The Dugout Diver
For thirteen years, I coordinated the Philadelphia Phillies chapel services in the clubhouse before the games. Usually the chapel was held in the morning before a one o’clock game, but on one occasion, before a six o’clock Sunday evening game, we had the chapel service at about 4:30. I had arranged for Dr. Stephen Olford to be our speaker. Olford was a preacher from England whom Billy Graham had once called “the man who most influenced my ministry.”
After Olford gave the message, he and legendary Phillies third baseman Mike Schmidt talked for a long time. Mike was a new Christian, and he and Olford seemed to hit it off.
At game time, the Phillies arranged for Olford and me to sit in the front row right next to the Phillies’ dugout. In the bottom of the first with two men on base, Mike Schmidt came up to bat. The next thing we knew, Mike hammered one far and deep into the left field seats. Fifty thousand Phillies fans went wild as Mike rounded the bases and headed for home.
While I watched all this, Olford leaped out of his seat and started climbing over the railing. For a moment, I was too shocked to move. There was the erudite Olford in his suit and tie and cuff links—and he was making a dive for the dugout! He was so caught up in the excitement that he wanted to go into the dugout and embrace his new best friend, Mike Schmidt!
The stadium security guards ran to Olford and pushed him back toward the stands, and I tried to grab him and pull him from behind. I shouted to him, “Dr. Olford! The fans aren’t allowed on the field! And they sure aren’t allowed to dive into the dugout!”
He shouted back in his clipped English accent, “I just wanted to congratulate my friend Mike!”
I said, “I’ll take you to the locker room after the game. That would probably be more appropriate.”
I managed to get Olford back into his seat. But for a few moments, I got to see a reputedly staid and reserved English clergyman go nuts at a Phillies game. No wonder even Billy Graham looked up to this “dugout diver” as a friend and mentor. Stephen Olford was a man who passionately, enthusiastically cheered the success and accomplishments of others.
Ted Williams
A Passion to Be the Best
Each year after the Ted Williams Museum and Hitters Hall of Fame induction ceremonies, there is an activity for the attendees, such as a golf or fishing outing.
One year, I elected to go fishing, and one of my companions in the bass boat was the great NBC sportscaster Curt Gowdy. Talk about intimidation! For years, Gowdy hosted The American Sportsman and took many sports and entertainment legends out on fishing and hunting expeditions. So I felt both honored and out of my league to be sitting in a boat on a lake in central Florida trying to catch a bass with Curt Gowdy.
I was much more interested in talking to Gowdy than in fishing. Gowdy knew Ted Williams quite well, having been the voice of the Boston Red Sox for fifteen years (in fact, he made the call when Williams hit a home run on his final at bat in 1960). So I asked Gowdy how he would sum up Williams’s life and career. He said, “Ted Williams is the only man I’ve ever met who was the best at what he did in three different fields: the best hitter in baseball, the best at catching fish, and the best Navy combat pilot. Everything Ted Williams does he does with an intense passion to be the best.”
Jentezen Franklin
“Like a Heat-Seeking Missile”
I once had bestselling author Jentezen Franklin (Right People, Right Place, Right Plan) as a guest on my Orlando radio show, and he made a statement that stuck in my mind and that I have quoted often when speaking to audiences: “When you discover your passion in life and pursue it relentlessly, you become like a heat-seeking missile.”
There’s so much truth packed into that one sentence. Think about it. A heat-seeking missile searches for a source of heat, locks onto it, then chases it with single-minded focus. If the heat source moves up, down, or sideways, the missile follows unerringly. When you are passionate about your goals and dreams, you move unerringly toward the target of your passion. That’s why passion is such a powerful ally of success.
It’s not enough simply to set some goals, then methodically plod toward them. You’ve got to get fired up and motivated. Never be content to dwell in the gray margins of life. Become a heat-seeking missile! Live passionately!
Ted Williams
The Groove in the Handle
I acquired my obsession with Ted Williams from my mother’s younger brother, Bill Parsons. Uncle Bill related everything—and I mean everything!—to the great Red Sox slugger. If I didn’t want to eat my brussels sprouts, Uncle Bill would say, “You know, Ted would have eaten his brussels sprouts. You think maybe that’s why he’s such a great hitter?”
When I was fourteen, my buddy Gil Yule and I would go to Philadelphia to watch the A’s play almost every weekend. I saw Ted Williams in person at an A’s–Red Sox doubleheader. My team, the A’s, lost both games.
Afterward, Gil and I waited outside the park by the Red Sox bus, and there was Williams walking to the bus as fans called out to him and pulled at him. He climbed into the front seat of the bus with the window open while hordes of kids swarmed around him like mosquitoes in July, begging for his autograph. And I was one of those kids.
Williams stuck his head out the window and roared, “Everybody get in line or I’m not signing!” Well, we all lined up and quieted down, and Williams signed autographs for every kid in line, including young Pat Williams. The picture he signed for me that day is still in my collection.
Gil and I boarded the train to Wilmington, and Dad picked us up at the station. I came bounding into the house, and Mom, who had heard the games on the radio, said, “Oh, son, what a disappointing day! The A’s lost twice.”
I said, “It was great, Mom! I got Ted Williams’s autograph!”
When the Ted Williams Museum and Hitters Hall of Fame opened not far from Orlando, I saw Williams more often. When he entered the room, every conversation stopped and he was the center of attention.
At one induction dinner, a fan went to Williams and held out a bat. “Ted, I’ve had this bat for a long time,” he said. “I’m told that you used it in 1941, the season you hit .406.”
Williams took the bat and closed his eyes as he worked his hands around the grip. “Yep,” he said, “this is one of my bats. In 1940 and ’41, I’d cut a groove in the handle for my right index finger to nestle in. I can feel that groove. This is one of my bats all right.”
After sixty years, Williams still recalled the little things that contributed to his greatness.
“Curious about Everything”
After speaking at an event in Fayetteville, Arkansas, I walked to the back of the room and sat down next to a man dressed in khaki slacks and a golf shirt. He leaned toward me and whispered, “Nice job.”
“Thank you,” I said.
He extended his hand and said, “I’m Jim Walton.”
I was amazed. By chance, I had chosen to sit down next to billionaire James Carr Walton, the chairman of Arvest Bank and the youngest son of Sam Walton, the founder of Walmart. According to Forbes, he was then the twentieth richest individual on the planet.
“Pleased to meet you, Mr. Walton,” I said.
“Call me Jim. Would you like to join me for lunch?”
So we had lunch together. Over turkey on rye sandwiches, I asked him, “Tell me about your dad. What was Sam Walton’s greatest strength as a leader?”
“His greatest strength? It would have to be his passion. Dad was passionate about life and passionate about the merchandise. He loved to travel around and see the latest things he could sell in his stores. He was always trying to get the best price on the best merchandise so he could pass the savings on to his customers. Now, take that shirt you’re wearing.”
Jim pointed to my Hawaiian shirt.
“What about it?” I said.
“Dad would have been fascinated by that shirt. He would have examined the fabric and asked you where it came from. He would have turned the sleeve inside out and looked at the stitching. He was curious about everything, constantly asking questions and reading up on every aspect of the retail business. That’s why he was so good at what he did, and that was his greatest strength as a leader.”
Jimmy Valvano
Laugh, Think, and Cry
One of the greatest role models of passionate living I’ve ever met is the late, great basketball coach Jimmy Valvano, aka “Jimmy V.” I knew Valvano when he was coaching the North Carolina State Wolfpack and broadcasting at ABC and ESPN. He was famed for his passionate, optimistic, enthusiastic way of speaking and living. Whenever I spoke to him, I always went away feeling emotionally uplifted.
In June 1992, Valvano was diagnosed with bone cancer—a grim diagnosis—yet he never surrendered his passion for living. On March 4, 1993, Valvano received the Arthur Ashe Courage and Humanitarian Award at the inaugural ESPY Awards event. In his acceptance speech, he talked about living with passion in spite of adversity.
“There are three things we all should do every day,” he said. “Number one is laugh. You should laugh every day. Number two is think. You should spend some time in thought. Number three, you should have your emotions move you to tears. It could be happiness or joy. If you laugh, you think, and you cry, that’s a full day. That’s a heck of a day. You do that seven days a week and you’re going to have something special.”
Valvano died less than two months after saying those words. He had something special, something we all need. He had an intense, irrepressible passion for living—and that passion lives on after him, setting an example for you and me.
Fess Parker
Pay Your Dues
Once in an interview, Davy Crockett star Fess Parker recalled how giant radioactive ants helped him land the role of the legendary frontiersman from Tennessee.
“Walt Disney was searching for the right actor to play Davy Crockett,” Fess told me. “Just about every Hollywood action guy was considered for the role, including George Montgomery and Ronald Reagan. Somebody told Walt he should look at a sci-fi movie called Them! about radioactive giant ants attacking Los Angeles. The star of that film was Jim Arness, who would eventually become Marshal Dillon on Gunsmoke.
“Walt screened the picture to scout Jim Arness, but then he spotted me in the film. I had a small speaking part, so small that if you looked away to put cream in your coffee you would have missed me altogether. But Walt said, ‘Who’s that fella?’ Nobody knew. So Tom Blackburn, one of Walt’s producers, called Warner Brothers, and they gave him my name. Then Disney called me out to the studio for an interview and a screen test.
“I was twenty-nine at the time, and I fancied myself a singer and songwriter, so I brought my guitar with me. Walt and I talked for a while, and then he said, ‘Why don’t you play me a little tune?’ I had written a song called ‘Lonely’ about a guy who’s riding on a train after breaking up with his girl. I did the sound of a train whistle in the song. I didn’t know it then, but Walt Disney had a real passion for railroads, so that little song didn’t hurt my chances.
“If I hadn’t had that bit part in a movie about giant ants, I might never have had the career I had. Walt spotted me, yanked me out of obscurity, and made me a star. He opened every door for me. I’ll always be grateful to Walt Disney.”
“So you paid your dues,” I said. “You took the bit part, and that’s how you got to be ‘King of the Wild Frontier.’”
“Something like that.”
“Fess, would you indulge me? How about a chorus of ‘Davy Crockett’?”
He immediately obliged. I heard that deep, mellow voice sing, “Born on a mountaintop in Tennessee . . .”
I sang along. Fortunately, no tape recorder was running.
Let Mistakes Refine You, Not Define You
When I was the general manager of the Philadelphia 76ers, we celebrated “God, Family, and Country Night” twice a year. We would bring in gospel singers and athletes to deliver a message of patriotism and faith. One year, we brought in a rising young singer named Sandy Patti to sing the National Anthem, then perform a concert after the game.
I was on the court while Sandy sang the National Anthem, and I noticed that it seemed to go by quickly. When she got to “and the home of the brave,” the crowd cheered. Then it was time for the game to begin.
I sat down at courtside and saw Sandy rushing toward me, her hand over her mouth, eyes wide, aghast. She said, “Oh, Mr. Williams, this is terrible! I left out the whole middle stanza!”
Well, that explained why the anthem seemed to go by so quickly.
“Sandy,” I said, “you sang so beautifully that no one even noticed.”
“But—”
“You did a terrific job. Don’t give it another thought.”
Not long after that appearance, Sandy Patti shot to stardom. She regularly comes through Orlando to perform concerts, so I have seen her from time to time over the years. Whenever she sees me, she laughs and says, “How about our National Anthem?”
That was more than three decades ago, and she still remembers leaving out the middle stanza. But she’s no longer horrified over it. She just laughs.
Billy Cunningham, Jerry Sloan, and Scott Skiles
Be a Ferocious Competitor
Over the many years I’ve worked in the NBA, I’ve often been asked if I have a favorite player among all the players I’ve worked with. You might think my favorite would be a player who’s loaded with natural talent like Julius Erving or Shaquille O’Neal or Pete Maravich. But the three players who left the greatest impression on me were Billy Cunningham, who played for the Philadelphia 76ers; Jerry Sloan, who played for the Chicago Bulls; and Scott Skiles, who played for the Orlando Magic.
What did Cunningham, Sloan, and Skiles have in common? They were ferocious competitors. They didn’t, in every case, possess the greatest natural talent, but they leveraged the talent they had through a positive attitude, an intense focus, a strong work ethic, and a commitment to teamwork.
Cunningham, Sloan, and Skiles were smart players, but they were more than that. They were coaches on the floor. They were leaders, and the other players looked up to them and took their cues from them. When a player is also a leader and a coach, the team tends to come together and fly in formation. That’s when magic happens.
I think it’s significant that each of these players went on to become a successful coach in the NBA. They had a powerful impact on me as an executive. Watching them play, I realized that when players compete so intensely and set an example for their teammates, success happens.
Bill Russell
Good Enough Is Never Good Enough
Born in 1934, Bill Russell played center for the Boston Celtics from 1956 to 1969. He was a five-time NBA MVP and a twelve-time all-star, leading the Celtics to eleven NBA championships over his thirteen-year career with the team. He won gold at the 1956 Summer Olympics as captain of the USA basketball team. And I’m proud to say that Russell is my friend. One of the highlights of my broadcasting career was a one-hour live radio interview with him. I’ll never forget that show.
I have always been fascinated by the high standards of performance Russell always set for himself. As a player, he used to keep a personal scorecard, and he’d grade his own performance after every game. His scoring system was based on a scale of one to a hundred, with a hundred being perfection. After the best game of Russell’s 1,128-game career, he gave himself a mere sixty-five on his personal scorecard. Sixty-five!
Why did Russell grade himself so harshly? He did so because his goal was not a “good enough” performance. His goal was not 99 percent. His goal was nothing less than perfection.
Though Russell never reached perfection, he did achieve something that few other people have ever known. He achieved greatness.
Joe Falls
“Enjoy Your Life and Be Good to People”
Along with such legends as Ring Lardner, Grantland Rice, and Heywood Campbell Broun, longtime Detroit sportswriter Joe Falls is a member of the Baseball Hall of Fame. Of the many guests I’ve had on my sports radio show in Orlando, Falls was one of my favorites. Near the end of one interview, he said out of the clear blue sky, “Pat, you want to know the keys to success?”
“I sure do, Joe,” I said. “What are they?”
“Two things: enjoy your life and be good to people.”
