.M.C.” (2009) and Grandmaster Flash and the Furious Five (2007) as the only groups to be inducted into the Hall.
Yauch leaves behind his wife Dechen Wangdu and their 13-year-old daughter Tenzin Losel.
The news of his passing rocked the music world and many shared their feelings about this major loss.
Via Twitter, actor Ben Stiller called Yauch, “A truly great musician and filmmaker. He stood for integrity as an artist.”
Former gangster rapper and actor Ice-T of NBC’s “Law & Order: Special Victim’s Unit” said on Twitter, “I’m going twitter silent today in honor of MCA. Rest in peace homie.”
Musician Lenny Kravitz also said on twitter, “ Rest in peace MCA. You are a legend. No Sleep till Brooklyn. ”
Yauch was born and raised in aforementioned Brooklyn, the son of Frances, a social worker and Noel Yauch, a painter and architect. Yauch’s father had been raised a Catholic and his mother was Jewish and he received a non-religious upbringing.
While attending Edward R. Murrow High School in the Midwood neighborhood of Brooklyn, Yauch taught himself how to play the bass guitar. He then formed the group the “Beastie Boys with John Berry, Kate Shellenbach and Mike D.
Their first performance was played on Yauch’s 17th birthday.
After dropping out of Bard College in Annandale-on -Hudson, NY after two years, he formed the group the Beastie Boys in 1979 as a hardcore punk band. They supported Bad Brains, the Dead Kennedys, the Misfits and Reagan Youth at venues that included Country BlueGrass and Blues, A7, Trudy Hellers Place and Max’s Kansas City, playing at the latter venue on its closing night.
After Berry left the group in 1983 and was replaced by guitarist of “The Young and the Useless,” the band recorded and then performed its first Hip Hop track “Cooky Puss,” which is based on a prank cal the group made to Carvel Ice Cream that year. The song was a major hit in New York underground dance clubs and night clubs upon its release.
The groups big break came in 1986 when they recorded their first album Licensed to Ill, which was well-received becoming the best selling rap album of the 1980s and the first rap album to reach No. 1 on the Billborad album chart, where it stayed for 35 days. It also reached No. 2 on the Urban album charts. The album also was Def Jam Records fastest selling debut record to date and sold over five million copies.
The first single from the album (You Gotta) Fight for Your Right (To Party!), reached the No. 7 spot on the Billboard Hot 100 and the music video became a staple on MTV.
Another hit from the album was one that Kravitz mentioned in his tweet to the passing of Yauch, which was No Sleep till Brooklyn.
In the years that followed, the Beastie Boys would record seven more albums Paul’s Boutique in 1988, Check Your Head in 1992, Ill Communication in 1994, Hello Nasty in 1997, To the 5 Boroughs in 2004, The Mix-up in 2007 and Hot Sauce Committee in 2009.
The amazing work by the Beastie Boys earned them 10 Grammy nominations winning two in 1999 and one in 2008. They won three MTV Video Music Awards (1998, 1999 and 2011) in eight tries and one MTV Europe Music Award in nine tries (1998).
Over the course of that span, they had four No. 1 albums and sold more than 40 million records and counting.
A big part of the Beastie Boys rise is to the all-time greatness, according to “Rolling Stone” magazine writer Simon Vozick-Levinson.
“That chemistry wouldn’t been complete without Adam Yauch. Without that sort of gravely raspy voice that he had,” Vozick-Levinson said.
“He had really just a incomparable energy. He had a really great sort of offbeat sense of humor.”
That incomparable energy allowed Yauch to have a second career as a filmmaker by building a recording studio called Oscilloscope Laboratories in New York City where he started an independent film distributing company called Oscilloscope Pictures.
In 2006 Yauch directed the 2006 Beastie Boys concert film, “Awesome; I ‘F-’ Shot That!,” although in the DVD extras for the film, its title character in “ A Day in the life of Nathanial Hornblower is played by actor David Cross.
Two years later, Yauch directed the 2008 film “Gunnin’ For That #1 Spot.” It was a film about eight high school basketball prospect at the Boost Mobile Elite 24 Hoops Classic at Rucker Park in Harlem, NY.
Yauch also produced Build A Nation, the comeback album from hardcore/punk band “Bad Brains.”
A year ago, Yauch received the Charles Flint Kellogg Award in Arts and Letters from Bard College, the place he attended for two years.
Besides being a great an all-time great artist and a solid filmmaker, Yauch was a practicing Buddhist. His involvement in his religion gave solid credibility in the Tibetan independence movement, which is one for independence of Tibet and the political separation of Tibet from the People’s Republic of China.
He created the Milarepa Fund, a non-profit organization that is devoted to Tibetan independence. It also an organization that puts together several concerts in support of the cause, which includes the Tibetan Freedom Concert, a series of rock festivals held in North America, Europe and Asia between 1996 and 2001 that took place from April to September.
The Beastie Boys were a music group that took their talents from Brooklyn, NY to the entire United States and beyond. Along the way they never forgot their roots.
Rolling Stone once said in headlining their early success from their first album License to Ill simply, “Three idiots create a masterpiece and what had begun in small clubs lead to a tour of arenas and a run that lasted more than a quarter or a century.”
They among all artists back then had the major benefit from the era of music videos.
The Beastie Boys became so popular that many years ago WABC use to have a show called “Hot Tracks” that aired from 1983-89 that was once hosted by former actors Darnell Williams and Debbi Morgan who portrayed super couple Angie and Jesse Hubbard on ABC’s “All My Children” from 1986-89, The Beastie Boys had their music videos showed regularly on the show.
Together they had seven platinum albums or better in an 18-year span. Worldwide they sold an aforementioned 40 million albums, “the biggest-selling rap group” since 1991. Their leader Adam Yauch created a group that made it cool to express yourself in a way that can be erratic, but exciting and something that fans, especially in the New York area gravitated toward. Along with that, he brought his creative imagination to the film industry and gave us a chance to see something different.
What the Beastie Boys and Yauch did more than anything is that they gave credibility to the rap music as well as the labels like Def Jam, Capitol and Oscilloscope, which allowed other acts like RUN DMC, Q-Tip, The Roots and Biz Markie to name a few to rise to stardom behind their own sound and lyrics.
“R.I.P. MCA from the Beastie Boys. He was an integral part of building Def Jam label that I am part of today. Condolences to the Fam [family],” Chris “Ludacris” Bridges, rapper and co-founder of Disturbing tha Peace, an imprint distributed by Def Jam Recordings.
Information and quotations are courtesy of 5/4/12 4 p.m. edition of WABC’s “Eyewitness News First at 4” with David Navarro and Liz Cho, report entertainment reporter Sandy Kenyon; 5/4/12 6:30 p.m. edition of “NBC Nightly News” with Brian Williams; 5/5/12 7 a.m. edition of “CBS This Morning” with Jeff Glor and Rebecca Jarvis, report from Brian Rooney; en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Beastie_Boys; en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Adam_Yauch; en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ludacris.
Yauch passed away on Friday from cancer. He was just 47 years old.
Back in 2009, Yauch was diagnosed and treated for a cancerous parotid gland and lymph node in his neck.
“It’s only localized in this one area and it’s not in the place that effects my voice. So that‘s nice,” Yauch said back then.
He became a vegan under the recommendation of his Tibetan doctors, meaning he abstained from eating any food that came from an animal.
While Yauch fought the cancer with great bravery, it did not allow him to appear in music videos for the album “Hot Sauce Committee Part Two” and the subsequent music tour. It also delayed the release of the aforementioned album.
The biggest disappointment though was that the cancer did not allow Yauch to be with his band mates when they were inducted into the Rock “N” Roll Hall of Fame on Apr. 14. They joined “Run-D.M.C.” (2009) and Grandmaster Flash and the Furious Five (2007) as the only groups to be inducted into the Hall.
Yauch leaves behind his wife Dechen Wangdu and their 13-year-old daughter Tenzin Losel.
The news of his passing rocked the music world and many shared their feelings about this major loss.
Via Twitter, actor Ben Stiller called Yauch, “A truly great musician and filmmaker. He stood for integrity as an artist.”
Former gangster rapper and actor Ice-T of NBC’s “Law & Order: Special Victim’s Unit” said on Twitter, “I’m going twitter silent today in honor of MCA. Rest in peace homie.”
Musician Lenny Kravitz also said on twitter, “ Rest in peace MCA. You are a legend. No Sleep till Brooklyn. ”
Yauch was born and raised in aforementioned Brooklyn, the son of Frances, a social worker and Noel Yauch, a painter and architect. Yauch’s father had been raised a Catholic and his mother was Jewish and he received a non-religious upbringing.
While attending Edward R. Murrow High School in the Midwood neighborhood of Brooklyn, Yauch taught himself how to play the bass guitar. He then formed the group the “Beastie Boys with John Berry, Kate Shellenbach and Mike D.
Their first performance was played on Yauch’s 17th birthday.
After dropping out of Bard College in Annandale-on -Hudson, NY after two years, he formed the group the Beastie Boys in 1979 as a hardcore punk band. They supported Bad Brains, the Dead Kennedys, the Misfits and Reagan Youth at venues that included Country BlueGrass and Blues, A7, Trudy Hellers Place and Max’s Kansas City, playing at the latter venue on its closing night.
After Berry left the group in 1983 and was replaced by guitarist of “The Young and the Useless,” the band recorded and then performed its first Hip Hop track “Cooky Puss,” which is based on a prank cal the group made to Carvel Ice Cream that year. The song was a major hit in New York underground dance clubs and night clubs upon its release.
The groups big break came in 1986 when they recorded their first album Licensed to Ill, which was well-received becoming the best selling rap album of the 1980s and the first rap album to reach No. 1 on the Billborad album chart, where it stayed for 35 days. It also reached No. 2 on the Urban album charts. The album also was Def Jam Records fastest selling debut record to date and sold over five million copies.
The first single from the album (You Gotta) Fight for Your Right (To Party!), reached the No. 7 spot on the Billboard Hot 100 and the music video became a staple on MTV.
Another hit from the album was one that Kravitz mentioned in his tweet to the passing of Yauch, which was No Sleep till Brooklyn.
In the years that followed, the Beastie Boys would record seven more albums Paul’s Boutique in 1988, Check Your Head in 1992, Ill Communication in 1994, Hello Nasty in 1997, To the 5 Boroughs in 2004, The Mix-up in 2007 and Hot Sauce Committee in 2009.
The amazing work by the Beastie Boys earned them 10 Grammy nominations winning two in 1999 and one in 2008. They won three MTV Video Music Awards (1998, 1999 and 2011) in eight tries and one MTV Europe Music Award in nine tries (1998).
Over the course of that span, they had four No. 1 albums and sold more than 40 million records and counting.
A big part of the Beastie Boys rise is to the all-time greatness, according to “Rolling Stone” magazine writer Simon Vozick-Levinson.
“That chemistry wouldn’t been complete without Adam Yauch. Without that sort of gravely raspy voice that he had,” Vozick-Levinson said.
“He had really just a incomparable energy. He had a really great sort of offbeat sense of humor.”
That incomparable energy allowed Yauch to have a second career as a filmmaker by building a recording studio called Oscilloscope Laboratories in New York City where he started an independent film distributing company called Oscilloscope Pictures.
In 2006 Yauch directed the 2006 Beastie Boys concert film, “Awesome; I ‘F-’ Shot That!,” although in the DVD extras for the film, its title character in “ A Day in the life of Nathanial Hornblower is played by actor David Cross.
Two years later, Yauch directed the 2008 film “Gunnin’ For That #1 Spot.” It was a film about eight high school basketball prospect at the Boost Mobile Elite 24 Hoops Classic at Rucker Park in Harlem, NY.
Yauch also produced Build A Nation, the comeback album from hardcore/punk band “Bad Brains.”
A year ago, Yauch received the Charles Flint Kellogg Award in Arts and Letters from Bard College, the place he attended for two years.
Besides being a great an all-time great artist and a solid filmmaker, Yauch was a practicing Buddhist. His involvement in his religion gave solid credibility in the Tibetan independence movement, which is one for independence of Tibet and the political separation of Tibet from the People’s Republic of China.
He created the Milarepa Fund, a non-profit organization that is devoted to Tibetan independence. It also an organization that puts together several concerts in support of the cause, which includes the Tibetan Freedom Concert, a series of rock festivals held in North America, Europe and Asia between 1996 and 2001 that took place from April to September.
The Beastie Boys were a music group that took their talents from Brooklyn, NY to the entire United States and beyond. Along the way they never forgot their roots.
Rolling Stone once said in headlining their early success from their first album License to Ill simply, “Three idiots create a masterpiece and what had begun in small clubs lead to a tour of arenas and a run that lasted more than a quarter or a century.”
They among all artists back then had the major benefit from the era of music videos.
The Beastie Boys became so popular that many years ago WABC use to have a show called “Hot Tracks” that aired from 1983-89 that was once hosted by former actors Darnell Williams and Debbi Morgan who portrayed super couple Angie and Jesse Hubbard on ABC’s “All My Children” from 1986-89, The Beastie Boys had their music videos showed regularly on the show.
Together they had seven platinum albums or better in an 18-year span. Worldwide they sold an aforementioned 40 million albums, “the biggest-selling rap group” since 1991. Their leader Adam Yauch created a group that made it cool to express yourself in a way that can be erratic, but exciting and something that fans, especially in the New York area gravitated toward. Along with that, he brought his creative imagination to the film industry and gave us a chance to see something different.
What the Beastie Boys and Yauch did more than anything is that they gave credibility to the rap music as well as the labels like Def Jam, Capitol and Oscilloscope, which allowed other acts like RUN DMC, Q-Tip, The Roots and Biz Markie to name a few to rise to stardom behind their own sound and lyrics.
“R.I.P. MCA from the Beastie Boys. He was an integral part of building Def Jam label that I am part of today. Condolences to the Fam [family],” Chris “Ludacris” Bridges, rapper and co-founder of Disturbing tha Peace, an imprint distributed by Def Jam Recordings.
Information and quotations are courtesy of 5/4/12 4 p.m. edition of WABC’s “Eyewitness News First at 4” with David Navarro and Liz Cho, report entertainment reporter Sandy Kenyon; 5/4/12 6:30 p.m. edition of “NBC Nightly News” with Brian Williams; 5/5/12 7 a.m. edition of “CBS This Morning” with Jeff Glor and Rebecca Jarvis, report from Brian Rooney; en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Beastie_Boys; en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Adam_Yauch; en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ludacris.
Tuesday, May 8, 2012
J-Speaks: Yankees Lose Their Closer
By his career numbers, he is not just one of the best relief pitchers of all-time, he is the true definition of what a closer is. He has done in the regular season and the postseason. More than anything is the fact that the greatest ability that he has is his availability. That is the reason he has been able to put together numbers that has been a major reason he has helped his team win a high number of games to get to the postseason as well as win in the postseason. Unfortunately on Thursday night in an instant doing something that he has done his entire career ended his season and possibly his Hall of Fame career.
On Thursday prior to their contest at the Kansas City Royals, New York Yankees relief closer Mariano Rivera while shagging fly balls in the outfield hit his right leg on the warning track tearing the Anterior Cruciate Ligament (ACL) and meniscus in his right leg.
Rivera, 42 will be lost for the rest of the season and likely his career could be over as well.
“Yeah this is bad. There’s no question about it. This is not what you come to Kansas City for to hear,” Yankees skipper Joe Girardi said on Thursday.
“It happened for a reason and just have to deal with it,” Rivera said on Thursday.
As to whether he can come back from this injury considering the fact that he is at the end of his long career Rivera said, “At this point I don’t. We have to face this first. All of that depends on how the rehab is going to happen. From there we see.”
By the numbers the “Bronx Bombers” are losing a major weapon that they have come to count on to win close games.
In 15 consecutive years, Rivera has recorded at least 20 saves, the longest streak in the major leagues and this season he has five saves in six tries. His 2.21 earned run average (ERA) is the lowest since 1920 among pitchers who have thrown at least 1,000 pitches and it is even better in the postseason with a 0.70 ERA in 141 innings pitched. In the postseason, his record is 8-1. He holds the record for most consecutive scoreless innings pitched with 34 1/3 and most save opportunities converted with 23. His 608 career saves are the most in MLB history and are exactly twice as many as the next closet to all come with one team. His record is 76-58 recording 1,119 strikeouts. He has made 12 all-star games and has helped the Yankees win five World Series titles (1996, 1998, 1999, 2000, 2009) and was the named World Series MVP in 1999.
An interesting fact about Rivera is the No. 42 jersey that he has worn in his 16-year career is not just the number of his age, it is also the number of saves he has recorded in the postseason, which is a MLB record.
ESPN NFL color analyst Jon Gruden has said that the best ability for a football player is their availability. You do not put up the kind of numbers that Rivera has in his Hall of Fame career without being very durable. In his career, he has appeared in 1,051 games in the regular season, the most by any pitcher in major league history. He also has finished a MLB record 892 games.
With those amazing stats and the fact that he has won five rings, why would Rivera consider coming back.
He answered that question via Twitter saying, “I’m coming back. Write it down in big letters. I’m not going out like this.”
He elaborated on his plans for a comeback with ESPN’s Pedro Gomez on Friday before Game 2 of the Yankees’ series with the Royals by saying, “I don’t want to go out because I hurt myself shagging fly balls. I just want to know that I ended it because I don’t want to do it anymore.”
Rivera also told Gomez that he believes that he can make a comeback at his age because of his “trust in the lord” and that he trust in his ability.
Boston Globe sports writer Bob Ryan echoed those same feelings when he said on ESPN’s “Pardon the Interruption” on Friday, “If there is a 42-year-old guy who be able to rehab properly, be fit and determined it would be Mariano Rivera.”
That rehab that Rivera will take on first begin with arthroscopic surgery to repair the ACL and meniscus and then rehab that will consist of physical therapy.
For those of you that are not aware of what the meniscus is, it is according to WABC Eyewitness News First at 4 medical reporter Dr. Sapna Parikh it is the shock absorbing cartilage in the knee.
According to Dr. Robert Gotlin New York’s Beth Israel Medical Center that 30 to 35 percent of people that have a tear in the meniscus do very well with pure old exercise, avoiding that which hurts. At Beth Israel, they try to heal their patients who have torn their meniscus with physical therapy, anti-inflammatory medications and injections that cushion the joint first. If that does work after a couple of months, then you may need surgery.
Another major factor in rehabilitating a tear in the meniscus is the individuals lifestyle, in particular the one of a professional athlete in which Rivera is.
Dr. Robert G. Marx, MD, a Sports Medicine Surgeon at the Hospital for Special Surgery in New York says that “Arthroscopic surgery can be extremely effective at relieving symptoms from a torn meniscus.”
Arthroscopic surgery though is not all black and white, especially if you have severe arthritis in your knee, which is when cartilage on the end of the bone is worn down and eventually there is no cartilage left at the end of the bone. It ends up being bone on bone and then the results of the surgery is unpredictable.
“That’s why its always worth it to get a second opinion and if you are a professional athlete like Mariano Rivera a doctor usually tries to be much more aggressive,” Dr. Parikh said on Friday.
“There more likely to operate sooner, but only if they think its worth it if it could save someone’s career.”
When a team loses a vital piece like Rivera, you find out very quickly how the team will respond. After dropping the first of the four-game set to the Royals 4-3 on Thursday, they came back to win on Friday 6-2. The team knows that not having Rivera for the remainder of the season will be tough, but they have to figure it out if they want to win another title.
“Mo is Mo. There’s never been anyone like him. There won’t be anyone like him,” Yankees’ Captain Derek Jeter said on Thursday.
“You can’t go out there and try to compare yourself to him. You just go out there and try to get outs and do your job.”
“Good teams find a way to overcome things and if we want to play in October were gonna have to find a way to overcome it,” Girardi said on Thursday.
Information, statistics and quotations are courtesy of www.newyork.yankees.mlb.com/schedule/index.jsp; en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mariano_Rivera; 5/5/12 edition of Daily News page 45; 5/4/12 4 p.m. edition of WABC’s “Eyewitness News First at 4” with Liz Cho and David Navarro, report from sports anchor Rob Powers and Dr. Sapna Parikh; 5/4/12 5:30 p.m. edition of ESPN’s “Pardon the Interruption” with Michael Wilbon and Boston Globe sports writer Bob Ryan 5/4/12 6 p.m. edition of ESPN’s “Sportscenter” with Briam Weinstein and John Anderson.
On Thursday prior to their contest at the Kansas City Royals, New York Yankees relief closer Mariano Rivera while shagging fly balls in the outfield hit his right leg on the warning track tearing the Anterior Cruciate Ligament (ACL) and meniscus in his right leg.
Rivera, 42 will be lost for the rest of the season and likely his career could be over as well.
“Yeah this is bad. There’s no question about it. This is not what you come to Kansas City for to hear,” Yankees skipper Joe Girardi said on Thursday.
“It happened for a reason and just have to deal with it,” Rivera said on Thursday.
As to whether he can come back from this injury considering the fact that he is at the end of his long career Rivera said, “At this point I don’t. We have to face this first. All of that depends on how the rehab is going to happen. From there we see.”
By the numbers the “Bronx Bombers” are losing a major weapon that they have come to count on to win close games.
In 15 consecutive years, Rivera has recorded at least 20 saves, the longest streak in the major leagues and this season he has five saves in six tries. His 2.21 earned run average (ERA) is the lowest since 1920 among pitchers who have thrown at least 1,000 pitches and it is even better in the postseason with a 0.70 ERA in 141 innings pitched. In the postseason, his record is 8-1. He holds the record for most consecutive scoreless innings pitched with 34 1/3 and most save opportunities converted with 23. His 608 career saves are the most in MLB history and are exactly twice as many as the next closet to all come with one team. His record is 76-58 recording 1,119 strikeouts. He has made 12 all-star games and has helped the Yankees win five World Series titles (1996, 1998, 1999, 2000, 2009) and was the named World Series MVP in 1999.
An interesting fact about Rivera is the No. 42 jersey that he has worn in his 16-year career is not just the number of his age, it is also the number of saves he has recorded in the postseason, which is a MLB record.
ESPN NFL color analyst Jon Gruden has said that the best ability for a football player is their availability. You do not put up the kind of numbers that Rivera has in his Hall of Fame career without being very durable. In his career, he has appeared in 1,051 games in the regular season, the most by any pitcher in major league history. He also has finished a MLB record 892 games.
With those amazing stats and the fact that he has won five rings, why would Rivera consider coming back.
He answered that question via Twitter saying, “I’m coming back. Write it down in big letters. I’m not going out like this.”
He elaborated on his plans for a comeback with ESPN’s Pedro Gomez on Friday before Game 2 of the Yankees’ series with the Royals by saying, “I don’t want to go out because I hurt myself shagging fly balls. I just want to know that I ended it because I don’t want to do it anymore.”
Rivera also told Gomez that he believes that he can make a comeback at his age because of his “trust in the lord” and that he trust in his ability.
Boston Globe sports writer Bob Ryan echoed those same feelings when he said on ESPN’s “Pardon the Interruption” on Friday, “If there is a 42-year-old guy who be able to rehab properly, be fit and determined it would be Mariano Rivera.”
That rehab that Rivera will take on first begin with arthroscopic surgery to repair the ACL and meniscus and then rehab that will consist of physical therapy.
For those of you that are not aware of what the meniscus is, it is according to WABC Eyewitness News First at 4 medical reporter Dr. Sapna Parikh it is the shock absorbing cartilage in the knee.
According to Dr. Robert Gotlin New York’s Beth Israel Medical Center that 30 to 35 percent of people that have a tear in the meniscus do very well with pure old exercise, avoiding that which hurts. At Beth Israel, they try to heal their patients who have torn their meniscus with physical therapy, anti-inflammatory medications and injections that cushion the joint first. If that does work after a couple of months, then you may need surgery.
Another major factor in rehabilitating a tear in the meniscus is the individuals lifestyle, in particular the one of a professional athlete in which Rivera is.
Dr. Robert G. Marx, MD, a Sports Medicine Surgeon at the Hospital for Special Surgery in New York says that “Arthroscopic surgery can be extremely effective at relieving symptoms from a torn meniscus.”
Arthroscopic surgery though is not all black and white, especially if you have severe arthritis in your knee, which is when cartilage on the end of the bone is worn down and eventually there is no cartilage left at the end of the bone. It ends up being bone on bone and then the results of the surgery is unpredictable.
“That’s why its always worth it to get a second opinion and if you are a professional athlete like Mariano Rivera a doctor usually tries to be much more aggressive,” Dr. Parikh said on Friday.
“There more likely to operate sooner, but only if they think its worth it if it could save someone’s career.”
When a team loses a vital piece like Rivera, you find out very quickly how the team will respond. After dropping the first of the four-game set to the Royals 4-3 on Thursday, they came back to win on Friday 6-2. The team knows that not having Rivera for the remainder of the season will be tough, but they have to figure it out if they want to win another title.
“Mo is Mo. There’s never been anyone like him. There won’t be anyone like him,” Yankees’ Captain Derek Jeter said on Thursday.
“You can’t go out there and try to compare yourself to him. You just go out there and try to get outs and do your job.”
“Good teams find a way to overcome things and if we want to play in October were gonna have to find a way to overcome it,” Girardi said on Thursday.
Information, statistics and quotations are courtesy of www.newyork.yankees.mlb.com/schedule/index.jsp; en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mariano_Rivera; 5/5/12 edition of Daily News page 45; 5/4/12 4 p.m. edition of WABC’s “Eyewitness News First at 4” with Liz Cho and David Navarro, report from sports anchor Rob Powers and Dr. Sapna Parikh; 5/4/12 5:30 p.m. edition of ESPN’s “Pardon the Interruption” with Michael Wilbon and Boston Globe sports writer Bob Ryan 5/4/12 6 p.m. edition of ESPN’s “Sportscenter” with Briam Weinstein and John Anderson.
Friday, May 4, 2012
J-Speaks: The Unexpected Passing of An NFL Legend
He was hailed as one of the finest football players at his position. Too many this player was the heart beat of both the National Football League (NFL) franchise he played 13 of his 20 years for. A pillar of the community that he played for. An inspiration to his teammates and other players past and present. A shoe in as a first ballot Hall of Famer. On Wednesday however this great competitor on the field and great person off of it left us unexpectedly.
On Wednesday, former NFL great linebacker Tiaina Baul “Junior” Seau, Jr. passed away at the age of 43. He was found dead by his girlfriend at his Oceanside, CA.
A 911 call was made to the Oceanside police at 10 a.m. West Coast time and it is believed that a housekeeper found Seau with a gunshot wound to his chest.
Oceanside Police Chief Frank McCoy said that the housekeeper indicated that she returned to the residence to find Mr. Seau unconscious suffering from the aforementioned gunshot wound to the chest, that according to reports was self-inflicted.
Police have been at the scene since responding to the 911 call and the number of people who have come to the scene has grown since Wednesday.
According to Oceanside Police Chief Frank McCoy Seau’s death is being investigated as a suicide, even though a suicide note was never found, but Seau’s ex-wife Gina, according to a report from the Associated Press said she received a text message saying simply, “I love you,” to her and their daughter and two sons.
Seau is survived by his aforementioned ex-wife who he married in 1991 and divorced in 2002 and their three kids. He is also survived by his father Tiaina Seau, Sr. and his mother Luisa who showed all of her emotion of the loss of her son to reporters on Wednesday.
“Thank you, I appreciate everybody’s over here show your love to my son,” Mrs. Seau said as she cried tears of unquestionable pain about the death of her son.
I don’t understand who do this to my son, but I pray to God, ‘Please take me. Take me, leave my son alone, but its too late.”
On the field, Seau was a fierce competitor who had a high motor that made him had an impact each and every game he was on the field.
In his 20-year NFL career in which he played with the San Diego Chargers for 13 of those years, which followed three years with the Miami Dolphins and his last four with the New England Patriots he recorded 1,849 tackles, had 56.5 sacks, 18 interceptions, three forced fumbles and 21 pass deflections.
He was voted to 12 consecutive Pro Bowls, 10 All-Pro teams. He played in two Super Bowls; Super Bowl XXIX in which they lost 49-26 to the San Francisco 49ers and in XLII to the New York Giants 17-14. He was named NFL Defensive Player of the Year in 1992; Named NFL Alumni Linebacker of the Year in 2003; Selected to the 1990s NFL All-Decade Team. On Nov. 27, 2011 in a game versus the Chargers’ American Football Conference (AFC) West Division rival the Denver Broncos at Qualcomm Stadium, Seau was inducted into the San Diego Chargers Hall of Fame being introduced by former fellow Charger and NFL Hall of Fame quarterback Dan Fouts before a crowd of close to 71,000 people. Two years earlier, Seau received another great honor by the Chargers organization when the team selected him and 52 other players and coaches as a part of their 50th Anniversary team.
Over the past two days since Seau’s passing many of his former teammates, many in the Chargers organization as well as many current players, coaches and many others associated with the NFL have come out and shared their feelings about what Junior Seau meant to them.
“Clearly he was the heart and soul of our franchise for 12, 13 years he played here,” Chargers President Dean Spanos said on Wednesday.”
“I heard somebody say no coach had to give any inspirational speeches because he clearly was the leader in that locker room.”
“Junior wanted to make sure when you saw him, he was at full strength,” former Charger teammate and current ESPN NFL analyst Marcellus Wiley said Wednesday.
“You didn’t want to see him in his weakest moments, but now I translate that to his personal life and I’m like, ‘We were there for you man. We knew you were a superstar. We knew you were a super person , but come out and tell us you needed us.’ ”
Via Twitter, New York Jets cornerback Darrelle Revis said he watched Seau as a kid and that “he represented a lot of great things.
Wide receiver Victor Cruz of the cross town rival Giants said, “Not Junior Seau! He was my idol growing up. True professional and role model to all.”
“No one had more passion for the game of football than Junior Seau,” Denver Broncos new quarterback Peyton Manning said.
“I was honored to call Junior a friend and I was deeply saddened by the news of his passing.”
ESPN’s Michael Smith said, “It’s terrible that I got to talk about part of my childhood as an NFL fan in this way. It’s really a tough day in the sports world cause a guy I grew up watching and everybody grew up enjoying watch play Junior Seau. The future Hall of Fame linebacker for the Chargers, the Dolphins and Patriots. We all know from the Chargers found dead in his home of an apparent gunshot wound. Just tragic for whatever the reasons are. Our hearts and sympathy go out to his three children, his ex-wife, all of his millions of fans everywhere, especially in the San Diego community. The teammates he leaves behind. Didn’t live long enough to see himself inducted into the Hall of Fame. Just sad.”
There are many asking how can this happen. How can someone who had everything going for them end it all just like that. Were their any signs.
One sign might be that two years ago, just a year after retiring from pro football, he was involved in a suspicious car accident in which he drove off a cliff and survived a 100-foot fall. He later said that the accident happened because he fell asleep at the wheel. It was reported that this incident happened after a domestic violence incident in his home.
What also makes the passing of Seau so unthinkable is that he became the eighth player from the 1994 Charger team that went to Super Bowl XXIX to pass away way too soon.
On Feb. 26, 2011 former Chargers defensive tackle Shawn Lee died from cardiac arrest brought on by double pneumonia at age 44. On Dec. 8, 2011 former Chargers outside linebacker Lewis Bush died of a heart attack at age 42. An enlarged heart is what claimed the life of former Chargers’ defensive end Chris Mims who was 38 years old at the time. Former center Curtis Whitley passed away on May 11, 2008 from a drug overdose in Texas. He was only 39 years of age. Back in 1998, backup linebacker Doug Miller, just 28 years old died after being struck by lighting. On May 11, 1996 backup tailback Rodney Culver died in a plane crash at just age 26 and just five months after the Chargers loss in Super Bowl XXIX starting linebacker David Griggs at just age 28 had his life taken in a car accident.
In the case of Seau’s passing his passing comes on the heels of the suicide of two former NFL players and the links to those comes from the numbers of hits those players have taken while playing in the NFL.
Back on Feb. 11, 2011 former Chicago Bears safety Dave Duerson passed away from a self-inflicted gunshot wound to the chest, which was found when a Miami-Dade County medical examiner reported. In a text message to his family, he wanted his brain to be used for research at the Boston University School of Medicine, which is now conducting research into Chronic Traumatic Encephalopathy (C.T.E.), a disease linked to memory loss, depression and dementia.
Two days ago researcher neurologists at the aforementioned Boston U. confirmed that Duerson, who played in the NFL for 10 seasons for the Bears, Giants and the then Phoenix Cardinals suffered from a neurodegenerative disease linked to concussions.
Last month, former Atlanta Falcons safety Ray Easterling, who played for the team from 1972-79 committed suicide. The 62-year-old was suffering from dementia.
Other former players who have passed on due to the effects from their career on the professional gridiron include former Pittsburgh Steelers offensive lineman Terry Long, who passed away seven years ago from drinking antifreeze and former Philadelphia Eagles and Arizona Cardinals safety Andre Waters committee suicide on Nov. 20, 2006. According to a report from the Hillsborough County Florida Sheriff’s Office, Waters died from a gunshot to his head. He was found at his home by his then girlfriend. No suicide note was found.
Right now more than 1,500 former players are now suing the league claiming that for years they have been ignoring evidence that shows how repeated blows to the head trigger C.T.E.
According to ABC News consultant Ret. U.S. Army General Peter Chiarell that in some instances that head trauma could be related to depression and depression at times can be a cause of suicide, but that is something that is not definitive.
“There’s some who say that the lag time between the damage that is done goes anywhere from 40 to 60 years,” Gen. Chiarell said on Wednesday.
Studies also show that high school football players are at risk for the effects of C.T.E. According to the Center for Disease Control and Prevention, two million brain injuries occur per year among teens playing football.
While Junior Seau really never showed any signs of having a concussion while he played in the NFL or even after former NFL offensive tackle Kyle Turley who knew Seau speculates that he may have paid a price for being a football great.
