maly, too: Story Time

Tuesday, February 4, 2014

Story Time

By RON MALY

I listened to a story at Drake's final Tipoff Club basketball lunch of the season that I had never heard before.

A couple of players on the Bulldogs' women's squad had just been asked what flavors of ice cream they'd enjoyed on the team bus after their victory Sunday at Northern Iowa.

Pretty innocent stuff, to be sure.

Later in the program, men's coach Ray Giacoletti followed up on the ice cream segment by saying Bear Bryant, whose football coaching stops included Maryland, Kentucky, Texas A&M and Alabama, permitted cigarettes and 6-packs on the team bus after at least some games.

Giacoletti didn't specify what was in the 6-packs, but feel free to use your imagination.

Jacob Enevold Jensen, Drake's 6-11, 240-pound center from Denmark, was in the room when Giacoletti told the story about Bryant, and the coach said it would be of interest to the big freshman.

Bear Bryant

Like I said, I'd never heard the story before, and I was writing a lot about collegiate football players and coaches when Bryant was in the business. I covered one bowl game in which The Bear coached.

But just because I'd never heard the story doesn't mean it didn't happen.

I did some research on my computer, but found nothing about Bryant permitting cigarettes and 6-packs on a team bus. I did see that Bryant was a chain smoker himself, and my guess is that contributed heavily to his premature death in 1983 at 69.

My research also uncovered this information on a site called : "100 Years Of Bear Bryant; 100 Facts You May Not Know":

"Bryant collapsed due to congestive heart failure in 1977. He checked into an alcohol rehabilitation clinic in Shelby County several months later, stayed a month and later resumed drinking."

*

It used to be that people would talk about things that were in the paper.

Now they talk about things that aren't in the paper.

I mean, you'd never know it by reading today's paper, but Ray Giacoletti and his Drake basketball team have a game tonight against Southern Illinois at the Knapp Center.

It starts at 7:05, and I'm predicting that the Bulldogs will win.

*

Also, they were wondering at the Drake basketball lunch why the paper couldn't find somebody--the night janitor if there's still one on the payroll, or somebody else--to cover the Bulldogs' game against UNI Sunday at Cedar Falls.

Night Janitor

Instead, the story that was emailed to me, the paper and others by Drake's sports information office was used in Monday's paper.

Sad stuff.

Where's Dan Johnson when they need him?

*

Somebody said the paper probably couldn't find the janitor or anybody else to cover the game because people there were too busy getting to the bottom of the Facebook item picked up by Des Moines sports talk announcer Marty Tirrell on Twitter [and printed here] over the weekend about some fans' racial taunts during the Dowling-Valley boys' basketball game.

The Facebook item:

There's been nothing in the paper about the incident.

Not a word.

Anyone, even the night janitor, can write 2-paragraph high school basketball stories and go to press conferences.

But, obviously, it would take some work--starting with calling the guy who wrote the Facebook item--to untangle that racial taunt thing.

So don't look for anything on it anytime soon in CIML Hoops or anywhere else in the paper.

Where's Tom Witosky when they need him?

*

Maybe I'm expecting too much from the paper.

Maybe I'm being unrealistic.

After all, the publisher wrote a story Sunday that was headlined REGISTER GIVES READERS MORE ON FEB. 9.

I guess I was expecting more too early.

*

I see they're saying the Super Bowl was watched by a record 111.5 million TV viewers.

I say prove it.

I don't believe numbers like that because I don't know how they were derived.

I don't believe them any more than I believe the Iowa Poll.

I have never gotten a phone call from anyone asking me what I'm watching on TV.

I also have never talked to anyone who says he or she has gotten such a call.

I think that information about 111.5 million TV viewers is all bullshit put out by TV networks and advertisers.

*

It was good to talk with Larry Morgan and Jay Davidson at the Drake lunch.

I hadn't seen either guy for a while.

*
Photos of Bear Bryant and Night Janitor courtesy of Google.