I think about those words often. They’re true. Falls lived those words, and he was a success in anybody’s book.
“Now That Was Fun!”
Every spring, the Arnold Palmer Invitational takes place at Palmer’s golf course in Orlando. It’s a benefit for the Arnold Palmer Hospital for Children and the Winnie Palmer Hospital. The tournament kicks off with a celebrity round on the first day.
Some years ago, I went as a spectator, along with five thousand other people, and watched a marvelous foursome consisting of Arnold Palmer, NBA legend Michael Jordan, Governor Tom Ridge of Pennsylvania, and Christian pop singer Amy Grant.
Jordan teed off first. Then Palmer. Then Governor Ridge. Grant went last from the women’s tee. She hit a beautiful, unbelievable shot that landed on the green. An excited murmur rippled through the crowd as we all moved down the fairway toward the green, where Grant putted to win the first hole.
I stayed as close as I could to Jordan. He’s the ultimate competitor, and I wanted to hear his reaction. Sure enough, as he walked to the second hole, I heard him muttering to nobody in particular, “We got us a game going here!”
I don’t recall how the round finished, but Grant’s shot on the first hole and Jordan’s reaction are etched in my memory.
Years later, I was in Nashville for a Christmas concert. My daughter Karyn, who is a singer-songwriter, was in the concert along with Amy Grant and was able to get me into the dressing room, where I got to visit with Grant for about twenty minutes.
As we chatted, I said, “Amy, do you recall the Arnold Palmer Invitational in Orlando when you hit that incredible drive on the first hole? I was in the crowd that day, and I’ll never forget the look on Michael Jordan’s face when he saw your first drive land on the green.”
“How could I forget that day?” she said. “Now that was fun!”
Max Patkin
A Serious Clown
Max Patkin was known as the “Clown Prince of Baseball”—a title he held for more than five decades. There was nothing he wouldn’t do to get a laugh. You might remember him from his role in the hit movie Bull Durham.
His biggest crowd-pleaser was shooting water straight up out of his mouth like a human water fountain. I’m not sure exactly how he did it, but I know he had a way of swallowing water and holding it in his gullet. Then, without taking another sip of water, he could tilt his head back and shoot water in the air again and again for the next five minutes, as if he had an inexhaustible supply. Just when you thought he had shot out all the water he had, he’d do it again!
I met Patkin while playing my first professional baseball game in 1962. I had just signed with the Miami Marlins, a class D Phillies farm club in the Florida State League. Our manager, Andy Seminick, put me in the game in left field. My first two times at bat I struck out on six pitches. I thought, Oh boy, at this rate my career is not going to last long.
My third at bat didn’t start any better. The first two pitches were strikes. So at that point, I had taken eight consecutive pitches, all strikes, either swinging or looking. But I got a hold of the next pitch and drove the ball into right center field for a stand-up double. Oh, sweet relief! What joy!
Coaching third base that inning was the inimitable Max Patkin, who was doing his clown act. The next hitter grounded out, so I bounced on over to third. At that point, Patkin turned all his funny stuff on me. He dragged me off the bag and planted a big kiss on my mouth! It was embarrassing, but the crowd loved it.
Patkin and I became good friends, and our friendship endured through nearly four decades. During my tenure as the general manager of the Spartanburg Phillies, I brought him to town to perform twice a year. When I moved to Philadelphia, I had him perform at 76ers games—a baseball clown entertaining a basketball crowd. When I moved to Orlando, I brought him to town to do his comedy dance act for the Magic fans (he was the greatest jitterbugger in the history of dancing).
I had many conversations with Patkin over the years, and he once explained his simple philosophy of life this way: “I live to make people laugh. They come to the ballpark to enjoy a ballgame, and I’m going to see that they enjoy the game and have a few laughs whether their team wins or not. I don’t take myself seriously at all, but I take this job very seriously. When it comes to making people laugh, I’m as serious as they come. I take great pride in making a fool of myself.”
Patkin was a beloved figure who brought fun with him wherever he went, and when he passed away in 1999, a great deal of pure, wholesome fun went with him—but I hear there’s a lot more laughter in heaven.
A Heart Full of Enthusiasm
Years ago, I was catching in an old-timers’ baseball game, and our first baseman was none other than Pete Rose. What a privilege it was to play on the same diamond with the man known as “Charlie Hustle”! He won three World Series rings, three batting titles, and two Gold Gloves, and he made seventeen all-star appearances, playing at five different positions.
My three oldest boys—Jimmy, Bobby, and David—were in their teens, and they got to sit in the dugout during the game. It was a treat for them to rub shoulders with guys they had only seen on television and bubble gum cards. Bobby was on his high school baseball team at the time, so I took him over to Rose and said, “I’d like you to talk to Bobby about hustle. You were synonymous with that word when you played in Cincinnati and Philadelphia, and I’d love to have Bobby hear about hustle straight from you.”
Rose looked at Bobby and said, “That’s funny, because I never really cared for that nickname ‘Charlie Hustle.’ I don’t think of what I do as hustle. Instead, I like the word enthusiasm. I went out there and had so much fun doing my job that I just had to do it well. The way I see it, Bobby, is that God gave me certain skills—not great skills but good skills. You can’t make it in this game on good skills alone. But if you take the skills God gave you at birth and you add an intense desire and great enthusiasm, you just might have a special career.
“Bobby, there has not been a day of my baseball career that I didn’t step onto the field with a heart full of enthusiasm. I was excited to be at the ballpark every day, and once I got there, I couldn’t wait to hear ‘Play ball!’ I always had a ton of fun playing baseball. That’s what it’s all about.”
Bobby never forgot those words—and neither have I.
Sandy Koufax
“Enjoy the Whole Experience”
For years, the great Dodgers left-handed pitcher Sandy Koufax has lived a quiet, private life in Vero Beach, Florida. Though famed for his stellar achievements on the mound (including a perfect game on September 9, 1965, three Cy Young Awards, and four World Series championships), Koufax is a big basketball fan. He played basketball in college, and some have said he was an even better basketball player than a pitcher in those days.
In 1995, when the Orlando Magic were in the NBA finals, I received a message from Koufax saying that he wanted to come up and attend the game. So I got him tickets and took him down to our locker room.
As we chatted, I learned that Koufax had started running marathons. “Well, you and I are in the same boat,” I said. “I’m getting ready to run my first marathon. What advice can you give me? What can you tell me about running marathons that I may not already know?”
“Let me tell you four things,” he said. “First, don’t go out too fast. Second, drink water at every station. You’ve got to stay hydrated. Third, enjoy the whole experience. It’s meant to be fun, so go out and enjoy it. Fourth, if you go out to dinner that night after the marathon, make sure you don’t have to go down any stairs. Your legs are going to be so rubbery that you’ll never navigate those stairs.”
I’ve always remembered his advice—especially the part about having fun. Yes, a marathon is long, punishing, grueling, and exhausting, but if you go into it with the right attitude, a marathon is also fun. “Enjoy the whole experience,” Koufax told me. I carried that advice in my heart every mile, and I try to remember it every day.
Mike Krzyzewski
Watching Film at Five A.M.
