Philadelphia Inquirer - October 31, 1980
Lerch column draws reaction
By Frank Dolson, Inquirer Sports Editor
The readers always write....
Dolson:
You must have been drunk when you wrote that column (defending Randy Lerch's right to be eligible for the playoffs and World Series).
Name Unreadable
Philadelphia
Unreadable:
Thash the most ridic... ridic... Thash crazy. I never touch the stuff.
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Dear Mr. Dolson:
A Mexican colleague, who recently visited Philadelphia, gave me a copy of The Philadelphia Inquirer wherein there appeared your very powerful article regarding the Randy Lerch and Nino Espinosa case.
... I have published some of your very valuable opinions in our newspaper, El Diario-La Prensa. I have also sent something similar to the newspapers in the Dominican Republic.
Tirso A. Valdez
New York City
Dear Mr. Valdez:
I can't tell you how much I appreciate getting that column translated into Spanish. Judging by the flood of mail it prompted from local readers, the biggest mistake I made was writing it in English in the first place.
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Dolson:
Oh, your poor, bleeding heart. So it pains you to see what the Phillies are doing to Randy Lerch and Espinosa? It is guys like you that make the fans of Philadelphia throw' up....
This is not my first complaint with you. I should have written several times in the past year to you about columns that in themselves were ridiculous and showed a lack of brain power on your part.
Why don't you try for another job?
Robert G.
Upper Darby
G.:
I'm trying, but there's a hiring freeze in the Dominican.
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Dear Mr. Dolson:
I appreciated your two-part series on the mystique of Howard Cosell and would like to add my two cents worth to the discussion. Howard Cosell at one time was an outstanding sports reporter. However, he seems to have abandoned that role in favor of compulsive name-dropping and irrelevant comments....
Norman Kaner
Philadelphia
Dear Mr. Kaner:
I know just what you mean. Only last week I ran into Larry Bowa and Tug McGraw and they, too, had some interesting things to say about Cosell. And, by a strange coincidence, while having lunch with Mike Schmidt in New York the other day I mentioned to him how much I enjoyed Cosell’s work and he said – or was it Dick Vermeil who said it? – anyway, somebody said that he thought Howard's name-dropping was getting out of hand. Next time I see Roone Arledge I'll be sure to bring it up.
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Dear Mr. Dolson:
With just over a minute to go in the game, Colgate was leading Princeton, 107. From their 20-yard line the Tigers ran and passed to a touchdown in the last six seconds.... All that this drama (received) in The Inquirer is recorded in the enclosed clips. (Editor's note: They were very small clips.)
Despite the large number of colleges and universities in and around Philadelphia, Princeton graduates have held a disproportionate share of leadership positions in the professions, business and civic affairs. We have great pride in the record and traditions of our great university, so we are sensitive to slights!
Henderson Supplee Jr.
The Board of Trustees
Princeton University
Dear Mr. Supplee:
Rest assured, all of us on The Inquirer sports staff hold Princeton, its football team and its graduates in the highest regard. Any university that can produce a Bowie Kuhn surely rates a special place on anybody's sports page.
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Dear Frank: Who is Dick Young and where is The New York Daily News published – some place up in the Bronx, where the Yankees used to play baseball?
He cannot be labeled a sportswriter. A sport is a guy who is fair minded.... Young even started picking on Philadelphia because he saw a few empty cans someone had thrown in the street....
R. K. (Dick) Allen
East Stroudsburg, Pa.
Dear Dick: Try to be understanding. Dick Young is working under a terrible handicap. He has to watch the Mets, the Jets and the Giants in the same year.
Phillies’ sportscasters finally do Game 6
By Gerald Etter, Inquirer Staff Writer
There is good news for all Phillies fans who missed having Harry Kalas, Richie Ashburn and Andy Musser present the play-by-play and color commentary for the 1980 World Series when the three men were preempted by NBC's sole rights to the series coverage.
You will be given an opportunity to see the deciding championship game all over again, from Steve Carlton's first pitch to Tug McGraw's final swisher – and the three local sports-casters will be on hand to describe it all.
This delightful deja vu will all be made possible by Channel 17, which will he rebroadcasting game six of the Phillies vs. Kansas City, with the three announcers calling the action.
The game will be pre-produced in WPHL's studios – with Kalas, Ashburn and Musser – and then aired at 8 p.m., Friday, Nov. 21.
According to a spokesman at Channel 17, the game action will be called in the present tense, and each play will be described as it unfolds, recreating that World Series clincher as if Kalas, Ashburn and Musser had originally announced it. The trio handled all Phillies games but the series.
Channel 17 also will rebroadcast the Oct. 3 and 4 games with the Montreal Expos (Nov. 17 and 18 at 8 p.m.) and the Oct. 11 and 12 playoff games with the Houston Astros (Nov. 19 and 20 at 8 p.m.)
You'll also get to see the locker, room celebrations following the three deciding games and the highlights of the Philadelphia Phillies celebration parade (Sat. Nov. 22 at 7 p.m.).
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There are a lot of people who remember Chief Halftown but for some reason refuse to believe that he is still going strong. Let the nonbelievers note that the Chief still has an early-morning children's amateur show Saturdays on Channel 6, and will be headlining the Trenton Thanksgiving Day Parade next month for the 24th consecutive year.
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Former President Gerald R. Ford will guest on the 33d anniversary edition of NBC's "Meet the Press," at noon Sunday (Channel 3).
Ford was the first president to be a guest on a network news interview program when he appeared on the 28th anniversary edition of "Meet the Press" in November 1975.
The Scene
In Philadelphia and its suburbs
By Clark DeLeon, Inquirer Staff Writer
People: The bomb squad checked it just in case
Tug McGraw headed out to Las Vegas this week to appear on Hollywood Squares, one of the many post-World Series TV shows on which you can expect to see Tug and other Phillies during the next several months. McGraw headed west with the five changes of clothing he would need, since all five shows are taped the same day and the producers want the celebrities to look different each time. The trouble was that when Tug arrived in Las Vegas Monday night, his bag labeled "Tug's Locker" and his clothing were missing. Immediately a nationwide search was launched by the airline (it's amazing the service you get when you're a World Series hero), but by the time the taping began on Tuesday morning for the shows to be broadcast Thanksgiving week, the bag still hadn't been found.
Tug taped two shows, wearing a Phillies jacket for one and removing it for the other, and he was just about to borrow a sweater for the third when his bag turned up. The bag, covered with Phillies stickers, had been found in Kansas City.