“He played hard, tough and there’s no doubt that the toile his brain took at the position he played it will most undoubtedly show that this is a factor,” Turley said.
Seau ex-wife Gina told the Associated Press that she didn’t know the effects from concussions contributed to her ex-husband’s death.
“We have no clues whatsoever. We’re as stunned and shocked as anyone else,” she said.
“We’re horribly saddened. We miss him and we’ll always love him.”
On top of that Seau’s neighbor Taylor Twellman revealed something from a conversation they had in 2008 that gave some very important incite.
Twellman told Seau that back in the aforementioned 2008 he suffered a serious concussion playing soccer when he was punched in the head by the opposing team’s goal keeper. When he met up with Seau four weeks later after the incident he mentioned that he had a real bad headache and that Seau tried to make him feel better by laughing about it and that he told him that he had so many concussions that he could not tell how many.
“ I didn’t put two and two together at the time, but when I heard the reports in 2010, I did my best two or three times to reach out because what I know about head injuries. What I know about concussions. Why I started a foundation,” Twellman said.
“He needed help, he just didn’t know how to get it.”
While it might have been too late to the life of Seau and those that passed on before him and after him, the NFL has taken a proactive approach to make the game safer.
It is why you have seen players in the last couple of years be fined a great deal for excessive hits on the field and even suspended.
The greatest example of that is what Commissioner Roger Goodell did to the New Orleans Saints suspending head coach Sean Payton for the entire 2012 season and his former defensive coordinator Gregg Williams indefinitely for their roles in the bounty scandal. Saints assistant coach Joe Vitt, the interim head coach for the 2012 season with the Saints will be suspended for the first six games of the upcoming season and General Manager Mickey Loomis received a suspension for the end of the 2012 preseason and the first eight games of 2012.
The NFL also suspended Saints linebacker Jonathan Vilma for the entire 2012 season. Saints defensive end Will Smith got a four-game suspension and former Saints’ linebacker, now with the Cleveland Browns got a three-game suspension and defensive end Anthony Hargrove, now with the Green Bay Packers received an eight-game suspension.
The NFL also fined the Saints $500,000 and stripped the team of this year’s pick in the 2nd round of the NFL Draft and in 2013.
“It was too harsh because this was the perfect thing for Roger Goodell to show everyone how serious he is about cleaning up violence,” Dan Le Batard said on his Dan Le Batard is Highly Questionable on Wednesday.
“So the penalty had to be echoing. It’s extreme. It’s unfair… but he’s making a symbolic statement to keep him and his league away from liability because the only thing that derails the NFL, this billion dollar money making machine is a billion dollar lawsuit from limping players walking through a courtroom.”
What also hurts the NFL name is kids who are fans of watching the game not playing because they see what can occur.
Going back to Seau, the NFL family just did not lose a great player, it lost the greatest representation of philanthropy off the field.
In his third season in the NFL Seau created the Junior Seau Foundation with its mission to educate and build confidence in young people through the support of preventing child abuse, drug and alcohol awareness, opportunities to participate in recreational activities, programs in education and efforts to battle juvenile delinquency.
The foundation since 2000 has given out an annual award to individuals that exemplify the mission of the Junior Seau Foundation.
The first 11 people to receive this great award are Sid Brooks (2000), former Charger wideout and Hall of Famer Lance Alworth (2001), former Chargers’ head coach Sid Gillman (2002), former Chargers head coach Don Coryell (2003), Hall of Fame tailback Marcus Allen (2004), Hall of Fame defensive end Deacon Jones (2005), National Champion head coach of the Georgia Tech Yellow Jackets of 1990 Bobby Ross (2006), Hall of Fame quarterback Warren Moon (2007) , NFL Network analyst Marshall Faulk (2008), Hall of Fame wideout Charlie Joiner (2009), FOX Sports NFL color analyst and Super Bowl champion John Lynch (2010) and NBA champion, Basketball Hall of Famer and NBA color analyst Bill Walton (2011).
“As talented as he was… a sure fire Hall of Famer, he was just as excellent off the field with his foundation activities, that principally benefited children,” said CBS Special Correspondent James Brown.
Brown also said how blessed he was to give Seau a JB Award that he does in conjunction with the NFL Players Association, which is given to players who commit significantly to building stronger communities and stronger families.
Former Chargers fullback Lorenzo Neal told ESPN’s Tom Friend on Thursday that at a recent event Seau raised $500,000.
“This guy was a pillar in San Diego…He was doing so many good things,” Neal said.
Patriots CEO and chairman Robert Kraft felt that Seau was also pillar in the Boston community as well.
Kraft called Seau “a true Patriot,” and he remembers one time that he sent him a letter within a few weeks after the passing of his wife Myra on July 20, 2011 from cancer.
The letter said, “I’m so sorry about the passing of Mrs. Kraft. She was an inspiration to me. I’ve so much respect for all she did to help people lead better lives. I will always be there for you and your family. Junior Seau. Love you buddy.”
Kraft said on Thursday that Seau would always say “love you buddy,” to him and in the letter he enclosed a check to the Myra Kraft Giving Back Fund.
Neal also revealed about how Seau and so many other great players sometimes reach the end of their rope after retiring from the NFL.
“People don’t understand its still 60 minutes. That four hours that your on the field and being around your guys and around that locker room,” Neal said.
“That’s your sanctuary. Once your not in that locker room and you don’t have that, a part of you dies. That was the highlight of your life.”
When someone like Junior Seau’s life ends, in this case way too soon, one of the questions that is asked what is his legacy and how will he be remembered?
James Brown says of Seau, “He was a competitor supreme on the football field. Highly respected, but just as revered off the field.”
Patriots head coach Bill Belichick said, “Of all the players I have coached, nobody was more full of energy and vitality than Junior Seau. He respected and inspired every single person he came in contact with-players, coaches and support staff. He’s defied the odds by playing two decades in the NFL at a level and with a youthful spirit rarely seen but appreciated by everyone. Junior will always be remembered as an intense Hall of Fame player from the old school.”
The NFL community lost a great player who competed like no other. The city of San Diego lost a local hero that gave back to those that made their life just a little better on the field and off of it. More than anything a mother and father lost a son. Their four children lost a sibling and a son lost a family.
On Thursday, Seau’s son Tyler, one of his cousins and one of Junior’s best friends did something that his father did almost everyday. They went to the ocean across the street where Tyler’s father lived and they jumped into the cold water without wetsuits and they body surfed and paddle boarded. Earlier in the day the cousins ran on the strand, something that Seau also did everyday.
The family plans to have a memorial service in honor of Junior Seau at his home on Sunday at 12 p.m. West Coast time. They will have what is called a paddle out because Seau was called a water man.
“My brother was a loving brother. A caring citizen” Seau’s sister said on Wednesday.
“So I would appreciate if you guys would just please honor his last day and give us some kind of peace and privacy.”
Information, statistics and quotations are courtesy of 5/2/12 4 p.m. edition of ESPN 2’s Bottom Line Breaking News report during the edition of “Numbers Never Lie” with Charissa Thompson, Michael Smith and Jemele Hill; 5/2/12 4:30 p.m. edition of “Dan Le Batard Is Highly Questionable” with Dan Le Batard and his father Gonzalo Le Batard; 5/2/12 4 p.m. edition of WABC “Eyewitness News First at 4” with David Navarro and Liz Cho-report from Sandra Bookman; 5/2/12 5 p.m. edition of WABC “Eyewitness News at 5” with Diana William and Sade Baderinwa-report from Jim Dolan; 5/2/12 6:30 p.m. edition of ABC’s “World News” with Diane Sawyer-report from David Wright; 5/2/12 5 p.m. edition of ESPN’s “Around The Horn,” with Toni Reali; 5/3/12 6 a.m. edition of Headline News’ “Morning Express” with Robin Meade-report from sports anchor Carlos Diaz; 5/3/12 7 a.m. edition of “CBS This Morning” with Charlie Rose, Erica Hill and Gayle King-report from John Blackstone and special correspondent James Brown; 5/3/12 6 p.m. edition of ESPN’s “Sportscenter” with Kevin Connors and John Anderson; en.wikipedia.org; www.pro-football-reference.com/teams/sdg/1994.htm; www.nfl.com/news/story/09000d5d8287ac55/article/formeratlantafalconssafetyrayeasterlingatage62.
On Wednesday, former NFL great linebacker Tiaina Baul “Junior” Seau, Jr. passed away at the age of 43. He was found dead by his girlfriend at his Oceanside, CA.
A 911 call was made to the Oceanside police at 10 a.m. West Coast time and it is believed that a housekeeper found Seau with a gunshot wound to his chest.
Oceanside Police Chief Frank McCoy said that the housekeeper indicated that she returned to the residence to find Mr. Seau unconscious suffering from the aforementioned gunshot wound to the chest, that according to reports was self-inflicted.
Police have been at the scene since responding to the 911 call and the number of people who have come to the scene has grown since Wednesday.
According to Oceanside Police Chief Frank McCoy Seau’s death is being investigated as a suicide, even though a suicide note was never found, but Seau’s ex-wife Gina, according to a report from the Associated Press said she received a text message saying simply, “I love you,” to her and their daughter and two sons.
Seau is survived by his aforementioned ex-wife who he married in 1991 and divorced in 2002 and their three kids. He is also survived by his father Tiaina Seau, Sr. and his mother Luisa who showed all of her emotion of the loss of her son to reporters on Wednesday.
“Thank you, I appreciate everybody’s over here show your love to my son,” Mrs. Seau said as she cried tears of unquestionable pain about the death of her son.
I don’t understand who do this to my son, but I pray to God, ‘Please take me. Take me, leave my son alone, but its too late.”
On the field, Seau was a fierce competitor who had a high motor that made him had an impact each and every game he was on the field.
In his 20-year NFL career in which he played with the San Diego Chargers for 13 of those years, which followed three years with the Miami Dolphins and his last four with the New England Patriots he recorded 1,849 tackles, had 56.5 sacks, 18 interceptions, three forced fumbles and 21 pass deflections.
He was voted to 12 consecutive Pro Bowls, 10 All-Pro teams. He played in two Super Bowls; Super Bowl XXIX in which they lost 49-26 to the San Francisco 49ers and in XLII to the New York Giants 17-14. He was named NFL Defensive Player of the Year in 1992; Named NFL Alumni Linebacker of the Year in 2003; Selected to the 1990s NFL All-Decade Team. On Nov. 27, 2011 in a game versus the Chargers’ American Football Conference (AFC) West Division rival the Denver Broncos at Qualcomm Stadium, Seau was inducted into the San Diego Chargers Hall of Fame being introduced by former fellow Charger and NFL Hall of Fame quarterback Dan Fouts before a crowd of close to 71,000 people. Two years earlier, Seau received another great honor by the Chargers organization when the team selected him and 52 other players and coaches as a part of their 50th Anniversary team.
Over the past two days since Seau’s passing many of his former teammates, many in the Chargers organization as well as many current players, coaches and many others associated with the NFL have come out and shared their feelings about what Junior Seau meant to them.
“Clearly he was the heart and soul of our franchise for 12, 13 years he played here,” Chargers President Dean Spanos said on Wednesday.”
“I heard somebody say no coach had to give any inspirational speeches because he clearly was the leader in that locker room.”
“Junior wanted to make sure when you saw him, he was at full strength,” former Charger teammate and current ESPN NFL analyst Marcellus Wiley said Wednesday.