After six seasons with the Detroit Pistons, Grant Hill came to Orlando and played seven seasons with the Magic. I came to know him as a young man of exceptional character. In college, Grant played for Coach Mike Krzyzewski at Duke. Grant told me how he learned the importance of preparation as an ingredient of success.
“When I was an eighteen-year-old freshman,” he said, “I broke my nose very badly in a game in December. Coach K invited me to stay in his home over Christmas break. Because I had so much pain from my broken nose, I had a lot of trouble sleeping. I’d wake up and couldn’t go back to sleep. So I’d come out of my room at four or five in the morning, and every time I came out, Coach K was already up!
I found out that he got up early every morning and watched game film of our next opponent. That spoke volumes to me about the way he prepared for each game. Whenever I’m tempted to slack off, I remember Coach K watching game film at five in the morning.”
Bill Walton
“Prepare Yourself Mentally for Anything”
In a lecture at the University of Lille, December 7, 1854, French biologist Louis Pasteur said, “Le hasard ne favorise que les esprits préparés.” In case you couldn’t understand my accent, here’s the English translation: “Fortune favors only the prepared mind.” Abraham Lincoln made a similar observation using a woodsman’s metaphor: “Give me six hours to chop down a tree and I will spend the first four hours sharpening my axe.”
One man who agrees with those sentiments is former UCLA and NBA basketball star Bill Walton. As a guest on my radio show, he once said, “I love the pressure and anticipation of the game. I love the preparation and practice. When I was at UCLA, Coach John Wooden taught us to love the process of getting ready for a game. He said that you build good game habits by the way you prepare yourself ahead of time.
“You prepare yourself mentally for anything that might happen in the game. You visualize the game a thousand times in your mind before it happens. As you rehearse your game plan in practice, you get into a flow with your teammates. You memorize all of their moves so that you begin to move in sync with them. Through repetition, your body and your mind memorize all the moves. Then, in the game, everything becomes automatic, like pushing a button.”
Or, to put it more simply, “Le hasard ne favorise que les esprits préparés.”
Bobby Bowden
A Sixty-to-One Ratio
Bobby Bowden, longtime football coach of the Florida State Seminoles, told me he once calculated that he and his assistants spent at least one full hour of planning and preparation for each minute his players were on the football field. That works out to a sixty-to-one ratio of prep time to playing time.
“I have always gotten my greatest pleasure,” he once said, “out of breaking down film, learning about opponents, then implementing a game plan to take advantage of our strengths and their weaknesses. I love to take a group of young men in the late summer and mold them into a team.”
Bowden’s love of strategic preparation goes back to 1943. He was a sports-obsessed thirteen-year-old when he came down with rheumatic fever and was forced to spend more than a year confined at home (including six months of bed rest). His source of entertainment in those pre-television days was the radio. “I basically listened to a play-by-play of World War II for a year,” he said. In his imagination, young Bowden pictured the battlefield terrain, the placement of troops and tanks, and the strategic movement of those forces. He didn’t realize it then, but he was preparing himself for a lifetime of coaching football.
His long career is a testimony to the power of preparation.
David Stern
An Extra Set of Ears
In 1986, we were petitioning the NBA to grant an expansion franchise in Orlando—the franchise that would become the Orlando Magic. We were at a point where we had to make a deposit of one hundred thousand dollars to prove to the league that we were legit. So I led a delegation to the New York City office of NBA commissioner David Stern.
At the time, Miami and Tampa were considered the odds-on favorites for expansion. Orlando was a smaller city without a major airport and without an arena. Our bid was clearly a long shot, so our little group had a lot of convincing to do.
I wanted to create a visual symbol that would be splashed across the sports pages of the nation, a symbol that would say to the world, “The NBA belongs in Orlando!” And what better symbol of Orlando could there be than a set of Mickey Mouse ears from Walt Disney World?
For the life of me, I don’t know why I came prepared with not one but two sets of mouse ears. Perhaps I had a premonition, or perhaps I simply had a vague feeling that a second set of mouse ears might come in handy. In any case, I came prepared.
We had a huge media turnout for the event. I stood alongside Commissioner Stern for the photo opportunity and handed him the check for a hundred grand. As we posed for the pictures, I pulled out a set of mouse ears and plopped them on Stern’s head.
He immediately yanked them off, but I was ready for that. I pulled out the second set of ears and plopped them on his head. He couldn’t move fast enough to remove the second pair, and that’s when all the flashbulbs popped. The picture of Stern wearing Mickey Mouse ears went out all over the country. It gave an added boost to our nationwide publicity campaign and helped tilt the odds for success in our favor.
I had gotten my wish. Magic was in the air.
Fast-forward almost three decades. In January 2014, I was interviewing Stern on my radio show. He was approaching retirement after thirty years as NBA commissioner, and he was very relaxed. We had a great conversation, and I asked him to reflect on the period of expansion and what it meant to the league.
He talked about the expansion era, about the rise in interest in pro basketball, about the great players that came into the league, and about the excitement of the fans. “It was an exciting time,” he concluded, “to be the commissioner of the NBA—in spite of the fact that you tricked me and put those Mickey Mouse ears on my head!”
Ha! He hadn’t forgotten!
Alex Martins
There’s No Such Thing as a Sure Thing
The 1992 NBA draft lottery was one of the most significant in the annals of the league. Whoever won the number one pick was assured of drafting a once-in-a-lifetime player: Shaquille O’Neal. The lottery was held at the NBA Films headquarters in New Jersey. All eleven teams that failed to make the play-offs took part in the lottery.
NBC broadcaster Bob Costas was emceeing the event and would be interviewing the representative of the lottery-winning team. So I went to him and said, “Bob, keep my seat warm up there. I’ll be talking to you right after the lottery.”
The ceremony commenced. The Magic had the worst record in the league, so we were allowed ten of the sixty-six Ping-Pong balls in the lottery machine. Commissioner David Stern officiated, and a representative from a major accounting firm was on hand to certify the fairness of the lottery. The doors of the room were locked. No one could go in or out until the ceremony was completed.
The results of the bouncing Ping-Pong balls were indicated by an arrangement of cards with team logos printed on them. As the network cameras recorded the event, Commissioner Stern turned over the cards one by one, revealing the logos of the teams in ascending order, from eleventh to first. As each logo was revealed, the suspense was excruciating.
By the time Stern reached the second from the last card, only two logos were left to be revealed—the Charlotte Hornets and the Orlando Magic. Stern turned the second from the last card faceup. The Hornets had gotten the second pick! The Magic card was still facedown! We had won the lottery!
I was numb as I rose from my seat and went to the podium to be congratulated by Stern. I held up our Magic Shaq jersey, and the cameras captured my look of stunned amazement.
Moments later, I sat down next to Bob Costas for an interview. “Pat Williams,” he said, “you told me before the lottery to keep your chair warm because you were going to be back here to talk about winning the first pick—and here you are.”
And there I was!
We had won the first pick, and drafting Shaq looked like a sure thing. But the draft was still five weeks away, and we were about to discover that there’s no such thing as a sure thing.
The draft is normally held in New York City, but because of the World Games that year, the draft was held in Portland, Oregon. All the players in the draft, including Shaq, had to be in Portland to be introduced on national television.
