No Heavy Lifting

by Rob Simpson

  Fast forward to the end of my final season. Who replaced me as ice-level reporter for the Bruins? Naoko Funayama of course. The EP apparently had his spite and/or revenge while the network had its savings. As it related to the loss of hockey background and entertainment for the fans, the network higher-ups didn’t really care. They had no problem insulting the intelligence of Original Six fans. Period.

  Taken in the early 2000s at the Air Canada Centre, promoting my TV show, Maple Leaf America, with Bob Harwood of Leafs TV.

  This is how the TV business works sometimes.

  Somewhat humbled, yet resilient, I had decent fallback opportunities in the Big Apple. That’s where the MSG opportunity unfolded. Through the small hockey world, I had a number of contacts in the market, including Rangers TV game producer Joe Whelan.

  At one point in the off-season, it seemed I had a choice between being the full-time backup play-by-play guy on Rangers radio or being the backup reporter/anchor guy on TV. Joe encouraged me into the television gig.

  Working with “The Maven” Stan Fischler in studio in New York, I had the chance to anchor a few Rangers and Islanders preseason and regular-season telecasts on MSG. Our job was pretty standard: we would sit at a fancy desk and discuss the teams on TV and toss back and forth with the talent on site. One of the strictest rules during the show came during the pregame warm-ups. When Giannone or Deb Placey, another ice-level reporter for the network, was standing on the bench to do the pre-game interview with a player and that player showed up, you immediately ended whatever conversation you were having and “threw” to the reporter at the rink. Under no circumstances would you make the player wait.

  Studio show producer Paula McHale had been emphatic about this, and I distinctly remember cutting Stan off at one point to throw to Deb during the pre-game show of the Rangers–Columbus Blue Jackets game on October 25. From the studio host chair, you could see the bench shot on a monitor directly in front of you so there would be no delays. When Deb was done with the interview she threw back to us and we continued our conversation.

  This was standard operating procedure, and during my first-ever on-air regular season Rangers game at the Joe Louis Arena in Detroit, things went swimmingly. Talk about a cool deal. My first regular season gig for the “Blueshirts” was against my childhood team back in my hometown. I had been there once with the Bruins previously, on March 11, 2007, but that game was on a Sunday afternoon and handled by NBC as a national game of

  the week, so NESN was bumped and I didn’t broadcast the match. Rangers–Red Wings on October 18, 2008, became my first-ever telecast from the Joe.

  (During my three years in Boston, the league played what was called an imbalanced schedule, with each team playing every division rival six times a season with the rest of the Bruins’ schedule weighted to the Eastern Conference. Detroit was in the Western Conference at the time, didn’t play Boston in 2005–06 at all, had the one game at the Joe in 2007, and played at Boston in February 2008. I actually did a book signing with Hall of Fame linesman Ray “Scampy” Scapinello at the Joe during the 2007 game because I knew I didn’t have to work it. We signed copies of our book Between the Lines.)

  The Rangers–Red Wings telecast went very well. The format called for a sit-down walk-off in the first intermission with Ranger Markus Naslund. A question or two longer than a typical hockey-intermission interview, it was done in chairs in “Al Trautwig” fashion: very conversational, very relaxed. Second intermission, I did a standing three-question interview with Red Wings defenceman Nicklas Lidstrom that also went very well. Like riding a bike, I’m thinking; I was back where I left off in Beantown.

  The Rangers lost in overtime, 5–4, we chartered back to New York, and the reviews were good. Maybe they were too good.

  The following week, I was in-studio with Stan for that Columbus game, eating pizza and watching hockey when we weren’t on the air.

  One week later, Saturday, November 1, I was back on the road, this time in Toronto at the Air Canada Centre, Rangers against the Leafs. It would be eventful and memorable from start to finish.

  The unbelievable, the unfathomable, a mystery to this day, occurred during the pregame warm-ups, as I stood on the Rangers bench preparing to interview defenceman Dan Girardi, selected by our producer because he grew up nearby.

  Standard operating procedure at the bench; the players hop on the ice, the guy who is slated to be interviewed usually takes one or two laps around the end zone and then heads over to talk. That’s exactly what Girardi did. As was customary, Deb Placey, the in-studio host in this case, would wrap up her conversation with the analyst and throw to me as soon as she saw us.

