Tittle and Brady, Giants and Pats (and Tightwads)

GIANTS, PATRIOTS, AND MEMORIES

I started watching sports as a six-year-old in (gulp) 1961. Every autumn Sunday at 1 p.m., my dad and I went to our “TV Room.” There we’d watch the New York football Giants on CBS-TV Channel 3, out of Burlington, Vt.—where the Giants had a preseason camp. The Giants always put on a show. Old-timers will remember the names. Y.A. Tittle. Frank Gifford. Andy Robustelli. Sam Huff.  On and on.

The games were in “black-and-white” as opposed to color, of course. But I can still hear TV play-by-play broadcaster Chris Schenkel’s voice.

“TOUCHDOWN, New York!”

I recall Tittle throwing for seven TD passes against the Washington Redskins in 1962. What fun it was to watch Alex Webster, Rosey Grier, Erich Barnes and company. The fledging Patriots weren’t taken seriously in those days. The Giants owned New England

The Giants made the NFL title game in 1961 and 1962, losing to the Packers both years. In 1963 Tittle threw for 36 touchdowns (in 14 games) but New York lost to the Chicago Bears, 14-10 in the championship game.

Those Sunday afternoon memories will never fade away.

Now the Patriots own New England, and countless New Hampshire youngsters now have their own lasting Sunday afternoon memories--watching a team that seldom disappoints.

However, there’s a difference between the Tittle-era Giants and the Tom Brady-era Patriots. Following that 1963 title game, the Giants fell upon hard times. In 1964 the team finished 2-10-2 and Tittle retired. In 1966 the Giants went 1-13. The magic was gone. Our “TV Room” was empty on Sunday afternoons.

But since Brady era began in 2001, the Patriots have had nothing but winning seasons—including five Super Bowl trips. Earlier this month they clinched yet another AFC East title. Fourteen years of unprecedented gridiron success have cemented Pats imagery into the minds of countless youngsters. A half century from now they’ll call up vivid memories of a Patriot Golden Age—just as I have my Giant memories.

So this Sunday I’ll be watching the Pats host the Buffalo Bills. At 1 p.m.. On CBS. In color. In my “TV room.” And I’ll be mentally thanking Coach Bill Belichick and Company for the memories, while pondering how sad it must be for generations of football youngsters to grow up in places like Detroit.

Go Pats!

MORE ON CHARLIE COMISKEY

I owe a “Thank you” to loyal reader Bill Lamb of Meredith, who took me to task for my comments regarding the supposedly penurious Chicago White Sox owner Charlie Comiskey (Sport-Thoughts, Dec. 11 Weirs Times). I pointed out that star ChiSox slugger Shoeless Joe Jackson made only $6000 in 1919, and the conventional wisdom was that the team threw the World Series that year because Comiskey didn’t pay them what they deserved.

Bill writes that “Comiskey was a relatively generous owner who paid his players the going salary rate, and then some.” He sent documentation that the ChiSox had the second highest player payroll in baseball for 1919. Apparently the portrayal of Comiskey as a tightwad owner was a stratagem devised by Black Sox defense lawyers at the 1921 criminal trial. Who knew?

Well, now YOU know “the rest of the story.”

Still, there remain internet accounts of Comiskey forcing his players to launder their own uniforms. And the story lingers that Comiskey’s promised bonus for winning the 1919 pennant turned out to be a case of flat champagne. But as Abe Lincoln reportedly said, “Don’t trust everything you read on the internet.”

Anyway, thanks for the info, Bill. Have a Merry Christmas!

(And if there ARE any tightwad, skinflint Scrooges out there who are not paying people what they deserve, may you be visited by the ghost of Shoeless Joe in your dreams tonight.)