About ten thousand Magic fans were in our arena for the event. I stood on a platform in the center of the arena so the fans could see me in person while watching the draft live from Portland on our giant screens. We had a high-tech satellite phone hookup that had been tested and double-checked. All I had to do was pick up the phone and announce that Orlando was selecting Shaquille O’Neal of LSU.
At the appointed time, I picked up the phone, smiled to the crowd, and heard—nothing. No dial tone. The line was dead.
I looked around for help. The technical wizards whispered, “Try it again!” I did. The line was still dead. I began to sweat. Panic rose.
I realized that we had no contingency plan for a technology breakdown. We should have instructed our people in Portland, “If anything goes wrong, just take Shaq!” But we hadn’t prepared for this.
An anxious murmur spread through the crowd. Our fans were wondering why I was just standing there, grinning foolishly and sweating buckets. The clock was ticking. If we didn’t get word to Portland in the next few seconds, we would forfeit our number one pick!
Then I saw the Magic’s ace publicity director (now CEO) Alex Martins calmly dialing his cell phone. “Tell Commissioner Stern,” he said calmly, “we’re taking Shaquille O’Neal of LSU.” Moments later, Stern announced our selection on national television.
For years afterward, I had nightmares about that event. I would wake up in a cold sweat, recalling the draft pick that almost didn’t happen because we failed to prepare for a high-tech snafu. Being prepared for crises is a key to success. I’ll always be grateful that Alex Martins was calm, competent, and prepared that day.
“Don’t Go Out Too Fast”
John Adelbert Kelley was probably the most famous Boston Marathoner of all time. He competed in his first Boston Marathon in 1928 and ran his last full Boston Marathon in 1992 at the age of eighty-four. He finished fifty-eight Boston Marathons in his lifetime and competed in the Olympics in 1936 and 1948. A statue of Johnny Kelley stands near city hall in Newton, Massachusetts.
I ran the first of my thirteen Boston Marathons in 1996, while Kelley was still living but after he had given up marathon running. He was a beloved figure and a legend around the city of Boston.
On Sunday before the event, he’d always be at Fenway Park to throw out the first pitch before the Red Sox game. The fans, all thirty-five thousand of them, would go crazy when he came out. In his later years, he wasn’t able to throw the ball over home plate, but nobody booed him. They’d boo anybody else, but they didn’t boo Johnny Kelley.
On the day of the marathon, I would eat breakfast around 6:30, and there would be Kelley talking with all the anxious runners, including me. We would all gather around him, seeking his counsel.
I’d say, “What advice do you have for someone like me?”
His advice was always the same, yet I loved to hear it. “Don’t go out too fast,” he’d say. “It’ll come back to bite you. Don’t get caught up too early. Pace yourself. Those hills at the end of the race will kill you if you don’t.”
I was always thrilled to be in Kelley’s presence. I was honored to listen to him, to learn from him, and to follow—literally—in his footsteps.
John F. Kennedy
Even Charisma Can Be Learned
When my sister Ruthie was a high school senior in Wilmington, Delaware, a Massachusetts senator named John F. Kennedy was running for president. My parents were lifelong Democrats, and Mom just adored JFK. So when the Democratic Party of Delaware held a major fund-raiser in Kennedy’s honor, Mom was front and center.
The dinner was held at the Scottish Rite Cathedral in Wilmington, and Mom and Dad took Ruthie with them. My mother was bold and knew no fear, so before JFK gave his speech, Mom took Ruthie in tow and went right up to Senator Kennedy for a chat. She introduced Ruthie and explained to the senator that she had been accepted to Vassar and would be attending classes there in the fall.
Ruthie was completely bedazzled by Senator Kennedy’s charm. She recently told me that she still remembers that encounter like it was yesterday. They chatted briefly, then Mom and Ruthie returned to their table.
Since it was a school night, Mom asked a friend of the family to drive Ruthie home. As Ruthie and the family friend slipped out a side entrance to head for the parking lot, they saw another door open at the same time. Kennedy and some of his aides and handlers were slipping out at the same time.
Ruthie stared as the future president strode to his limousine. As he was about to enter the car, Kennedy spotted Ruthie across the dark parking lot. He smiled at her and said (in his trademark Boston accent), “Good luck at Vassah!”
My sister has never gotten over that moment. Kennedy greeted her and even remembered where she was going to attend college. As Ruthie told me not long ago, “I was thrilled then, and I’m still thrilled whenever I remember it. I have his picture on my refrigerator, and I’ve loved him ever since.”
Kennedy had a quality called charm or charisma. Many people assume that charisma is a natural gift—you’re either born with it or you’re not. I challenge that assumption. I’m convinced that practically every desirable trait can be learned and acquired: leadership ability, speaking ability, strong work ethic, boldness, and, yes, even charisma. I believe we can boost our own charisma by focusing on a few simple skills: making good eye contact, smiling with confidence, projecting an attitude of enthusiasm, listening to others and remembering some key details about them, leaning into the conversation, and remaining humble and gracious. These are all learnable skills, and I believe JFK studied and learned them.
Historians say that, as a young man, John F. Kennedy was painfully awkward and self-conscious. But when Kennedy was in his early twenties, he underwent a personal transformation. In The Kennedys: An American Drama, Peter Collier and David Horowitz note that Kennedy had a friend, Chuck Spaulding, who was an assistant to actor Gary Cooper. Spaulding took Kennedy around prewar Hollywood and introduced him to many film stars. Spaulding later said that Kennedy “was very interested in that binding magnetism these screen personalities had. What exactly was it? How did you go about acquiring it?”1
When my sister Ruthie was captivated by that fabled Kennedy charisma, she couldn’t have imagined that it was a skill he had acquired while observing screen stars like Gary Cooper and Clark Gable. She just knew that she had been charmed, and JFK’s charisma still lives in my sister’s memory fifty years after the gleam of Camelot died.
Larry Bowa
“If Every Game Is Like This One”
It was opening day 1966, and the Greenville Mets had come to Duncan Park to play the Spartanburg Phillies. I was the Phillies’ twenty-five-year-old general manager. Our nineteen-year-old rookie shortstop, Larry Bowa, was our leadoff hitter, and the Greenville Mets’ pitcher struck him out on three pitches.
In the course of the game, Bowa came up to bat three more times—and struck out three more times. In his pro debut, Larry Bowa was 0-4 with four strikeouts. Not exactly an auspicious start.
That night, Bowa called his dad, a former ballplayer and manager who lived in California. “Dad,” he said, “if every game is like this one, I’ll be coming home soon.”
What Bowa didn’t realize was that the Mets pitcher who struck him out was a young flamethrower named Nolan Ryan, who would go on to have a twenty-seven-year Hall of Fame career in baseball—a career that included seven no-hitters, three more than any other pitcher in Major League Baseball history.
Though Larry Bowa’s first game in pro baseball seemed a bad omen, he didn’t let a rough start keep him down. He battled back and went on to enjoy a long career in baseball (he is currently the Philadelphia Phillies’ bench coach).
John Havlicek
“Obstacles Are More Mental than Physical”
John Havlicek is widely recognized as one of the greatest basketball players of all time. He played sixteen seasons with the Boston Celtics, won eight NBA titles, and was inducted into the Basketball Hall of Fame in 1984. I once had him on my radio show, and I asked him if perseverance was a big factor in his successful career.
