The Major League Baseball trading deadline has come and gone, and its passing has reinforced one of the facts of my life: Even though I'm a longstanding sports fan, I have officially reached the point where I am more familiar with the playing careers of most MLB managers than with the current players.
It has been coming for a while, but it's a challenge to come face-to-face with the reality that, in the process of pruning the tree of events to which I am willing to allocate time and attention, I've pretty much cut it down to its trunk and may be in the process of lopping it down altogether.
This might actually be for the best. At this point, it's highly likely my memory of past events is more exciting than my observation of current ones. Kind of a twist on the old adage that "The older I get, the better I was," except it's "The older I get, the better they were."
It's challenging to have a debate over whether Michael Jordan or LeBron James is better when you keep interjecting Oscar Robertson into the conversation and the people you're debating just keep staring at you like you've mentioned the Hussite Wars (Google them: they were a big deal in the 1400s).
So, generally, for the time being (or at least until that point at which I can refocus my attention with nothing inconsequential like work or family to get in the way), I'm content to sort of drift over the sports landscape, cherry-picking those moments I care to observe. And the MLB trading deadline isn't one of them.
All this is a long way of bringing me to this. Bill Russell passed away this week.
Now I have to qualify the following a bit. My parents brought me onto the scene at the very end of what are called the Baby Boomer years (1946 to 1964, for those keeping score at home.).
As a result, I wasn't really anything close to the significant sports fan I was to become during the careers of folks like Mickey Mantle, Jim Brown or, well, Bill Russell. When they were at their peaks, I was more concerned about how you kept GI Joe's foot from coming off in his boot. Short answer: You don't. That's what needle-nose pliers are for.
I know now that Russell was certainly one of the best to ever play in the NBA, and also single-handedly revolutionized the way defense is played with his athleticism and shot-blocking ability.
Strangely, until later in Russell's career, shot-blocking stats weren't even kept. I mean, you'd think keeping a shot from going in by slapping it away from the basket might be important.
Anyway, while I don't remember seeing Russell play, what I do remember Russell for is a commercial he did for AT&T, back when they advertised actual on-the-counter phones, not the kind that get lost under the car seat.
Russell gave the pitch for AT&T, then threw a basketball back over his shoulder to a goal that incongruously happened to be hanging 10 feet off the floor over the desk at which he was seated. Urban legend has it he was supposed to come close and miss, and then deliver the line "I can miss, but you can't with AT&T." However, so the story goes (and when the legend becomes fact, print the legend) he kept making it. So the last time he hit the shot, he broke down in his trademark giggle and said "I can't miss! And neither can you with AT&T."
Yep, there was a guy who knew how to get back after a turnover.
It may have been the best commercial ab lib ever, with the possible exception on the one legendary college football coach Paul "Bear" Bryant made at the end of his AT&T ad. Bryant said the best thing about AT&T was that his players could use the phone to keep in touch with their families. Then he was supposed to end it with "Be sure and call your mother." And out of the blue and off script, in his deep baritone fear-inducing growl, he added, "I wish I could."
That ad caused an entire generation of Southern men to suddenly have allergy issues or need to check on something out in the yard.
Who knows, maybe some day I'll be back to exhibiting laser-like focus on sports again. Maybe about the time LeBron makes a cool AT&T commercial.