memories, like the ....

I have many joys in my life these days. Watching sports these days with my awesome daughter may be tedious for her mom but my daughter loves when they go to commercial and the music starts playing. Her mom may not admit it but she watches too and asks some smart questions. Reading some of the responses to my blogs and talking shop with some of my friends, got me thinking about things I remember as a child or even as an adult. My father was a cop in White Plains, N.Y. and he used to know so many professional athletes. He would take me to the N.Y. Giants training camp every year as a youth and I absolutely loved it. I went to see the Giants and Jets play in the Yale Bowl back in 1973 and I remember walking off the field with John Mendenhall. He looked so grizzled and scary but it was cool nonetheless. The Giants had Ron Johnson and Bob Tucker, Brad Van Pelt and Spider Lockhart. It was soo cool. The Jets still had Namath but he was a shell of himself. His knees were so bad then that he could barely walk. I couldnt imagine walking on the field and off today. Security would pounce pretty quickly.
I went to a baseball game once with Dan Weitz my junior year at Riverdale. We went to see the Cubs and the Mets and Dwight Gooden was on the mound and he was electric. We went with Paul Gleason who was the detention monitor in the movie the Breakfast Club. He was great friend I guess with Keith Hernandez who was a star with the Mets. Doc that night should have been given credit for a no-hitter but was not because Ray Knight could not field a ball hit by Ryne Sandberg. Gooden that night set the Rookie strikeout record. Straw hit a Home run, so did George Foster. We changed seats so many time that night until we finally ended up behind home plate and that is where we saw Straw's home run. It was awesome. After the game Mr. Gleason took us to the dugout and we got to meet Keith and the boys. Everyone knew that I had a football game the next day. I was sooo stunned that everyone wanted to talk to me about football. Mookie Wilson, Doc, Keith looked like Giants. Gary carter too. Rusty Staub then took out to the bullpen and we talked with Gary Matthews. Then the ladies that were supposed to meet up with Keith and Mr. Gleason showed up and that is when we knew it was time to go. What a night!!! The best part about that story is that 25 years later, i saw Mr. Gleason at a nightclub I was working at in Hollywood. I told him the story and he remembered. Mr. Gleason passed away last year. I was glad that i was able to relay the story to him.
To top all of that, within my first month working at Billboard Live Night club, Micheal Jordan showed up at the club. I couldn't believe my eyes. He walked past me and my boss knew that I wanted to body guard him more than anyone working there. So when he told me to go to the V.I.P room and stay with him, I nearly crapped my pants. In the same V.I.P room that night was Leonardo DiCaprio and he wanted to say hello to Micheal. I told his handler that if he thought that Micheal Jordan was going to get up and go over to him, he must crazy. Micheal started asking me questions about Leo. I told him that he was in a few movies and Titanic was a movie that he was about to star in. Then I started babbling about how I used to go to the Knicks-Bulls games when I was a teen. We sat right behind the Bulls and how I rooted for him. I was such a dork and was surprised that Jordan's security did not ask me to leave. Then the pipe broke behind the bar so they left and I was left with his vodka and cranberry drink. I did not drink it and when he and Leo shook hands they did know each other from a movie shoot DiCaprio did during "Basketball Diaries".
I have had the pleasure as a bouncer out here to meet several athletes and celebs. Remember when Jeter got credit for hitting a home run against the Orioles in the playoffs that gave the Yankees a victory? Jeffrey Mayer caught the ball. Tont Tarasco was the Oriole's outfielder who was below the play and we had a nice chat about the play. I worked the Magic Johnson foundation dinner in 1996. The Lakers had just signed Shaquille Oneal and i was given strict instructions not to let anyone in who's name wasn't on the list. Shaq showed up in a silver Bentley and he and his security wore matching silver three piece suits. I gave Shaq a hug and told he him that wasn't on the list and he couldn't come in. We all laughed and Magic came outside and escorted him in to a loud ovation. Denzell was there and Luther Vandross was the headline act. I remember working a LimpBiskit video shoot for the son "Faith". Peter Berg was the Director and he asked the boys to go on stage and play the song just to get the feel of the place. I had never heard the version of the song so when they jumped into the chorus I was wide-eyed and taken aback, but then that wasn't the story. The bass guitarist was jumping up and down on the stage and jumped right off the stage and fell and hit his head. All of us ran to the stage to help get the cord from around his neck. It was pretty scary but he was okay and the day was pretty cool. I could tell stories all day and night about my sport memories and others but i will save that for book one day.. I guess the moral of the story is having memories good or bad better than never experiencing them at all.. just live people..