JOLTIN' JOE GOT IT STARTED

When Ron Maly was a kid in Cedar Rapids, he wanted to enter an essay contest, and he did. He wrote about Joe DiMaggio of the New York Yankees being his favorite baseball player. For finishing second in the contest, Ron won a Louisville Slugger baseball bat autographed by DiMaggio. Ron later wanted to be the first person in his family to attend college, and he was. He earned a degree in political science from the University of Iowa, and did what all political science majors do. He became a sportswriter. He had, after all, covered high school football, basketball and baseball games for the Cedar Rapids Gazette while he worked parttime during his university days. Ron wanted to sit in the press box and write about an Iowa-Minnesota football game, and he did. It happened while he was the sports editor at the Albert Lea [Minn.] Tribune, and the game was at Memorial Stadium in Minneapolis. Ron wanted to cover a World Series, and he did. Also when he was working for the Albert Lea newspaper. Ron wanted to cover Rose Bowls, Sugar Bowls, Orange Bowls, Cotton Bowls, Holiday Bowls, a Freedom Bowl, a Sun Bowl, a Super Bowl and NCAA basketball tournaments, and he did those things after he moved to Des Moines. Ron was a four-time sportswriter of the Year in the state of Iowa [the years were 1977, 1978, 1994 and 1996]. In 2006, he was named a charter member of the University of Iowa's media Wall of Fame in the Kinnick Stadium press box. A photo of the plaque that's displayed in the press box is displayed above this story. Following Ron's retirement from the newspaper business, a publisher asked him if he wanted to write a book about the rich football tradition at the University of Iowa, and he did. The hardback version of "Tales from the Iowa Sidelines" was a best-seller, and so was the revised, softback version. Now he's been asked by his publisher to update the book for a second time. He's in the process of doing that at the present time. Ron considers being asked to update a best-selling book for the second time to be the supreme compliment, considering the Hawkeyes won just four games in the 2012 season. When Ron isn't working on books, he's busy traveling and spending time with his family. Indeed, he attends the athletic, theatrical and musical [both vocal and instrumental] events in which his six grandchildren participate. He also writes about anything that interests him for his many websites. Every chance he gets, Ron proudly wears his America Needs Farmers T-shirt.

The Hawkeyes' Rich Football Tradition, Revisited

I mentioned a while back that I was in the process of updating my Tales from the Iowa Sidelines book. Updating it for the second time. The original hardback edition of Tales from the Iowa Sidelines [pictured at the right] was published in 2003, during the 10-3 season, when coach Kirk Ferentz and his Iowa football team had a 10-3 record that included a 37-17 victory over 15th-ranked Florida in the Outback Bowl and after the Hawkeyes went 11-2 in 2002. That book was a best-seller, so the publishers came to me again in 2005, a season that finished with a breathtaking 30-25 victory over No. 11 Louisiana State in the Capital One Bowl on New Year's Day, 2005. Because buyers had cleaned out the the shelves in the bookstores, the publishers wanted to know if I'd do an updated version of the book. I agreed, The revised, soft-cover edition [pictured at the left] was published in 2005. Warren Holloway, who teamed with quarterback Drew Tate on a miraculous 56-yard touchdown pass to win the Capital One Bowl, was featured on the cover. That book, too, turned into a best-seller, So I had reason to feel very good about my years as a published author. It's not every day that a the original version is a best-seller, and so is the updated version. Then, imagine my surprise when I received an e-mail from a senior editor at the publishing company last fall, wanting wanted to know if I was interested in doing a second updated version of the book. It came at a time when things weren't going well for the Hawkeyes in the 2012 season. They lost their last six games and finished with a 4-8 record. Frankly, the thought of doing a revised edition of the book during a 4-8 season seemed to be a stretch. "Maybe producing a revised edition in a year or two would be a better idea," I told the publishers. "We'd like to do it now," I was told. "Let me think about it," I said. After a few days of thought, I accepted the idea. I talked myself into the idea that this was the supreme compliment--being asked to do a second book update during a 4-8 season showed strong confidence by the publishers in me and in the Hawkeyes' football program. So I got back into the business of interviewing players and coaches again, going to postgame press conferences, weekly press conferences and a scrimmage in West Des Moines. After a press conference in Iowa City, I did a one-on-one interview with coach Kirk Ferentz, and mentioned to him that I was in the process of doing a revised edition of my two best-selling books. I congratulated him on the excellent things he had done for Iowa's football program--all of which contributed to the success of my books. "I think Coach Fry had more to do with it," he told me, bringing up the name of Hayden Fry, his one-time boss at Iowa and a man who brought Iowa's football program back from the dead in the 20th century. That's modest Kirk Ferentz for you. Even though the 2012 season wasn't something Hawkeye coaches, players and fans will recall with any special feeling, Ferentz has a 14-year record of 100-74 at Iowa that includes two 11-victory seasons [2002 smd 2009], two 10-victory seasons [2003 and 2004], plus he's been the Big Ten coach of year in 2002, 2004 and 2009, and national coach of the year in 2002. Indeed, Ferentz has done some wonderful things at Iowa City, and I fully expect his success to continue. I've concluded my writing for the second update of Tales from the Iowa Sidelines, and the senior editor has furnished me with an early look at the book. Not only are the Kirk Ferentz years included in the updated version, but so is the stuff I previously wrote about Howard Jones, Dr. Eddie Anderson, Heisman Trophy winner Nile Kinnick and the 1939 Hawkeye Ironmen, Ronald Reagan, Ozzie Simmons, Ossie Solem, Randy Duncan, Alex Karras and lots of other legends from Iowa's rich football history. I expect the book to be in stores soon. I hope you like it.