R.I.P. to a broadcast professional ... and a compassionate human being

There have been a long of wonderful tributes paid to Jim McKay, the longtime voice of the Olympics, who died the other day at age 86. He was a journalist first and foremost, a fellow who didn't mind taking on unusual stories. I suspect he did this because he knew that even offbeat guys like Evil Knieval had a tale to tell.

I think of today's sports journalists and try to imagine someone like, say, Chris Berman, handling the sad story of the 1972 Olympics. The modern sports guy is taught that style triumphs over substance. The story isn't the important thing anymore. Guys like McKay must have hated this. But he, like many TV reporters of that era, had started his career as a print guy. He was a writer first and foremost and knew the facts must come first. The game or the athlete was the most important thing.

I remember a broadcast that displayed McKay's humanity, a trait not often seen in today's media. Although he wasn't much of a baseball play-by-play guy, he used to handle the call of the championship game of the Little League World Series on ABC. At that time, the title game was the only game shown and they didn't go into as uch detail as is done now.

In 1971, Taiwan was playing a team of inner city kids from Gary, Indiana in the title game. At that time, the Taiwanese kids were a lot better than most of the American kids. (They won five of six titles in that time period.)

On this afternoon, however, Gary (which had future major league Lloyd McClendon on their team) gave them a stiff test, taking the game into extra innings. But it all fell apart in the ninth as the Taiwanese team scored nine runs. As the Taiwanese kids pounded hit after hit, it became obvious how was going to win. McKay mumbled into his microphone something that has probably been felt by by every parent who has ever seen their kid be on the wrong end of such a rockslide. "You kind of wish they could stop and go home about now, don't you?," he said.

It is that kind of humanity we need more of in journalism, whether it be sports or politics, these days.

Jim McKay provided it every time he stepped behind a microphone. We need more of his type in our business.