“You didn’t want to see him in his weakest moments, but now I translate that to his personal life and I’m like, ‘We were there for you man. We knew you were a superstar. We knew you were a super person , but come out and tell us you needed us.’ ”
Via Twitter, New York Jets cornerback Darrelle Revis said he watched Seau as a kid and that “he represented a lot of great things.
Wide receiver Victor Cruz of the cross town rival Giants said, “Not Junior Seau! He was my idol growing up. True professional and role model to all.”
“No one had more passion for the game of football than Junior Seau,” Denver Broncos new quarterback Peyton Manning said.
“I was honored to call Junior a friend and I was deeply saddened by the news of his passing.”
ESPN’s Michael Smith said, “It’s terrible that I got to talk about part of my childhood as an NFL fan in this way. It’s really a tough day in the sports world cause a guy I grew up watching and everybody grew up enjoying watch play Junior Seau. The future Hall of Fame linebacker for the Chargers, the Dolphins and Patriots. We all know from the Chargers found dead in his home of an apparent gunshot wound. Just tragic for whatever the reasons are. Our hearts and sympathy go out to his three children, his ex-wife, all of his millions of fans everywhere, especially in the San Diego community. The teammates he leaves behind. Didn’t live long enough to see himself inducted into the Hall of Fame. Just sad.”
There are many asking how can this happen. How can someone who had everything going for them end it all just like that. Were their any signs.
One sign might be that two years ago, just a year after retiring from pro football, he was involved in a suspicious car accident in which he drove off a cliff and survived a 100-foot fall. He later said that the accident happened because he fell asleep at the wheel. It was reported that this incident happened after a domestic violence incident in his home.
What also makes the passing of Seau so unthinkable is that he became the eighth player from the 1994 Charger team that went to Super Bowl XXIX to pass away way too soon.
On Feb. 26, 2011 former Chargers defensive tackle Shawn Lee died from cardiac arrest brought on by double pneumonia at age 44. On Dec. 8, 2011 former Chargers outside linebacker Lewis Bush died of a heart attack at age 42. An enlarged heart is what claimed the life of former Chargers’ defensive end Chris Mims who was 38 years old at the time. Former center Curtis Whitley passed away on May 11, 2008 from a drug overdose in Texas. He was only 39 years of age. Back in 1998, backup linebacker Doug Miller, just 28 years old died after being struck by lighting. On May 11, 1996 backup tailback Rodney Culver died in a plane crash at just age 26 and just five months after the Chargers loss in Super Bowl XXIX starting linebacker David Griggs at just age 28 had his life taken in a car accident.
In the case of Seau’s passing his passing comes on the heels of the suicide of two former NFL players and the links to those comes from the numbers of hits those players have taken while playing in the NFL.
Back on Feb. 11, 2011 former Chicago Bears safety Dave Duerson passed away from a self-inflicted gunshot wound to the chest, which was found when a Miami-Dade County medical examiner reported. In a text message to his family, he wanted his brain to be used for research at the Boston University School of Medicine, which is now conducting research into Chronic Traumatic Encephalopathy (C.T.E.), a disease linked to memory loss, depression and dementia.
Two days ago researcher neurologists at the aforementioned Boston U. confirmed that Duerson, who played in the NFL for 10 seasons for the Bears, Giants and the then Phoenix Cardinals suffered from a neurodegenerative disease linked to concussions.
Last month, former Atlanta Falcons safety Ray Easterling, who played for the team from 1972-79 committed suicide. The 62-year-old was suffering from dementia.
Other former players who have passed on due to the effects from their career on the professional gridiron include former Pittsburgh Steelers offensive lineman Terry Long, who passed away seven years ago from drinking antifreeze and former Philadelphia Eagles and Arizona Cardinals safety Andre Waters committee suicide on Nov. 20, 2006. According to a report from the Hillsborough County Florida Sheriff’s Office, Waters died from a gunshot to his head. He was found at his home by his then girlfriend. No suicide note was found.
Right now more than 1,500 former players are now suing the league claiming that for years they have been ignoring evidence that shows how repeated blows to the head trigger C.T.E.
According to ABC News consultant Ret. U.S. Army General Peter Chiarell that in some instances that head trauma could be related to depression and depression at times can be a cause of suicide, but that is something that is not definitive.
“There’s some who say that the lag time between the damage that is done goes anywhere from 40 to 60 years,” Gen. Chiarell said on Wednesday.
Studies also show that high school football players are at risk for the effects of C.T.E. According to the Center for Disease Control and Prevention, two million brain injuries occur per year among teens playing football.
While Junior Seau really never showed any signs of having a concussion while he played in the NFL or even after former NFL offensive tackle Kyle Turley who knew Seau speculates that he may have paid a price for being a football great.
“He played hard, tough and there’s no doubt that the toile his brain took at the position he played it will most undoubtedly show that this is a factor,” Turley said.
Seau ex-wife Gina told the Associated Press that she didn’t know the effects from concussions contributed to her ex-husband’s death.
“We have no clues whatsoever. We’re as stunned and shocked as anyone else,” she said.
“We’re horribly saddened. We miss him and we’ll always love him.”
On top of that Seau’s neighbor Taylor Twellman revealed something from a conversation they had in 2008 that gave some very important incite.
Twellman told Seau that back in the aforementioned 2008 he suffered a serious concussion playing soccer when he was punched in the head by the opposing team’s goal keeper. When he met up with Seau four weeks later after the incident he mentioned that he had a real bad headache and that Seau tried to make him feel better by laughing about it and that he told him that he had so many concussions that he could not tell how many.
“ I didn’t put two and two together at the time, but when I heard the reports in 2010, I did my best two or three times to reach out because what I know about head injuries. What I know about concussions. Why I started a foundation,” Twellman said.
“He needed help, he just didn’t know how to get it.”
While it might have been too late to the life of Seau and those that passed on before him and after him, the NFL has taken a proactive approach to make the game safer.
It is why you have seen players in the last couple of years be fined a great deal for excessive hits on the field and even suspended.
The greatest example of that is what Commissioner Roger Goodell did to the New Orleans Saints suspending head coach Sean Payton for the entire 2012 season and his former defensive coordinator Gregg Williams indefinitely for their roles in the bounty scandal. Saints assistant coach Joe Vitt, the interim head coach for the 2012 season with the Saints will be suspended for the first six games of the upcoming season and General Manager Mickey Loomis received a suspension for the end of the 2012 preseason and the first eight games of 2012.
The NFL also suspended Saints linebacker Jonathan Vilma for the entire 2012 season. Saints defensive end Will Smith got a four-game suspension and former Saints’ linebacker, now with the Cleveland Browns got a three-game suspension and defensive end Anthony Hargrove, now with the Green Bay Packers received an eight-game suspension.
The NFL also fined the Saints $500,000 and stripped the team of this year’s pick in the 2nd round of the NFL Draft and in 2013.
“It was too harsh because this was the perfect thing for Roger Goodell to show everyone how serious he is about cleaning up violence,” Dan Le Batard said on his Dan Le Batard is Highly Questionable on Wednesday.
“So the penalty had to be echoing. It’s extreme. It’s unfair… but he’s making a symbolic statement to keep him and his league away from liability because the only thing that derails the NFL, this billion dollar money making machine is a billion dollar lawsuit from limping players walking through a courtroom.”
What also hurts the NFL name is kids who are fans of watching the game not playing because they see what can occur.
Going back to Seau, the NFL family just did not lose a great player, it lost the greatest representation of philanthropy off the field.
In his third season in the NFL Seau created the Junior Seau Foundation with its mission to educate and build confidence in young people through the support of preventing child abuse, drug and alcohol awareness, opportunities to participate in recreational activities, programs in education and efforts to battle juvenile delinquency.
The foundation since 2000 has given out an annual award to individuals that exemplify the mission of the Junior Seau Foundation.
The first 11 people to receive this great award are Sid Brooks (2000), former Charger wideout and Hall of Famer Lance Alworth (2001), former Chargers’ head coach Sid Gillman (2002), former Chargers head coach Don Coryell (2003), Hall of Fame tailback Marcus Allen (2004), Hall of Fame defensive end Deacon Jones (2005), National Champion head coach of the Georgia Tech Yellow Jackets of 1990 Bobby Ross (2006), Hall of Fame quarterback Warren Moon (2007) , NFL Network analyst Marshall Faulk (2008), Hall of Fame wideout Charlie Joiner (2009), FOX Sports NFL color analyst and Super Bowl champion John Lynch (2010) and NBA champion, Basketball Hall of Famer and NBA color analyst Bill Walton (2011).
“As talented as he was… a sure fire Hall of Famer, he was just as excellent off the field with his foundation activities, that principally benefited children,” said CBS Special Correspondent James Brown.
Brown also said how blessed he was to give Seau a JB Award that he does in conjunction with the NFL Players Association, which is given to players who commit significantly to building stronger communities and stronger families.
Former Chargers fullback Lorenzo Neal told ESPN’s Tom Friend on Thursday that at a recent event Seau raised $500,000.
“This guy was a pillar in San Diego…He was doing so many good things,” Neal said.
Patriots CEO and chairman Robert Kraft felt that Seau was also pillar in the Boston community as well.
Kraft called Seau “a true Patriot,” and he remembers one time that he sent him a letter within a few weeks after the passing of his wife Myra on July 20, 2011 from cancer.
The letter said, “I’m so sorry about the passing of Mrs. Kraft. She was an inspiration to me. I’ve so much respect for all she did to help people lead better lives. I will always be there for you and your family. Junior Seau. Love you buddy.”
Kraft said on Thursday that Seau would always say “love you buddy,” to him and in the letter he enclosed a check to the Myra Kraft Giving Back Fund.
Neal also revealed about how Seau and so many other great players sometimes reach the end of their rope after retiring from the NFL.
“People don’t understand its still 60 minutes. That four hours that your on the field and being around your guys and around that locker room,” Neal said.
“That’s your sanctuary. Once your not in that locker room and you don’t have that, a part of you dies. That was the highlight of your life.”
When someone like Junior Seau’s life ends, in this case way too soon, one of the questions that is asked what is his legacy and how will he be remembered?
James Brown says of Seau, “He was a competitor supreme on the football field. Highly respected, but just as revered off the field.”
Patriots head coach Bill Belichick said, “Of all the players I have coached, nobody was more full of energy and vitality than Junior Seau. He respected and inspired every single person he came in contact with-players, coaches and support staff. He’s defied the odds by playing two decades in the NFL at a level and with a youthful spirit rarely seen but appreciated by everyone. Junior will always be remembered as an intense Hall of Fame player from the old school.”
The NFL community lost a great player who competed like no other. The city of San Diego lost a local hero that gave back to those that made their life just a little better on the field and off of it. More than anything a mother and father lost a son. Their four children lost a sibling and a son lost a family.
On Thursday, Seau’s son Tyler, one of his cousins and one of Junior’s best friends did something that his father did almost everyday. They went to the ocean across the street where Tyler’s father lived and they jumped into the cold water without wetsuits and they body surfed and paddle boarded. Earlier in the day the cousins ran on the strand, something that Seau also did everyday.
The family plans to have a memorial service in honor of Junior Seau at his home on Sunday at 12 p.m. West Coast time. They will have what is called a paddle out because Seau was called a water man.
“My brother was a loving brother. A caring citizen” Seau’s sister said on Wednesday.
“So I would appreciate if you guys would just please honor his last day and give us some kind of peace and privacy.”
Information, statistics and quotations are courtesy of 5/2/12 4 p.m. edition of ESPN 2’s Bottom Line Breaking News report during the edition of “Numbers Never Lie” with Charissa Thompson, Michael Smith and Jemele Hill; 5/2/12 4:30 p.m. edition of “Dan Le Batard Is Highly Questionable” with Dan Le Batard and his father Gonzalo Le Batard; 5/2/12 4 p.m. edition of WABC “Eyewitness News First at 4” with David Navarro and Liz Cho-report from Sandra Bookman; 5/2/12 5 p.m. edition of WABC “Eyewitness News at 5” with Diana William and Sade Baderinwa-report from Jim Dolan; 5/2/12 6:30 p.m. edition of ABC’s “World News” with Diane Sawyer-report from David Wright; 5/2/12 5 p.m. edition of ESPN’s “Around The Horn,” with Toni Reali; 5/3/12 6 a.m. edition of Headline News’ “Morning Express” with Robin Meade-report from sports anchor Carlos Diaz; 5/3/12 7 a.m. edition of “CBS This Morning” with Charlie Rose, Erica Hill and Gayle King-report from John Blackstone and special correspondent James Brown; 5/3/12 6 p.m. edition of ESPN’s “Sportscenter” with Kevin Connors and John Anderson; en.wikipedia.org; www.pro-football-reference.com/teams/sdg/1994.htm; www.nfl.com/news/story/09000d5d8287ac55/article/formeratlantafalconssafetyrayeasterlingatage62.
Monday, April 30, 2012
J-Speaks: The Passing of “America’s Oldest Teenager”
He was one of the finest people ever on the small screen. He was the one that turned a local television show in Philadelphia, PA into one of the finest, ground breaking shows in television history. He was one person that was always there for you on Dec. 31st ready to party whether you were in Times Square or watching on television. His young looks earned him the nickname “America’s Oldest Teenager.” With that being said he was one special businessman whose worth came to be close to $100 million dollars. Unfortunately with all of his youthful spirit and energy, father time did catch up with him and on Wednesday Apr. 18 he was gone.
Last Wednesday Rock ‘N’ Roll legend Dick Clark passed away from a massive heart attack. He was 82 years old. He is survived by his wife Kari Wigton and his three children Richard, Duane and Cindy. He had been married on two other occasions to Barbara Malley (1952-1961) and Loretta Martin (1962-1971).
In a statement The Walt Disney Company Chairman and Chief Executive Officer Bog Igor said in a statement, “We’re proud that ABC was home to those programs and will always be part of his legacy. We send our sincere condolences to Dick’s family, as well as the three generations of fans who will miss him as much as we do.”
Clark was born Richard Wagstaff Clark on Nov. 30, 1929 in Mt. Vernon, NY, Clark graduated from his hometown high school and went to college at Syracuse University where he began his legendary career as a radio disc jockey, which he would eventually parlay into a $100 million dollar media empire that he built on a laid back persona that was first perfected on a local television show called, “American Bandstand.”
The show was gave the baby boomers a place to go and dance to the latest music as well as the place where some of the latest acts performed and some even turned those performances into the big break and shot them to stardom.
Among the acts that appeared on “American Bandstand” that are household names today include Madonna, who made her debut to the music world. Cher, Barry Manilow, the rock group KISS, Elvis, Billy Haley (“Rock Around the Clock”), David Bowe, Frankie Avalon and Nick Jagger just to name a few.
“We knew we had arrived when we did your show,” Cher said last Wednesday.
“You were so sweet to us and I was so terrified, but once we got there it was fun and it was great.”
“Dick Clark was involved in the earliest exposure of the band. His contribution to American music and to Rock ‘N’ Roll and bringing it into the homes of America is immeasurable. He is the one who did it. He‘s Dick Clark” Paul Stanley of KISS said.
The show gave Rock ‘N’ Roll music a place to build its audience and to persuade those that were skeptical that it was okay to listen to. Within a year of taking over the show at age 26 back in 1956 when it was just a local show in Philadelphia, it was syndicated nationally behind Clark’s clean cut image and sanitized Rock ’N’ Roll in a way that made it safe for parents to allow their teens to watch it on television
“I don’t think there’s anything really very mysterious about the younger generation,” Clark said one time on CBS’s “Person to Person” with Edward R. Morrow.
“for the very first time in their lives, they’ve been able to look in on their children having fun doing what they like to do. They finally got a common ground of understanding so they can talk to one another for a change.”
Manilow echoed those same feelings about the show when he said, “American Bandstand had the biggest impact on all of us kids because it gave a voice to teenagers that were always just being told to got to bed or go to your room and suddenly Bick cam on the air and gave us respect and treated us like people and we had a voice.”
He Clark’s show also introduce the world to African American musical talents like The Jackson Five, Chubby Checker and disco legend Donna Summer.
Checker who introduced America to “The Twist,” which went No. 1 twice said, “If Elvis was the king of Rock ‘N’ Roll then Dick Clark is the king of all disc jockeys. Before Chubby Checker came on ‘American Bandstand’ they did ‘The Swing.’ Chubby Checker came on ‘American Bandstand’ with ‘The Twist.’ ”
Music legend Stevie Wonder said about Dick Clark having African American acts on his show that it “bridged a color gap at a time when there should not have been one. Giving musical life to black artist that may not have had a chance. He gave music freedom equal opportunity.”
“It’s a sad day for the music industry and the world,” Disco legend Donna Summer said in a statement last Wednesday.
“He was a legend a true gentleman and most importantly a dear friend to me.”
At its peak “American Bandstand” played to 20 million viewers. The show was on from 1957-1989 on ABC. He gave us 10,000 performances by the all-time greatest artist that 20th century that got their first big break on the show.
At age 28 Clark’s show had a confined weekly audience of 50 million Americans at least and he received 50,000 letters a week from teenage fans, which earned him the title America’s “oldest teenager.”
“I have a terrible problem because people keep referring to me as America’s oldest living teenager,” Clark once said. “If you want to stay young looking, just pick your parents carefully. The minute you mentally atrophy and freeze in time, you are old.”
His ageless looks very often were a punch line from so many famous faces like George Burns who said, “I’ve been watching Dick Clark ever since I was a little kid.”
Behind those good looks and effervescent charm was a business man ahead of his time. He investment company Dick Clark Productions into game shows like the “$25,000 Pyramid,” “Rate-A-Record,” “Bloopers” and “This is Your Life” and he became a commercial pitch man for some major companies.
“Dick Clark had one of the most remarkable careers in television history. He defined pretty much what we know as reality programming,” Ron Simon of the Paley Center for Media said.
His production company is also responsible for putting together two of the greatest award shows that are a major part of the landscape now. “The Golden Globes” is the prelude to award shows like “The Academy Music Awards” and “The American Music Awards” are the prelude in the music world to “The Grammys.”
To show how big of a mark Dick Clark made on television, at one time he was on all three major network CBS, ABC and NBC seven nights a week. His media empire that he built when he passed last Wednesday was worth more than $100 million
“He wasn’t just the star of it. He was really the conceptualizer of it and he understood the market,” Fred Goodman, former writer for “Rolling Stone” magazine said.
“There were two Dick Clark’s. There was the Dick Clark who was the performer. The guy with the beautiful smile, those twinkly eyes and then there was Dick Clark the businessman,” said radio personality Cousin Brucie.
Clark’s biggest impact on American television came each and every Dec. 31 when he would bring in the New Year in Times Square in New York City as host of Dick Clark’s Rockin New Year’s Eve on ABC.
No matter if you were by yourself, with your significant other or just with family, he was always on the tube to bring in the New Year ever since the middle of the 1970’s.
His long streak came to an end eight years ago when he suffered a minor stroke on Dec. 8, 2004.
According to Clark’s spokesperson Amy Streibel, Clark was hospitalized, but was expected to be okay and he was.
Taking Clark’s place on Dec. 31, 2004 was hosted by Regis Philbin, who during the show sent his best wishes to Clark, who returned one year later and he brought along Ryan Seacrest and Hillary Duff as co-host.
Back in Aug. of 2005, it was announced that Seacrest, who is also the host of “American Idol” and is also a radio personality that he would take over as the sole host of the New Year’s Eve show on ABC, which he has done the past six years, should Clark decide to retire or be unable to continue.
“I remember as a kid I was allowed to stay up and watch Dick Clark with the head set and the microphone and the big ABC logo. I just thought it was the coolest thing in the world,” Seacrest said.
“I was always impressed with how he could make you feel so comfortable. You would watch at home and you would feel like you were part of the party. You felt like was just talking to you. I think that is one of his amazing talents.”
One year after making his return to our living rooms on New Year’s Eve, he made his return to the Emmy’s where he had many nights of victory, he came back a broadcast and Rock ‘N’ Roll Hall of Famer.
There are very few people who can have an impact in life, particularly in the music world without singing a tune or playing an instrument. That is the kind of impact Dick Clark had on the music industry and television. Along the way he made long lasting friendships and brought joy to those that watched him in person or on the small screen.
On Twitter many celebrities sent their condolences to Clark and their fondest memories.
Russell Simmons said, “Clark was eternally young. No matter what culturally phenomenon was happening, he always embraced it.”
Actress Melissa Joan Hart said on Twitter, “Thanks for entertaining my family for decades! New Year’s Eve won’t be the same ever again!
Singer Fergie said, “Dick Clark will be truly missed. We will carry on his legacy every New Year’s Eve.”
Rapper and actor Snoop Dogg, “REST IN PEACE to the Dick Clark !! U were pioneer n a good man!! Thank U Sir.”
We will definitely as Hart and Fergie said we will miss him on New Year’s Eve. He was always there to bring in the New Year with all us in North America from the middle of the 1970s to his last appearance in Dec. 31, 2011 giving a big kiss to his wife at the stroke of midnight.
One Dick Clark Rockin New Year’s Eve that stands out among all the rest is the one after Sept. 11, 2001, which is when he said before the stroke of midnight, “New Yorkers are resilient. They are strong.”
“For 40 years he has spent New Year’s Eve celebrating with us here in Time Square and he brought America with him. This is New Year’s Eve and he’s Mr. New Year’s Eve,” Lori Raimondo of the Times Square Alliance said to WABC Eyewitness News reporter Lauren Glassberg.
There are very few of us who know at an early age what we want to do with the rest of our lives. At age 13 Clark walked into a radio studio and he saw two guys do a radio and he said “Wow what a great way to make a living.”
He made a great living and built an empire that made millions of dollars, brought great entertainment to the masses, broke barriers along the way. He had a way of touching people and giving them confidence to be their best when that time came and they were. Above all he never forgot his routes, which made it even more amazing that he spent the last night of the year in an area he knows very well, especially future generations of those from his hometown.
“Having them feel a sense of pride in this community in the fact that they attend a school with such a rich tradition and rich history,” Mr. Vernon High School Principal Ronald Gonzalez said about its famous alum and Hall of Famer Dick Clark.
