Those Guys Have All the Fun - James Andrew Miller [173]
On the plus side, SportsCenter was thriving; the newsroom staff felt like there wasn’t a story out there that they couldn’t handle; and football and baseball were front and center. In the broadcasting business, rumors swirled about CapCities merging with, or being acquired by, some other entity. And, of course, there was Ted Turner. Having been rebuffed in an attempt to buy ESPN, he was now determined to squash it, or at least slow it down. What might he be up to, and could the Bristol brigade fight him off?
5
Jonah: 1995–2000
“Poor man wanna be rich, rich man wanna be king, And a king ain’t satisfied till he rules everything.”
—Bruce Springsteen
Suppose ESPN were a human being—let’s call him Espin—instead of a company. And suppose it’s 1995 and feisty Espin has managed to survive a birth and an infancy in which his life was threatened more than once; navigated wild and raucous toddler and childhood years filled with poverty and mishaps; and careened through an adolescence marked by expansion—in his size, reach, and vision. Having reached the age of sixteen, he is preparing for collegiate years ahead. Will he overindulge in wacky frat antics, or get serious about encroaching adulthood and its opportunities for further growth, industry, and success? Can he pull off the neat trick of managing both? From his current late-adolescent viewpoint, he can foresee the glorious possibilities but not, perhaps, the pitfalls.
ROY FIRESTONE, Host:
Cameron Crowe had written the script for Jerry McGuire and called my producer to say he’d like some ideas about casting a Roy Firestone–type person. And the guy said, “What about Roy Firestone?” And Cameron literally said, “You mean we could get Roy Firestone to do the Roy Firestone interview?” He said, “Hold on a second,” and handed me the phone. Cameron couldn’t believe he could get me, but I of course couldn’t wait to do it. Sony Pictures asked ESPN to use our set for the scene, and they turned them down! God only knows what their reasons were. So the studio literally had to reconstruct the Up Close set piece by piece, along with the photographs. The truth is they did a better job with the set; it was more multidimensional than the real one. When the film was wrapped, they destroyed it. It was the craziest thing. Metaphorically speaking, it was like doing the White House better than the White House, then destroying it after you make a movie.
I told Cameron years later I didn’t even read the freaking script because I thought my scene was just going to be cut out of the movie anyway. I couldn’t believe the scene made it to the final cut, because so much other stuff was cut out. But there I was, and there it remains. It’s become a calling card for me and it will probably be my epitaph. Being in that movie turned out to be a huge piece of business for me. To this day, there isn’t a single airport, there isn’t a single hotel lobby, there isn’t a single sporting event, there isn’t a single line I’m in every single day of my life, where somebody doesn’t say to me, “Don’t make me cry, Roy.” Not a single day. I even titled my second book Don’t Make Me Cry, Roy. It’s a wave I’ve ridden happily.
PAM OLIVER, Reporter:
When I was reporting for ESPN, I remember Emmitt Smith looked me in the face one day and said, “You must have no life.” And I said, “What do you mean? How can you say that? You know I have a life.” And then I thought, ‘Hey, he’s right. It’s true.’ I was never home because I was always working, and I had gotten into that creepy area where you’re single and working nonstop around athletes on television. That’s a double whammy for some insecure men who I didn’t really want to be messing with anyway. But it was definitely a long dry spell. I don’t think I even had a boyfriend when I was at ESPN. It was a three-year drought.
BILL MAHER, ESPY Presenter: