When ever a video rolls up to be posted that includes two legends of sport….like this one seen herewith…. as Jim McKay interviews Jack Nicklaus at the 1987 US Open Golf Tournament….it always reminds me of just how awesome our treasure chest of vintage memories is here at ImaSportsphile…..for we consider footage like this video to be rare “nuggets of golf” in that treasure chest.
As we have often written before, ABC’s Jim McKay is a sportscaster endowed with the gifts of “elegance and eloquence” when he covers any event…..be it an interview with golf legend Jack Nicklaus….or his be it his description while covering the Munich massacre at the 1972 Summer Olympics….when he took on the job of reporting the events live on his only scheduled day off during the Games….while substituting for Chris Schenkel…..on a day in which he was on air for fourteen hours without a break during a sixteen-hour broadcast. After an unsuccessful rescue attempt of the athletes held hostage, at 3:24 AM German Time, McKay came on the air with this statement….“When I was a kid my father used to say…’Our greatest hopes and our worst fears are seldom realized.’as our worst fears have been realized tonight. They have now said there were 11 hostages; two were killed in their rooms this morn– yesterday morning, nine were killed at the airport tonight. They’re all gone.”
The way that McKay was able to be such a “master word merchant” is why every piece of video footage that we have of him with nothing but “pure gold” in our treasure chest of vintage memories here at ImaSportsphile.