  “Hey, Dan,” I said to Girardi as he skated over and stood next to me. “Ready to go in a sec.” I quickly reviewed the two or three questions in my head as I listened to Deb in my earpiece.

  Instead, after the analyst finished his comments (I honestly don’t recall who was in-studio that night with Deb), Placey went ahead and asked her sidekick another question.

  “Dude, she just asked another question. Hang on a second, we’ll get it out here,” I told Girardi, who was immediately impatient and annoyed. Why wouldn’t he be, the clock is ticking and warm-up time is limited. Our interview should have started, and I was getting uncomfortable. “Joe, what happened,” I said into the mic, communicating with Whelan in our production truck at the ACC. “She needs to bring it out.”

  I could hear “program” in my IFB (interruptible feedback), a fancy acronym for earpiece, “program” being the on-air conversation from the studio in New York. The analyst seemed to be in no rush. After a minute that seemed like ten, he finally started to wind down, and I told Girardi, “Okay, stand by.”

  But when the analyst wrapped up his latest thought, Placey went ahead and asked him another question.

  I held the mic to my chest to muffle it and said to Girardi, “She just asked another question. I don’t know what’s going on.” F-bombs were on the tip of my tongue.

  Even if you think or know you’re not “hot,” you never swear around a live mic, just in case. Girardi wasn’t really concerned about my dilemma, to him this was just an absolutely unnecessary delay, and I was the douchebag creating it. He skated away, took a slap shot from the right point, and then skated back. During this, I was trying to reach Joe, who didn’t respond. “What is going on, Joe, Girardi is losing it. Why didn’t she send it out?”

  There was some panic in my head, but this being my third game with a new network, I was trying to stay cool. Didn’t want to yell, definitely didn’t want to swear at the truck through the mic. But this was bullshit. Girardi returned just in time for me to hear Deb ask yet another question. The conversation continued in my ear from New York, and no one was doing anything about it.

  I was then speaking stream of consciousness to Girardi and Joe at the same time. “I don’t know what to say, they just keep on talking. They’re not throwing it out here. I say just bag it. Joe, can we just bag this, they’re not throwing it out here. Girardi’s gotta go!” Nothing.

  In almost forty years of broadcasting, I’ve never been as stressed out before or since. Meanwhile, the Hockey Night in Canada crew handling the Leafs telecast that night had come and gone. They actually conducted live interviews on both benches in the time I was standing around waiting.

  After the fourth Q and A back in the studio, Deb finally threw it to me. The interview was flat — he couldn’t pretend to give a shit — and I kept it quick. Girardi had missed out on four or five minutes of warm-up. He was pissed, and I had a feeling I’d be hearing about it later. The camera guy and Eddie, the ice-level stage manager, both with me on the bench, looked at each other in disbelief.

  The Rangers took a 1–0 lead with ten seconds remaining in the first period. Ryan Callahan scored the goal while Dan Girardi had one of the assists. Yeah baby, who needs warm-up?

  We
didn’t interview a player involved in the scoring on the goal as we had already decided upon Scott Gomez as our walk-off guest. I actually lobbied for him to be the guy because of a familiarity factor. “Gomer” and I had a joke-around acquaintanceship that went back to his New Jersey days and my Boston days for whatever reason. He’d make fun of my clothes; I’d respond by saying, “You wish you had this tie.”

  Our interaction in Toronto that night garnered this response from sports media reporter Phil Mushnick the next day in the New York Post.

  It’s rare when an NHL player removes his game face during a between-periods interview. But after one in Rangers–Leafs Saturday, new MSG rink-side reporter Rob Simpson (last stop, Bruins games on NESN) interviewed Scott Gomez, who quit — midanswer — to tell Simpson: “I’m kinda distracted by your outfit. Anything match there?”

  At interview’s close, Gomez again poked at Simpson’s clothing. “Halloween’s over,” he said.

  Simpson, wearing a tie, white shirt and what appeared to be a blazer — nothing out of the ordinary, though MSG never provided a head-to-toe shot — seemed confused. The session seemed more odd than funny.

  Phil had no idea this had been a running joke with Gomer, and I obviously wasn’t confused, but I also wasn’t ready in my second road game with MSG to take it the next level by saying, “You wish you had this tie,” to end the conversation. Whelan was a bit of a temperamental producer to say the least and he preferred to play things pretty straight. In hindsight, I probably shouldn’t have curbed the familiarity and personality that came naturally, but unfortunately I did. I didn’t know I’d be getting yelled at either way.

