After almost two summers as an intern at the original Shreveport Journal – plus a full year at The Tech Talk – I assumed I pretty much knew everything there was to know about being a sports writer.
So when I was assigned to go to the Astrodome to cover a three-game series between the Houston Astros and Pittsburgh Pirates in August 1980, I was all over it. No doubt that a Pulitzer Prize was waiting on the other end.
Surely a season of covering the Shreveport Captains at SPAR Stadium had more than adequately prepared me to cover the Astros (who were on their way to winning the division) and the Pirates (the defending World Champions).
In addition to writing about the Astros, who were clearly Shreveport’s favorite MLB team at the time, the Pirates had a local product on the team in Matt “The Scat” Alexander, who was little more than a “designated pinch runner.” (He played in 44 games that season and had only 13 at bats.)
But as long as I was there, I might as well have tried to reel in the biggest fish I could find.
And lo and behold, there he was.
Before the first game of the series, I headed to the field to take it all in and to meet up with Alexander, who had played at Bethune High and Grambling State. But as I entered the Pirates dugout, there was only one player on the bench. He was at the far end of the third base dugout, just sitting there all by his lonesome.
Willie Stargell.
“Pops.” The reigning National League MVP. Future Hall of Famer.
Known to be as affable as he was respected in baseball circles, I was certain to start this trip off with a probing and insightful interview with the leader of the We-Are-Family Pirates.
I might just have to skip my senior year at Tech and go straight to Sports Illustrated.
Stargell was not in the starting lineup that night (at 40, he played only 67 games in 1980) so he figured to be even more accessible for a pre-game interview.
Man, had I hit paydirt!
As I made the long walk through the dugout to talk to Stargell, I noticed as object in his hands. When I got closer, I realized it was a camera and he would occasionally raise it to snap a picture and then put it back down.
I probably should have clued in that this wasn’t going to quite be what I expected when Stargell didn’t even turn in my direction as I introduced myself.
Silence.
OK, maybe he didn’t hear me or maybe I just needed to get to the point.
“Do you have time for an interview?”
Stargell slowly turned his head to his right and as he did, gave me a menacing look. That was followed are five words I will never, EVER, forget:
“Can’t you see I’m busy?”
Every single insecurity I thought had been hidden away suddenly revealed themselves at that moment. I pretty much mentally melted on the spot in the far end of the visitor’s dugout of the Astrodome.
Willie turned back toward the field while I slithered away.
Later, I got in touch with Alexander and told him about what had happened. “Oh, yeah, he can be like that sometimes,” he said of his teammate. “You gotta catch him at the right time.”
Thanks, Matt. You couldn’t have tossed me that little nugget before I went and lost every bit of self-esteem I had?
For years afterward, “can’t you see I’m busy?” would always hang around in the back on my mind whenever I would go to a one-on-one interview with a sports superstar. Willie Mays wasn’t too busy. Neither was Terry Bradshaw. Or Sugar Ray Leonard.
Jack Nicklaus pretty much blew me off in a nice way after a round at the Masters, but that’s because I been told by my newspaper bosses to ask a stupid question that I didn’t want to ask in the first place.
I look back at my first incarnation as a sports writer in the 1980s and early ‘90s and only can vaguely remember some of the details of those interviews. But it’s the interview that I didn’t get that is as unforgettable as any.
Contact JJ at johnjamesmarshall@yahoo.com