“Perseverance is absolutely important,” he replied. “The obstacles you face are more mental than physical. When two people play against each other, the question is who will give up first. It becomes a mental game of one-on-one. The object is to see who is mentally tougher—you or the other guy—on every single move, on every individual shot.
“The player who wins is the one who works a little harder, who goes a little longer. I believe you will pass out before you are overworked, but most people don’t know that. They think they’re overworked, so they stop. They could have kept going, but they didn’t. They weren’t beaten physically. They were beaten mentally. Those who persevere win.”
Havlicek announced that he was retiring after the 1978 season, so when he came to Philadelphia to play his last game in the Spectrum Arena, we honored him with a tribute before the game. Even though he played for our perennial rivals, the Celtics, it was an emotional ceremony for our hometown fans, and Havlicek was clearly touched. On April 12, 1978, he sent me a handwritten note that read:
Dear Pat,
I want to take the time to thank you for the wonderful pregame ceremony on my last trip to the Spectrum.
The gifts, the crowd, the gestures, and the hospitality of you and your organization made it a most memorable affair, and I’m most appreciative.
John Havlicek
A very classy word of thanks from the great John Havlicek.
“I’ll Do Anything to Get People to Hear My Music”
In October 1974, when I was the general manager of the Philadelphia 76ers, I was working on a fall-themed promotion for an upcoming game with the Knicks. We had all kinds of activities planned—bobbing for apples, a pumpkin-pie-eating contest, treats for the kids, and on and on. While I was trying to manage all the details, my phone rang. It was Barry Abrams, a record promoter who worked part-time at our games.
“Pat,” he said, “could you do me a favor? I’m working with a terrific young recording artist who has a new song. Could you play it at the game tonight?”
“I don’t know, Barry,” I said. “That’s not the kind of thing we usually do. Plus, I’m up to my ears with this new promotion.”
“You’d be doing me a huge favor.”
I sighed. “Okay, have him bring me his tape before the game. I’ll see what I can do.” I hung up and forgot all about it.
An hour before the game, a lanky, long-haired young man approached me and said, “Mr. Williams? Barry Abrams said I should see you. I brought my tape.” He held out a cassette.
It took me a moment to recall my chat with Abrams. “Oh, yeah. Are you sure you want to play your song in this arena? The acoustics are terrible.”
“Mr. Williams,” he said, “I’ll take my tapes to sporting events, radio stations, school dances, birthday parties, bar mitzvahs—anyplace at all. I’ll do anything to get people to hear my music, because if they hear it, they’ll like it.”
I told him to take his tape to Joe the sound guy up in the glass booth. “Tell Joe that anything you want is okay with me.” Then I went back to work.
Sometime later, the arena filled with fans, the 76ers and Knicks took the court, and the game got underway. During a time-out, I noticed a song playing over the public address system—a smooth, plaintive love ballad. When the song ended, a smattering of applause broke out in the stands. Well, somebody out there liked the kid’s music.
I didn’t think any more about it until the next time I heard that song. It was playing on the radio—and it was a huge hit. The song was “Mandy,” the breakthrough recording that launched the career of a young singer-songwriter named Barry Manilow.
Martin Luther King Jr.
“Nothing Ever Rattled Him”
In the summer of 2012, former CBS anchorman Dan Rather came on my radio show to talk about his new book Rather Outspoken. He was effusive and eager to talk. I was especially interested in his thoughts on Martin Luther King Jr.
As the Southern bureau chief for CBS news during the most turbulent years of the civil rights movement, Rather had covered King almost daily and had interviewed him a number of times. Rather vividly recalled what many people now forget—that King endured searing hatred, death threats, and actual violence throughout those years of conflict and opposition.
“King was not a perfect man,” Rather told me, “but he was a courageous man with a vision for a better America. He risked everything and worked tirelessly for that vision, and he succeeded in breaking the back of institutional segregation in America.”
I asked Rather for a personal assessment of King’s character. “King,” he said, “was a self-contained man, but he had the ability to connect with people of all different stripes. Bill Clinton had the same quality. Both men, regardless of how busy they were, would stop what they were doing and give you their full attention. They were there in the moment with you. Dr. King was under constant pressure, tension, and chaos, but nothing ever rattled him. The more intense his circumstances, the steadier he got. I like to say that he was quiet at the center.”
Pat Robertson
“I Thought I Could Win”
I’ve gotten to know Christian television host Pat Robertson through my many appearances on The 700 Club. I go on the show about once a year to promote a new book, and Robertson is always very kind to me. He has invited me to Regent University on four occasions to speak.
One time, several years ago, I gave the commencement address. Afterward, I shed the cap and gown I had been wearing on that ninety-degree day and had lunch with Robertson. Over lunch, I reminisced with him about the 1988 presidential primaries. He entered the primaries, finished second in Iowa (ahead of President George H. W. Bush), and won the majority of delegates in the Washington State caucus. But he was not much of a factor in the multiple-state primaries. Still, it was an audacious attempt by a political outsider to take on a sitting president.
I asked Robertson what prompted him to enter the race. He looked at me as if I had just asked the silliest question ever uttered.
He said, “Because I thought I could win.”
Stan Musial
“Ever Have a Day Like That?”
All the great stars of baseball came out to the 1992 grand opening of the Ted Williams Museum and Hitters Hall of Fame. One of those stars was one of Ted Williams’s contemporaries, Stan Musial, who played twenty-two seasons (1941 through 1963) with the St. Louis Cardinals. Nicknamed “Stan the Man,” Musial is universally acknowledged as one of the greatest hitters in Major League Baseball history. He was certainly one of the most consistent hitters in baseball, with 1,815 career hits at home and exactly the same number of career hits on the road. His record of 3,630 career hits ranks fourth over-all and first among players who spent their entire career with one team.
I enjoyed getting to talk to Musial during the museum event, and he told me a story from his playing days that says a lot about his confidence as a player. “I was in the locker room one day,” he said, “and a rookie came in and said, ‘I feel great! I think I’m gonna get three hits today! You ever have a day like that, Stan?’ I said, ‘Yeah. Every day.’”
Jack Youngblood
No Regrets
How tough do you have to be to play football on a broken leg?
On December 30, 1979, LA Rams defensive end Jack Youngblood was in Dallas playing in a divisional play-off game against the Cowboys. Late in the second quarter, two Dallas offensive linemen chop-blocked him, leaving him writhing in pain. The Rams’ trainers carted him off to the locker room, where the doctor X-rayed his leg. The picture showed that his calf bone had snapped a couple of inches above the ankle.
“Tape up my leg,” Youngblood demanded, “and bring me some aspirin!”
The doctor protested, but Youngblood insisted—and he prevailed. He went back into the game and even managed to sack Roger Staubach on a key play. The Rams upset the Cowboys 21-19.
Youngblood played the next game, the NFC championship game in Tampa Bay, with a plastic cast on his leg. The Rams beat Tampa Bay 9-0 for the NFC title.
In Super Bowl XIV in Pasadena, the Rams faced Terry Bradshaw and the Pittsburgh Steelers. Once again, Youngblood played the entire game with a broken bone in his leg.