In his “Let Me Finish…” segment on his MSNBC show “Hardball” Philadelphia native Chris Matthews said last Wednesday, “I was thinking about my paper boy days back when I spent all those slow summer afternoons delivering The Philadelphia Bulletin along the boarder between Montgomery County, PA and Bucks County PA. It was a long lonely route about five miles and I had to ride my bike a mile just to get to it, but there was something ideal about it given all that’s happen since off course. I was thinking late today about that because I remember standing at the doorway of somebody on a Friday afternoon. That was collection day waiting for the customer to get me that $.30 for the week of newspapers and listening to Bandstand on the TV set. Bandstand was a big deal back then, especially for teenagers. It was a place each afternoon, our place where kids a little older than me became celebrities just for showing up after school to dance to the latest music. Celebrities with names like Mary, South Philly. The host of that show was off course Dick Clark, who died today. I wonder where all those kids were when they got the news. Probably over in Jersey most of them. Some of them still hanging on now in their 70s in the old narrow streets of South Philadelphia. Dick Clark had a wonderful way of connecting to those kids. Us kids. He cared about our music. About our fun. He actually cared about us. He was a little older, but not a day less hip. So tonight I want to say how much I share in all of this. We Philly people were very proud, really proud that ‘Bandstand’ started in our old neighborhoods and I say best to you Mr. Clark and also to Mary wherever you are who made South Philly such famous part of our great country. Long before Rocky. Long before even cheese steaks.”
Information and quotations are courtesy of 5/18/12 5 p.m. edition of WABC Eyewitness News with Diana Williams and Sade Baderinwa, who was substituted by David Navarro, reports from entertainment reporter Sandy Kenyon and reporter Lauren Glassberg; 5/18/12 7 p.m. edition of “The Insider” on WCBS with Brooke Anderson and Kevin Frazier; 5/18/12 6:30 p.m. edition of “CBS Evening News” with Scott Pelley, report from Anthony Mason; en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dick_Clark; 5/18/12 5 p.m. edition of MSNBC’s “Hardball” with Chris Matthews; 5/18/12 11 p.m. edition of WABC Eyewitness News with Bill Ritter and Sade Baderinwa, substituted by Liz Cho, reports from entertainment reporter Sandy Kenyon and reporter Jen Maxfield; 5/18/12 11:35 p.m. edition of ABC News “Nightline” with Bill Weir.
Last Wednesday Rock ‘N’ Roll legend Dick Clark passed away from a massive heart attack. He was 82 years old. He is survived by his wife Kari Wigton and his three children Richard, Duane and Cindy. He had been married on two other occasions to Barbara Malley (1952-1961) and Loretta Martin (1962-1971).
In a statement The Walt Disney Company Chairman and Chief Executive Officer Bog Igor said in a statement, “We’re proud that ABC was home to those programs and will always be part of his legacy. We send our sincere condolences to Dick’s family, as well as the three generations of fans who will miss him as much as we do.”
Clark was born Richard Wagstaff Clark on Nov. 30, 1929 in Mt. Vernon, NY, Clark graduated from his hometown high school and went to college at Syracuse University where he began his legendary career as a radio disc jockey, which he would eventually parlay into a $100 million dollar media empire that he built on a laid back persona that was first perfected on a local television show called, “American Bandstand.”
The show was gave the baby boomers a place to go and dance to the latest music as well as the place where some of the latest acts performed and some even turned those performances into the big break and shot them to stardom.
Among the acts that appeared on “American Bandstand” that are household names today include Madonna, who made her debut to the music world. Cher, Barry Manilow, the rock group KISS, Elvis, Billy Haley (“Rock Around the Clock”), David Bowe, Frankie Avalon and Nick Jagger just to name a few.
“We knew we had arrived when we did your show,” Cher said last Wednesday.
“You were so sweet to us and I was so terrified, but once we got there it was fun and it was great.”
“Dick Clark was involved in the earliest exposure of the band. His contribution to American music and to Rock ‘N’ Roll and bringing it into the homes of America is immeasurable. He is the one who did it. He‘s Dick Clark” Paul Stanley of KISS said.
The show gave Rock ‘N’ Roll music a place to build its audience and to persuade those that were skeptical that it was okay to listen to. Within a year of taking over the show at age 26 back in 1956 when it was just a local show in Philadelphia, it was syndicated nationally behind Clark’s clean cut image and sanitized Rock ’N’ Roll in a way that made it safe for parents to allow their teens to watch it on television
“I don’t think there’s anything really very mysterious about the younger generation,” Clark said one time on CBS’s “Person to Person” with Edward R. Morrow.
“for the very first time in their lives, they’ve been able to look in on their children having fun doing what they like to do. They finally got a common ground of understanding so they can talk to one another for a change.”
Manilow echoed those same feelings about the show when he said, “American Bandstand had the biggest impact on all of us kids because it gave a voice to teenagers that were always just being told to got to bed or go to your room and suddenly Bick cam on the air and gave us respect and treated us like people and we had a voice.”
He Clark’s show also introduce the world to African American musical talents like The Jackson Five, Chubby Checker and disco legend Donna Summer.
Checker who introduced America to “The Twist,” which went No. 1 twice said, “If Elvis was the king of Rock ‘N’ Roll then Dick Clark is the king of all disc jockeys. Before Chubby Checker came on ‘American Bandstand’ they did ‘The Swing.’ Chubby Checker came on ‘American Bandstand’ with ‘The Twist.’ ”
Music legend Stevie Wonder said about Dick Clark having African American acts on his show that it “bridged a color gap at a time when there should not have been one. Giving musical life to black artist that may not have had a chance. He gave music freedom equal opportunity.”
“It’s a sad day for the music industry and the world,” Disco legend Donna Summer said in a statement last Wednesday.
“He was a legend a true gentleman and most importantly a dear friend to me.”
At its peak “American Bandstand” played to 20 million viewers. The show was on from 1957-1989 on ABC. He gave us 10,000 performances by the all-time greatest artist that 20th century that got their first big break on the show.
At age 28 Clark’s show had a confined weekly audience of 50 million Americans at least and he received 50,000 letters a week from teenage fans, which earned him the title America’s “oldest teenager.”
“I have a terrible problem because people keep referring to me as America’s oldest living teenager,” Clark once said. “If you want to stay young looking, just pick your parents carefully. The minute you mentally atrophy and freeze in time, you are old.”
His ageless looks very often were a punch line from so many famous faces like George Burns who said, “I’ve been watching Dick Clark ever since I was a little kid.”
Behind those good looks and effervescent charm was a business man ahead of his time. He investment company Dick Clark Productions into game shows like the “$25,000 Pyramid,” “Rate-A-Record,” “Bloopers” and “This is Your Life” and he became a commercial pitch man for some major companies.
“Dick Clark had one of the most remarkable careers in television history. He defined pretty much what we know as reality programming,” Ron Simon of the Paley Center for Media said.
His production company is also responsible for putting together two of the greatest award shows that are a major part of the landscape now. “The Golden Globes” is the prelude to award shows like “The Academy Music Awards” and “The American Music Awards” are the prelude in the music world to “The Grammys.”
To show how big of a mark Dick Clark made on television, at one time he was on all three major network CBS, ABC and NBC seven nights a week. His media empire that he built when he passed last Wednesday was worth more than $100 million
“He wasn’t just the star of it. He was really the conceptualizer of it and he understood the market,” Fred Goodman, former writer for “Rolling Stone” magazine said.
“There were two Dick Clark’s. There was the Dick Clark who was the performer. The guy with the beautiful smile, those twinkly eyes and then there was Dick Clark the businessman,” said radio personality Cousin Brucie.
Clark’s biggest impact on American television came each and every Dec. 31 when he would bring in the New Year in Times Square in New York City as host of Dick Clark’s Rockin New Year’s Eve on ABC.
No matter if you were by yourself, with your significant other or just with family, he was always on the tube to bring in the New Year ever since the middle of the 1970’s.
His long streak came to an end eight years ago when he suffered a minor stroke on Dec. 8, 2004.
According to Clark’s spokesperson Amy Streibel, Clark was hospitalized, but was expected to be okay and he was.
Taking Clark’s place on Dec. 31, 2004 was hosted by Regis Philbin, who during the show sent his best wishes to Clark, who returned one year later and he brought along Ryan Seacrest and Hillary Duff as co-host.
Back in Aug. of 2005, it was announced that Seacrest, who is also the host of “American Idol” and is also a radio personality that he would take over as the sole host of the New Year’s Eve show on ABC, which he has done the past six years, should Clark decide to retire or be unable to continue.
“I remember as a kid I was allowed to stay up and watch Dick Clark with the head set and the microphone and the big ABC logo. I just thought it was the coolest thing in the world,” Seacrest said.
“I was always impressed with how he could make you feel so comfortable. You would watch at home and you would feel like you were part of the party. You felt like was just talking to you. I think that is one of his amazing talents.”
One year after making his return to our living rooms on New Year’s Eve, he made his return to the Emmy’s where he had many nights of victory, he came back a broadcast and Rock ‘N’ Roll Hall of Famer.
There are very few people who can have an impact in life, particularly in the music world without singing a tune or playing an instrument. That is the kind of impact Dick Clark had on the music industry and television. Along the way he made long lasting friendships and brought joy to those that watched him in person or on the small screen.
On Twitter many celebrities sent their condolences to Clark and their fondest memories.
Russell Simmons said, “Clark was eternally young. No matter what culturally phenomenon was happening, he always embraced it.”
Actress Melissa Joan Hart said on Twitter, “Thanks for entertaining my family for decades! New Year’s Eve won’t be the same ever again!
Singer Fergie said, “Dick Clark will be truly missed. We will carry on his legacy every New Year’s Eve.”
Rapper and actor Snoop Dogg, “REST IN PEACE to the Dick Clark !! U were pioneer n a good man!! Thank U Sir.”
We will definitely as Hart and Fergie said we will miss him on New Year’s Eve. He was always there to bring in the New Year with all us in North America from the middle of the 1970s to his last appearance in Dec. 31, 2011 giving a big kiss to his wife at the stroke of midnight.
One Dick Clark Rockin New Year’s Eve that stands out among all the rest is the one after Sept. 11, 2001, which is when he said before the stroke of midnight, “New Yorkers are resilient. They are strong.”
“For 40 years he has spent New Year’s Eve celebrating with us here in Time Square and he brought America with him. This is New Year’s Eve and he’s Mr. New Year’s Eve,” Lori Raimondo of the Times Square Alliance said to WABC Eyewitness News reporter Lauren Glassberg.
There are very few of us who know at an early age what we want to do with the rest of our lives. At age 13 Clark walked into a radio studio and he saw two guys do a radio and he said “Wow what a great way to make a living.”
He made a great living and built an empire that made millions of dollars, brought great entertainment to the masses, broke barriers along the way. He had a way of touching people and giving them confidence to be their best when that time came and they were. Above all he never forgot his routes, which made it even more amazing that he spent the last night of the year in an area he knows very well, especially future generations of those from his hometown.
“Having them feel a sense of pride in this community in the fact that they attend a school with such a rich tradition and rich history,” Mr. Vernon High School Principal Ronald Gonzalez said about its famous alum and Hall of Famer Dick Clark.
