It’s a good bet that many of us during our lifetime have experienced situations that alter your intentions and turns out to be the exact opposite of plans.
Murphy’s Law is defined simply as,
“Anything that can go wrong, will go wrong.”
It simply means that when there are multiple ways of doing a particular task or an event, there exists a way or circumstances that can lead to disaster upon implementation.
Denny working on Big Bertha
Who is Murphy anyway?
History tells us that the credit goes to Captain Edward A Murphy, an Air Force engineer who discovered a technical error made by a junior technician during a deceleration test in 1949.
Captain Murphy’s belief being that if there are two or more ways to do something and one of those ways can result in a catastrophe, then it will happen.
Like so many other things in life, you can believe his theory or just laugh about it.
However, here are some incredible facts that actually happened a few years ago that Murphy’s Law should put in a text book.
My broadcast partner Denny Wright and I spent 12 wonderful years calling college sports; 7 seasons at NKU and 5 seasons at Thomas More.
During those many years there is one football game we called or should I say, tried to call, that will live in infamy for both us as a complete fiasco due to Murphy’s Law.
The elements were there and on this particular Saturday, Murphy’s Law pounced on us big time.
When you’re a broadcaster you will certainly broadcast games “on the road”. Once you get to your destination, you NEVER know what to expect.
Mike calling the game on a cradle phone.
Sometimes, our on the road hosts were tremendous in making sure we had all we needed to get “On the Air” and if need be, they would facilitate our needs to ensure we were ready to go.
It should be noted that one KEY component of needed broadcast equipment we were given to broadcast with was a huge Mixer Box that weighed 80 pounds.
Upon my first vision of looking at the enormous box, I immediately dubbed it, BIG BERTHA!
Bertha was obsolete as mixers here in the 21st century function. Bertha even had tubes that were essential back in 1959.
She was analog and most broadcast venues are digital today. This incompatibility would turn out to be disaster waiting to happen.
Realistically, Bertha should have been on display at a museum.
Be all that as it may, Bertha was cantankerous from time to time, but a gentle touch of her tubes or a shake usually woke her up for duty. The point being that the static and interruption of the broadcast was counterproductive to the operation which should never be compromised.
As you know the month of September sometimes can be brutally hot for a football game for fans in the stands and on the gridiron, but usually, in the press boxes, the A/C is pumping and things are just fine. In fact, this particular Saturday the temperature would zoom to a high of 96.
Denny and I jumped off the team bus, grabbed Bertha and our equipment and made our way to the stadium’s press box. From ground level looking up at the press box looked like it was sitting on top of Mount Everest. Our very first challenge, was to climb 85 steps to the top while lugging our 80-pound mixer named Bertha. 85 steps, I know, I counted them.
There was not a cloud in the sky for the 1 p.m. game and the sweat was pouring as we climbed skyward. Upon entry into the press box we were greeted by our host who directed us to our broadcast location. It was a very small cubicle about 8X7 in size. As we entered, the heat was incredible.
My question, “ Sir, could we get some A/C in here, it suffocating with the heat.” The answer I received, “Sorry sir, it broke down 2 years ago and they never repaired it.”
I asked, “Could we get a fan to circulate the hot air in here?” He replied, “No sir, we don’t have any!”
Denny with his turn on the phone
By the way, the rest of the press box was very cool with a great buffet for the media and VIP’s.
My next thought was to raise the windows so at least we could get a hot breeze. Another dagger, this time, the windows did NOT open.
It was about 11:15 a.m., kickoff was at 1 p.m.. The sun was to our left and getting hotter by the minute. By game time, we would be baked like a rotisserie chicken. We were captured.
So far, Murphy’s Law was percolating.
Denny amid a ton of sweat had set up Bertha and attempted to call the radio station, but could not dial out. After many times, it was apparent that the incompatibility of a relic did not mix well with the digital outlets. It was time to literally punt.
Deep down in our equipment bag amid our headsets etc was a push button cradle phone. Bingo! Denny got a dial tone, and dialed the station just fine. We would be just fine albeit we would have to pass the phone back and forth for over two hours without a headset, but that was fine, because we were not going to lose the game.
It was time for our pregame show.
Although our shirts were drenched with sweat and our caps pulled down over our eyes to deflect the glare of the bright sun, we were ready to go. Or were we?
Again, Murphy’s Law raised its ugly head.
This time, right under our closed window in our “microwave” booth, the home team Pep Band had taken up residence just a few feet below us. Yeah, they boomed the entire game and halftime too. Keep this in mind, we did not have headsets which made it very hard to hear each other.
During the game, inside our small cubicle, the hot air was getting my attention that this was indeed a danger to us. If it was 96 outside, inside our box, it had to be 100+.
We took turns going out into the press box where the AC was working to cool off and hydrate. We kept bottles of water inside the box as well.
Mercifully, the game ended and Murphy’s Law decided to go back into hiding.
We improvised and we overcame defeating Murphy’s Law with our completed broadcast.
Any broadcaster will tell you, you never know what to expect once you hit the road to call a game.
Sometime later, I would move on to call NCAA basketball on ESPN+ where not only was the equipment the best, but we had a crew and producer that set things up for the game. Believe me, I really appreciated that reality.
Looking back, was this hot box the WORST broadcasting day of my long career? No, in fact, it was the 2nd worst.
Soon, in my upcoming columns I will tell you about THE “Worst Broadcasting Day” of all time… You will not believe it.
But for now, Denny and I lost track of BIG BERTHA over all these years. I have a feeling she is resting comfortably with all her tubes in the A/C at a museum somewhere here in the Midwest.
From Denny and me, Bertha…we don’t miss ya.
very funny but true. nice story!!