Near the end of the game, the Rams were ahead and the Steelers were mired deep in their own territory. On third and eight, Bradshaw took the snap, faked a handoff, and stepped back to throw. Youngblood blew through the line and barreled straight for Bradshaw, who was waiting for his receiver to get open downfield. Youngblood was just a half step too late. Bradshaw unleashed the pass, and the receiver caught the ball and took it to the end zone for a seventy-three-yard touchdown.
The Steelers won, but Youngblood had no regrets playing in the Super Bowl on a broken leg. “The only regret I would have had,” he later said, “is if I hadn’t played.”
Today, Youngblood lives in Orlando and is actively involved in many organizations, including the Orlando chapter of the Christian organization Young Life. I see him from time to time, and I’ve told him I have to admire a guy who has the guts to chase down Roger Staubach and Terry Bradshaw on a broken leg.
“Focus! Focus! Focus!”
Some years ago, the Boston Celtics came to our arena to play the Magic. It was around the midpoint of the season, and the two teams had nearly identical records. The game was going to be televised nationally, so the pressure was intense.
More than an hour before the game, I went down to the visiting team’s locker room to talk to the Celtics’ power forward Kevin Garnett. I wanted to give him a signed copy of my most recent book and ask him to autograph his picture on the new Wheaties box so we could auction it for charity.
I found Garnett sitting in a chair, staring off into space while a trainer taped his ankles. The look on his face was intimidating. You’ve heard the expression “He has his game face on.” Well, until you see Kevin Garnett’s game face, you don’t know what that term really means. His eyes were intense and fierce. His jaw was set like stone. I could actually feel an emotional aura around him, like static electricity before a thunderstorm.
Garnett was in a zone all his own. I found his demeanor so intimidating that I wanted to take my book and my Wheaties box and just get outta there! But I gulped hard, summoned my courage, and said, “Uh, Kevin, I’d like you to sign this Wheaties box for charity.”
“Mr. Williams,” Kevin said, glancing at me as if noticing me for the first time, “I don’t sign anything, I don’t look at anything, I don’t do anything before a game.”
He raised his right hand up before his face, holding it like an ax with the blade aimed straight in front of him. Then he slowly chopped the air with his hand. “Focus! Focus! Focus!” he said. “Before the game, I don’t want any distractions. After the game, I’ll sign the box. Right now, I’m focused on the game.”
Then his face again became a mask of intense concentration. I had often heard of Garnett’s intensity as a player, but until I saw him in the locker room that night, I had no idea what that really meant.
“Focus! Focus! Focus!” That’s why Kevin Garnett is a champion.
Paul Hornung and Jerry West
The “Focus” Switch
My friend Ernie Accorsi, former New York Giants general manager, played in a celebrity golf tournament with retired Hall of Fame running back Paul Hornung, who played for Vince Lombardi’s Green Bay Packers from 1957 through 1966. Hornung is a colorful cowboy-type guy who speaks with a laid-back Kentucky drawl. For most of the round, Hornung had been playing in an easygoing manner that matched his drawl.
But as they moved into the final six holes, Hornung and his companions realized they had a chance to win the tournament. Accorsi told me, “I’ve never seen a switch go on like I saw the switch go on in Paul Hornung. He turned on the ‘focus’ switch, and all the funny stuff and kidding around were gone. He stopped laughing, and it was just pure focus for the last six holes. And we won! Hornung carried us, and I got to see a world-class athlete do something only a world-class athlete can do. I saw him turn on the ‘focus’ switch.”
Another world-class athlete who exemplifies the “focus” switch is legendary basketball star Jerry West, who retired in 1974 after a fourteen-year career with the Los Angeles Lakers. He has also been a head coach and general manager with the Lakers. West is so closely identified with NBA basketball that the NBA logo incorporates his silhouette for its distinctive image.
I was at a store in Orlando doing a book signing when a man approached me and asked, “How well do you know Jerry West?”
“We’ve been in this business a long time together,” I replied. “I know Jerry pretty well. Why do you ask?”
“I played golf with him one day,” the gentleman told me, “and it’s not much fun playing golf with Jerry. He’s so intense, so focused, that it’s hard to have fun around him. You oughta see this guy putt. He’s a great putter, but it’s all business with him. Nothing deters him; nothing distracts him. You can’t speak to him. He’s totally focused on his game.”
Yes, that described West all right, but that’s the key to his success over the years. He approached basketball the same way he approached golf—with an intense, unbreakable focus. He turned on that “focus” switch, and nothing could keep him from his goal.
I remember bringing West to Orlando in 1986, when we were trying to bring an NBA franchise to town. West spoke at a rally to stir up the community to get behind the Magic, and his presence gave a huge boost to our efforts. After West spoke, we had a Q&A session, and someone asked him if, out of all the thousands of games he’d played, any games stood out in his mind.
“Well,” West said, “I remember one game when I was eighteen for twenty from the floor and twelve for twelve from the free throw line, and I had a 103-degree fever.” And he went on to describe some memorable moments from that game.
Could you deliver one of your best performances with a 103-degree fever? West could flip the “focus” switch and completely block out his fever, the distractions from the crowd, and the pressure, and he could shoot eighteen of twenty from the floor and twelve of twelve from the free throw line. West could put on mental blinders and focus totally on winning. That’s what made him great.
Michael Jordan
“That’s the Jordan Way”
In the late 1990s, the Magic acquired veteran guard B. J. Armstrong, who had played with Michael Jordan and the Bulls during their championship era. On one occasion, I sat next to Armstrong on the team bus and told him about my book project on Jordan. “Take a look at my outline for the book,” I said. “I’ve tried to list all the character qualities that have made Michael so successful. What do you think, B. J.? Did I capture the man?”
“It looks pretty good,” he said, reading through the outline, “except for one thing. In fact, you’ve forgotten the most important thing that makes Michael who he is.”
The most important thing? What had I missed?
“B. J.,” I said, “I’m all ears.”
“Focus,” he said. “That’s what sets Michael apart. He has an almost superhuman ability to be in the moment, totally focused on his goal. His concentration is absolute. His head is totally in the game—no distractions. Nothing interferes with his focus. That’s what sets him apart.”
Armstrong was right. I had totally missed that key element of Jordan’s greatness. Just a few months after my conversation with Armstrong, the focus factor was underscored for me once again.
I had written to veteran NBC newsman Tim Russert, the host of Meet the Press. I knew that Russert had interviewed Jordan on television a number of times, so I asked him if he could share with me the secret of Jordan’s success as an athlete and competitor. Russert replied at Christmastime with a handwritten note.
Dear Pat,
Focus. Focus. Focus. Then get it done. That’s the Jordan way.
Have a nice holiday.
Tim Russert
Don Shula
“You Were Completely Focused”
After Don Shula retired as the head coach of the Miami Dolphins, the longtime coach sat in the stands with his friend Charlie Morgan to watch a Dolphins game for the first time as a mere spectator.
Between the third and fourth quarters, the team owner’s wife came out and honored some inner-city kids in a brief ceremony near the Dolphins’ bench. Shula was impressed. “What a great idea!” he said. “How long has that been going on?”