In his “Let Me Finish…” segment on his MSNBC show “Hardball” Philadelphia native Chris Matthews said last Wednesday, “I was thinking about my paper boy days back when I spent all those slow summer afternoons delivering The Philadelphia Bulletin along the boarder between Montgomery County, PA and Bucks County PA. It was a long lonely route about five miles and I had to ride my bike a mile just to get to it, but there was something ideal about it given all that’s happen since off course. I was thinking late today about that because I remember standing at the doorway of somebody on a Friday afternoon. That was collection day waiting for the customer to get me that $.30 for the week of newspapers and listening to Bandstand on the TV set. Bandstand was a big deal back then, especially for teenagers. It was a place each afternoon, our place where kids a little older than me became celebrities just for showing up after school to dance to the latest music. Celebrities with names like Mary, South Philly. The host of that show was off course Dick Clark, who died today. I wonder where all those kids were when they got the news. Probably over in Jersey most of them. Some of them still hanging on now in their 70s in the old narrow streets of South Philadelphia. Dick Clark had a wonderful way of connecting to those kids. Us kids. He cared about our music. About our fun. He actually cared about us. He was a little older, but not a day less hip. So tonight I want to say how much I share in all of this. We Philly people were very proud, really proud that ‘Bandstand’ started in our old neighborhoods and I say best to you Mr. Clark and also to Mary wherever you are who made South Philly such famous part of our great country. Long before Rocky. Long before even cheese steaks.”
Information and quotations are courtesy of 5/18/12 5 p.m. edition of WABC Eyewitness News with Diana Williams and Sade Baderinwa, who was substituted by David Navarro, reports from entertainment reporter Sandy Kenyon and reporter Lauren Glassberg; 5/18/12 7 p.m. edition of “The Insider” on WCBS with Brooke Anderson and Kevin Frazier; 5/18/12 6:30 p.m. edition of “CBS Evening News” with Scott Pelley, report from Anthony Mason; en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dick_Clark; 5/18/12 5 p.m. edition of MSNBC’s “Hardball” with Chris Matthews; 5/18/12 11 p.m. edition of WABC Eyewitness News with Bill Ritter and Sade Baderinwa, substituted by Liz Cho, reports from entertainment reporter Sandy Kenyon and reporter Jen Maxfield; 5/18/12 11:35 p.m. edition of ABC News “Nightline” with Bill Weir.
Friday, April 27, 2012
J-Speaks: “The Legendary Summitt Steps Down at Tennessee”
She won more basketball games than any men’s or women’s coach in NCAA Basketball history. She made players great both on and off the court. She set a standard for excellence that can never be duplicated or replicated. More than anything else, this proud lady put both the University, the team that she coached and women’s basketball on the map and everyone wanted a chance to see it on television or in person. On Wednesday Apr. 18 however that amazing journey to greatness came to an end.
On Wednesday, Tennessee Lady Volunteers basketball coach Pat Summitt stepped down after 38 seasons.
Back in August of this year, the 59-year-old Summitt was diagnosed with early onset dementia, a type of Alzheimer’s disease.
Former Lady Volunteer and assistant coach for 27 seasons at Tennessee
In her new role Summitt, according to NCAA rules, will be allowed to watch the Lady Volunteers practice and collaborate with the coaching staff on game plans. Summitt will also be allowed to sit behind the Tennessee bench during games, but she will not be allowed to actively coach the team.
In a statement, Summitt said, “I’ve loved being the head coach at Tennessee for 38 years, but I recognized that the time has come to move into the future and to step into a new role. I want to help ensure the stability of the program going forward. I would like to emphasize that I fully intend to continue working as head coach emeritus, mentoring and teaching life skills to our players and I will continue my active role as a spokesperson in the fight against Alzheimer’s through the Pat Summitt Foundation.”
Current ESPN Women’s College Basketball Analyst and former Purdue Lady Boilermakers head coach Carolyn Peck, who led them to the National title in 1999 said that Summitt “will be the icon that will be around that program. She is a great motivator. A fantastic teacher and she’s a great role model.”
The resume that Summitt put together at Tennessee speaks to why she was inducted into the Naismith Basketball Hall of Fame 12 years ago.
She garnered the most wins than any other men’s or women’s basketball head coach in NCAA Division I with 1098. Her record overall is 1,098 and 208. The Lady Volunteers under her leadership made it into the Women’s NCAA Basketball Tournament in each of its 31 seasons, the most in Division I history. Summitt’s’ teams reached the Final Four 18 times, a Division I record and won the National Championship eight of those times (1987, 1989, 1991, 1996, 1997, 1998, 2007, 2008), falling two short of the 10 that UCLA legendary head coach John Wooden won. The Lady Vols won 16 South Eastern Conference Championships (SEC) and 16 SEC Tournament titles under Summitt.
Individually, Summitt was named SEC Coach of the Year eight times (1983, 1995, 1998, 2001, 2003, 2004, 2007, 2011) and was named NCAA Coach of the Year seven times (1983, 1987, 1989, 1994, 1995, 1998, 2004).
“She’s just the legend that John Wooden is on the men’s side,” said Baylor Lady Bears head coach Kim Mulkey, whose team won their second Women’s National Title this past season and did something that the Lady Vols never did compiling a 40-0 record.
“Pat started coaching at a young age and one of us will ever pass her on anything that she has done.”
The style that has made Summitt a success as well as the team’s she has coach is a no nonsense make the most, respect and never take for granted the opportunity that you have. We are in this together win or lose. It is on you individually on the court as well as in the classroom.
A great example of this is from a story that Sports Illustrated writer Gary Smith did 14 years ago about Summitt and the Lady Vols when they lost a game in conference at the South Carolina Lady Gamecocks. When they returned to Knoxville, TN that night the players were ordered to report straight to the locker room and to suit up into the smelly uniforms that were in the trunk of a car that entire night. Summitt told her players, “Now you’re going to play the second half you didn’t play last night.”
It is those kinds of methods that Summitt would use to let her team understand that they are not just the standard of women’s college basketball, they are the, model. Every team that they play wants to defeat them. They have a target on their back and they can choose to accept the challenge and get better each day or fall by the wayside.
It is something that former players like forward Chamique Holdsclaw and Kara Lawson learned, appreciated and respected about Summitt.
“When you talk about women’s basketball and when you talk about the top teams, people are going to put Tennessee and there automatically going to think of her,” said Holdsclaw, who won four titles at Christ The King Regional High School, three straight titles at Tennessee in four years (1995-99) , was the No. 1 overall pick in the 1999 WNBA Draft by the Washington Mystics and played 11 seasons.
“For us that had the opportunity to be around her and to be exposed to that environment is truly a blessing.”
Another former Lady Vol who feels very grateful for the chance she got at Tennessee and is very sad to see a great era come to an end is ESPN Women’s College Basketball analyst and current WNBA player for the Connecticut Sun Kara Lawson.
The former Lady Vol guard who played for the school from 1999-2003 says that Summitt’s exit as head coach at Tennessee brings to a conclusion the most impressive era in women’s college basketball history.
“This is a woman whose impact in her game will never be forgotten,” the nine-year pro and Olympic Gold Medalist said.
The same sentiments were echoed by former Vols men’s basketball head coach and good friend Bruce Pearl.
“When a young lady came to Tennessee
The success that the Lady Vols had in terms of how they went about the task of winning both on and off the court gave other schools and example of what it takes.
The best example of this is the University of Connecticut Lady Huskies who under head coach Geno Auriemma have made the Final Four 12 times with it ending in a championship seven championships. They have also won 19 Big East regular season titles and 18 Big East Tournament crowns.
“Pat’s vision for the game of women’s basketball and her relentless drive pushed the game to a new level and made it possible for the rest of us to accomplish what we did,” Auriemma said.
“In her new role, I’m sure she will continue to make significant impacts to the University of Tennessee and to the game of women’s basketball as a whole.”
The success of Pat Summitt is measured in more than just victories and the championships. It is also measured in the fact that the ladies she has coached have taken stock in their own lives or have learned to do so. A big part in being in her program that is mandatory is that in your classes you are visible literally and figuratively. A major example is that you sit in front of the classroom and not behind. Some would say why? If you think about it by being in front of the classroom, you have no where to hide. By being in the front you are visible and as a result, you know that being prepared in the classroom will give you the best chance to succeed. Just like in practice, if you pay attention, when it comes time for the game you are not shocked by anything that is going to come at you. You have focus on the task at hand.
To Pat Summitt, being prepared and making a commitment to being great is something that she greatly values when you really look at it. To her when you truly care about being special and you are willing to pay the price and not leave any stone unturned that is the measure of being great. It also allows you to see yourself as more of yourself and a part of something.
That something is a large number of victories and while that may not be the only thing that matters, it is what makes the difference.
Back on Nov. 4, 2011 ABC News Good Morning America anchor Robin Roberts asked Summitt, “Why she still wants to coach?”
Her answer, “I want to cut down nets. I might get up on a ladder again. Wouldn’t that be neat?”
While her Lady Vols won one more SEC regular season title and two more SEC Tournament crowns, they never won another overall championship, which makes you appreciate and respect the eight they did win as well as the other accomplishment that they were able to do.
“You saw those players have those traits and they loved the tame of basketball, but they had a passion to be so much better and her tank never ran out,” North Carolina men’s basketball coach Roy Williams said about Summitt.
“It’s all about doing things the right way. Sticking to core values that you believe in and really demonstrating them everyday and also living them out,” assistant coach Dean Lockwood said.
“It’s one thing to speak them, it’s another thing to live them out and Pat Summitt has been a person who’s lived out her core values.”
If there is one thing that Summitt has shown to the nation and the world from her excellence in coaching is what Title IX, the 1972 landmark legislation that was signed by then President Richard Nixon.
It said according to Section 181(A): “No person in the United States shall on the basis of sex, be excluded from participation in, be denied the benefits of, or be subjected to discrimination under any education program or activity receiving federal financial assistance.”
It is because of this law we have the likes of a Summitt, Mulkey and Rutgers Lady Scarlet Knights C. Vivian Stringer, just to name a few head coach on the sidelines leading their teams to greatness, just as well as the likes of Williams and Pearl.
“Its just hurts me in my heart, it really does,” said Stringer, whose team lost to the Lady Vols in the NCAA title game five years ago.
“I feel so connected to Pat, as we’ve been together so long on the same journey as coaches and friends. This is really a sad day for me. I love Pat so much, but this isn’t the way her amazing career should end.”
This is not the way her career should end, but while this chapter of Summitt’s life is coming to a close, the lasting impact she has had on women’s basketball as a whole is remarkable. Above all, she made an impact on the lives of her assistants, her former players and the last group of seniors that played for her.
“I wouldn’t be the woman that I am today if it wasn’t for coach and I really appreciate her for the opportunity and the blessing that she’s been in my life and I love her so much and I’m gonna miss her,” senior guard Brianna Bass said.
“She’s life a place in all of our hearts, especially the seniors leaving,” senior forward Alicia Manning said.
“She’s such a wonderful person. She’s more than just a legendary basketball coach. She’s a legendary person.”
She is a legendary coach and person and above all a trail blazer whose record, attention to detail and her relentless pursuit of greatness brought respect to college campus in Knoxville Tennessee and to a sport that is seen by many in person and on television.
“Pat understood the importance of being on campus and she made going to women’s college basketball fashionable and popular and that is one of the reasons the program developed because people were coming and then national television wanted to come look at women’s college basketball games because there were 10,000, 15,000, 20,000 people in the stands saying its important,” said Pearl.
Information, statistics and quotations are courtesy of 5/18/12 5:30 p.m. crawl report from ESPN’s Bottom Line during the show “Pardon the Interruption” with Michael Wilbon and Tony Kornheiser; 5/19/12 2 a.m. edition of ESPN’s Sportscenter from Los Angles, CA with Neil Everett and Stan Verrett; 4/22/12 10 a.m. edition of MSNBC’s Melissa Harris-Perry with Melissa Harris Perry; en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pat_Summitt; en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Geno Auriemma; www.utladyvols.com/sports/w-baskbl/mtt/tennw-w-baskbl-mtt.com.
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