Showing posts with label Terrible Towel. Show all posts
Showing posts with label Terrible Towel. Show all posts
Tuesday, October 20, 2009
Remember, The Titans?
To the Tennessee Titans publicity department:
I certainly do not envy your current task. To some degree, I can relate to it. I once worked in sports information for my college football team which went 0-10 my junior year. I know how frustrating a winless season can be.
All the pundits are having their say as to why the Titans are 0-6 and coming off a humiliating 59-0 loss to Tom Brady. Too many injuries, bad defense, Jeff Fisher is through, I’m sure you’ve heard them all.
Everybody up here in da ‘Burgh knows the real reason.
It’s because the Titans stomped on the Terrible Towel.
I’m serious. When several Titans trampled the Terrible Towel after their 31-14 win over the Steelers last year, they had no idea how much bad karma they unleashed. The Titans haven’t won a game since. Do you think that’s just a coincidence?
But your team and their fans are in luck. There is a chance to redeem yourselves, and probably save Jeff Fisher’s job, too.
The Terrible Towel is more than just a stadium accessory. Sales of the Towel benefit the Allegheny Valley School for people with intellectual and developmental disabilities. The Terrible Towel was created by the late Myron Cope, the longtime Steelers radio announcer whose son, David, is a resident at the school.
It would be a great gesture for the Titans to make a donation to Allegheny Valley School, perhaps accompanied by a visit to Myron Cope’s grave at Chartiers Cemetery in Carnegie.
Hey, desperate times call for desperate measures. The Titans can still go 10-6….
Regards,
Bob Fritz
Penn Hills, PA
Friday, February 29, 2008
Myron Cope 1929-2008
A piece of Pittsburgh died this week.
As I write this, people are gathering in downtown Pittsburgh to pay tribute to Myron Cope with a ceremonial wave of the Terrible Towel he invented. Newspapers, TV stations, and blogs are loaded with tributes to Cope, who died Wednesday from respiratory failure at 79.
These tributes are the most I’ve ever seen for a sportscaster. Nobody mourned Howard Cosell this way.
In the relatively brief time that I’ve lived in Pittsburgh, I can see that the tributes are justified.
Soon after I moved here in 2002, it became apparent to me that Cope was more than a sportscaster. One of the first things Jamie did to introduce me to the area was play a Steelers radio broadcast. I had never heard an announcer quite like him. His nasal voice, with a heavy Pittsburgh accent, came across like Cosell without the pretentiousness. His catch phrases, such as “um-hah,” “yoi,” and “okle-dokle,” became part of the local vocabulary, as did his nicknames for opposing teams—the “Cleve Brownies,” the “Cincinnati Bungles,” and the “Baltimore Birdies.” He made Steelermania instantly accessible to me. For the uninitiated, this site has a good collection of Myron’s sound bites.
Two of his most recent games stand out in my mind. One was the last game of the 2004 season. The Steelers had clinched a playoff berth and started many second-stringers against the Buffalo Bills, but beat them anyway. Myron marveled at the performance of the “Steelers Scrubs” and riffed on it throughout the game. He even joked that he would have T-shirts made reading “Steelers Scrubs.”
Another game, that same year, was a fairly decisive win against the arch-rival Cincinnati Bengals, in which he came up with the line, “We’re putting the lox on those Cincinnati Bagels!”
His legacy goes beyond the broadcast booth. He once joked that his epitaph would read, “Creator of Towel Dead,” and many people know him best as the creator of the Terrible Towel. The Towel, invented prior to a 1975 playoff game, has set the standard for sports team symbols. Cope was also an excellent print journalist. He and George Plimpton are the only two writers ever given the title of Special Correspondent for Sports Illustrated.
As I write this, people are gathering in downtown Pittsburgh to pay tribute to Myron Cope with a ceremonial wave of the Terrible Towel he invented. Newspapers, TV stations, and blogs are loaded with tributes to Cope, who died Wednesday from respiratory failure at 79.
These tributes are the most I’ve ever seen for a sportscaster. Nobody mourned Howard Cosell this way.
In the relatively brief time that I’ve lived in Pittsburgh, I can see that the tributes are justified.
Soon after I moved here in 2002, it became apparent to me that Cope was more than a sportscaster. One of the first things Jamie did to introduce me to the area was play a Steelers radio broadcast. I had never heard an announcer quite like him. His nasal voice, with a heavy Pittsburgh accent, came across like Cosell without the pretentiousness. His catch phrases, such as “um-hah,” “yoi,” and “okle-dokle,” became part of the local vocabulary, as did his nicknames for opposing teams—the “Cleve Brownies,” the “Cincinnati Bungles,” and the “Baltimore Birdies.” He made Steelermania instantly accessible to me. For the uninitiated, this site has a good collection of Myron’s sound bites.
Two of his most recent games stand out in my mind. One was the last game of the 2004 season. The Steelers had clinched a playoff berth and started many second-stringers against the Buffalo Bills, but beat them anyway. Myron marveled at the performance of the “Steelers Scrubs” and riffed on it throughout the game. He even joked that he would have T-shirts made reading “Steelers Scrubs.”
Another game, that same year, was a fairly decisive win against the arch-rival Cincinnati Bengals, in which he came up with the line, “We’re putting the lox on those Cincinnati Bagels!”
His legacy goes beyond the broadcast booth. He once joked that his epitaph would read, “Creator of Towel Dead,” and many people know him best as the creator of the Terrible Towel. The Towel, invented prior to a 1975 playoff game, has set the standard for sports team symbols. Cope was also an excellent print journalist. He and George Plimpton are the only two writers ever given the title of Special Correspondent for Sports Illustrated.
Until Myron's retirement, it was a tradition in our house to watch the Steelers game with the TV sound turned down and the radio playing in the background. I will never forget that moment before each game when the stadium music boomed in the background as the Steelers ran onto the field. Myron would sputter, raise his voice higher than usual, and generally break every rule of sportscasting, but, at that moment, he said everything you needed to know. It’s telling that, with all due respect to Tunch and Bill, we now listen to the radio broadcast only when the TV announcers really suck.
Thank you, Myron, for welcoming me to Pittsburgh.
Bye now!
Subscribe to:
Posts (Atom)