“Don,” Charlie replied, “they did that at every home game throughout your entire coaching career.”
Shula was astounded. “I never knew that!”
“Of course you didn’t,” Charlie replied. “You were completely focused on the game.”
Carol Channing and Mary Martin
Never Retire
In the summer of 1986, three cities were competing hard to obtain an NBA expansion franchise in Florida—Miami, Tampa, and Orlando. The Miami effort was headed by Zev Buffman, an Israeli-born Broadway impresario with strong Florida ties and more than forty Broadway productions to his credit. So, for a while, Buffman and I were intense rivals.
Once the word came down that the NBA had selected both Orlando and Miami for expansion franchises, the rivalry subsided, and Buffman and I became friends. In fact, it wasn’t long after the league made its decision that Buffman called me and invited me to attend a new stage show that was coming to Orlando costarring Carol Channing and Mary Martin. “Come see the show,” he said. “Afterward I’m hosting Carol and Mary at dinner, and we’d like you and your wife to join us.”
I had grown up loving the theater. My mother had taken my sisters and me to New York for many Broadway shows, and I had seen Carol onstage in Hello, Dolly! and Mary in South Pacific. Getting to see them on the same stage together, then have dinner with them, would be the experience of a lifetime.
So we went to the show. It was a comedy called Legends by James Kirkwood Jr., and it told the story of two rival film stars late in their careers. It was funny, warm, and touching. Carol and Mary were amazing in it, and it seemed to have been written expressly for them.
After the show, we met Buffman and the two stars for dinner, and it was as if the show went into extra acts! For ninety minutes, it was impossible to get a word in edgewise between Carol and Mary. But why would I want to talk when it was so fascinating to listen? These two ladies had so much theater history in common, and they shared gossip, tall tales, and reminiscences without end. I hung on every word.
It occurred to me that, even though Carol and Mary were no longer onstage, they were still performing, still entertaining, still pleasing the audience. In fact, they were practically still in character! Because Legends was about two longtime actresses, it was hard to say where the character began and the actress left off.
One of my takeaways from that evening was the realization that when you love what you do, you never want to stop, you never want to retire, you want to keep doing what you love. Even over dinner.
Keep Doing What You Love
When I was growing up in the 1950s, the music was fantastic. One of the great musical innovators of that era was guitarist Les Paul. More than a musician, he was an inventor and instrument designer who pioneered the development of the solid-body electric guitar and helped invent the sound we know as rock ’n’ roll. While recording with his wife, Mary Ford, he was one of the first to experiment with overdubbing, multitrack recording, and electronic sound effects. Les Paul and Mary Ford produced some of the most distinctive recordings of that time.
Mary Ford died in 1977, but Les Paul continued performing well into his nineties. A few years ago, my son Jimmy, who lives and works in New York, called me and said, “Dad, I know you like Les Paul. Well, there’s a nightclub here where he performs, and I can get us in.”
“Jimmy,” I said, “I would love that.”
So Jimmy got us into the club. The place was packed and turning people away at the doors, but we were able to get seats close to the stage. The lights dimmed and out walked ninety-three-year-old Les Paul. He performed his patented licks and trills on the magical strings and frets of a guitar he himself invented—and then he did a second show later that night.
In August 2009, about three months after we saw him perform, I picked up the paper and read that he had passed away. Though he was gone, he had left us his music—and he had left us a message through the example of his life: Don’t retire. Don’t let them put you out to pasture. Keep doing what you love until you draw your last breath.
Bob Feller
The Full Sixty Feet
After retiring from the American League, Hall of Famer Bob Feller played every year in the alumni game. He’d suit up in an Indians uniform, pitch the first inning, then go up into the stands and sign autographs. He did this right up until the end of his life.
In 2006, when he was eighty-eight years old, Feller was playing in one of these alumni games. I was catching for the National League, and our pitcher was Gaylord Perry, another Hall of Famer. Feller and Perry were both pitching pretty well for a couple of old-timers. Feller got some hitters out, and he received a wonderful ovation from an appreciative crowd.
After the game, I was in the clubhouse, and I found Feller sitting at a table signing baseballs. I said, “Bob, that was marvelous. You and Gaylord were the stars of the evening.”
Feller said, “Yeah, but I pitched from the full sixty feet.”
In other words, Feller claimed that Perry had moved up a few feet in front of the rubber to get the ball over the plate. I hadn’t noticed that, but Feller sure did. He had a real competitor’s spirit and pride in craftsmanship. Though pushing ninety, he was still competing against a rival pitcher!
Satchel Paige
Keep Pitching
In 1965, I was in Spartanburg, trying every which way to promote our team and get people into the ballpark. One day, I was on the phone with my mentor, the great Bill Veeck, and I said, “Bill, is there any way you could get Satchel Paige to come in here and pitch in our ballpark? I’d love to build a promotion around him.”
“Let me check,” he said. “I’ll get back to you.”
Satchel Paige was known for his blazing fastball. Joe DiMaggio once said that Paige was the best pitcher he ever faced, and Bob Feller called him the best pitcher he’d ever seen. I knew that Veeck had brought Paige to the major leagues in 1948 and was very close to him. If anyone could reach him, it was Bill Veeck. Soon my phone rang, and it was Veeck. “Yeah,” he said, “I can get him there for you. He’ll do whatever you want for the promotion.”
We advertised that we were bringing in ace right-hander and future Hall of Famer Satchel Paige to pitch against the Spartanburg Phillies. I knew the game had the potential to be a huge crowd-pleaser.
Though Paige was about sixty, he could still pitch, still get guys out, still wow the crowd. He pitched against our guys for three innings in an exhibition, and the promotion was a huge success. Before he left, he signed a photo for me with this inscription: “To Pat Williams from Satchel Paige, who would love to pitch in Spartanburg!” I still have that picture on my wall as a reminder to keep living every day to the fullest—and to keep pitching.
Kenny Rogers
“The Very Best I’ve Got”
I first encountered Kenny Rogers in Philadelphia when I was the general manager of the 76ers. Rogers was a huge star in the 1980s, and he was doing a concert at our arena, which was completely packed. There was a meet-and-greet event with Rogers before the concert, and I was invited. Rogers was glad-handing everyone and getting his picture taken with people right up until an announcement came over the public address system: “Mr. Rogers, you’re on in sixty seconds.”
With that, he waved good-bye and took off toward the tunnel leading to the stage. I found it amazing that he could switch gears so fast. One minute he’s schmoozing, and the next minute he’s leaping onto the stage to give a show-stopping performance. The music blares, the lights play across the stage, the audience roars, and he’s on!
Now, fast-forward more than a decade. Sometime after our family moved to Orlando, Rogers did a concert on the campus of the University of Central Florida. The crowd was not as big as in earlier years, but he still had a lot of fans, and he still put on a rousing good show.
Our family attended the meet-and-greet event before the concert, and my wife and I had pictures taken with him. As we were standing next to him, I said, “Kenny, does all of this ever get old? What drives you to keep performing, to keep giving audiences so much energy onstage?”
“The people do,” he said. “The moment I hear the music and see the crowd, I think, These people paid a lot of money to see me get up and perform. I need to give them their money’s worth, the very best I’ve got. That’s what keeps me going.”