  Blair Betts scored his second goal of the season to give the Rangers a 2–0 lead after two periods. Warm-up shmarm-up.

  Second intermission I interviewed former (and future) Ranger Dominic Moore. In what was kind of a nervy manoeuver, I asked about the health of his brother Steve, who with the Colorado Avalanche had suffered career-ending injuries via a brutal on-ice attack by Vancouver Canuck Todd Bertuzzi back in 2004. Steve was out of hockey and lawsuits related to the incident were dragging on. Dom, Steve, and a third brother Mark had all played college hockey together at Harvard. He didn’t mind the questions — it was a thoughtful conversation — and off we all went to the third period.

  Good on-cams, 2–0 Rangers lead, I’m thinking maybe we need to fuck up the pregame interview more often.

  Or maybe not.

  Twelve minutes into the third period, the Maple Leafs went nuts. First, rookie John Mitchell scored to put the home team on the board. One minute and twenty-six seconds later, Jason Blake scored to tie the game. Fifty-two seconds later, defenceman Pavel Kubina scored. A minute and two seconds later, Mitchell scored again. Then, to bring the cluster fuck full circle, Dominic Moore scored with two minutes left in the game. New York goalie Steve Valiquette was shell-shocked; Toronto won 5–2.

  Holy shit.

  I started the post-game media scrum with Rangers head coach Tom Renney by phrasing the question: “How exactly did the trolley come off the tracks?” I thought it was a clever way of asking, “How exactly did your team completely screw this up?” Whelan the producer didn’t like the phraseology. He felt it wasn’t serious enough. Not sure about Renney, but literally every New York paper used his answer the next morning: “The trolley came off the tracks because . . .” I had written the metaphor for everyone and felt validated for using the terminology.

  An evening of misfortune continued.

  Chartering out of Toronto, we literally puddle jumped Lake Ontario and landed in Buffalo to go through immigration privately. We all disembarked and lined up, coaches first from the front of the plane, media and staff next from the middle, and then the players from the back. The coaching staff passed the U.S. border agents and headed back on the plane. Next up was the media, each of us ready to pass by one of two computers, me at the head of the line on the left, Whelan at the head of the line on the right.

  That’s when the computers malfunctioned. They could no longer read our passports. For the next twenty minutes, Joe and I stood at the front of a line that wasn’t moving. Of course, the players saw only the tall douchebag who had delayed Girardi during pregame once again fucking things up. They didn’t know anything about the computers going down — no one was talking. It was dead quiet. They also didn’t notice Whelan so much; he’s a foot shorter than the “new guy” Donkey Balls. They probably didn’t even realize there were two computers; they just saw the freakishly tall dimwit looking uncomfortable at the front of the line.

  I remember searching back over the line and seeing Valiquette at the very end of it. He shot me a look full of daggers. Dude was tired, just got smoked for five goals in the third period, and now some likely criminal broadcast nob was wanted by the feds. Why else would we be standing here?

  Mercifully, the immigration guys gave up on the computers and let us board with just a quick glance at the passports. I was first on ahead of Joe and while walking past Renney I quickly let him know what had happened.

  In passing, I said, “The computers fried; they just let us on now.” That’s when he hit me with the news that essentially meant “enjoy this ride because it’s your last.”

  I kind of wasn’t sure I had heard him utter, “This is your last Rangers game,” or maybe it was just wishful thinking I hadn’t heard it. Or, perhaps, knowing that none of the bullshit over the course of the evening was actually my doing, I was confident the truth would come out and I’d be just fine.

  It never did.

  On the way out of the Westchester Airport after stopping to take a leak, I was chatting with Scott Gomez as I walked. Whelan, who was kind enough to share his car service with me back to the city, took exception to what looked like me wasting time while needlessly fraternizing. When I sat down in the back, he laid into me with every expletive in the book six times over. It was mostly about making him wait, but there was a little in there about my post-game “trolley” question. He said nothing about the pregame. Oddly enough, after he cooled down a few minutes later, he actually complimented me on my work.

  A couple weeks later, while standing in the Zamboni corner near the glass at Madison Square Garden, Al Trautwig said something like, “You’ll be alright, Simmer, you’ll always have hockey.”

  John Gianonne, like Trautwig, a true pro, said something along the same lines: good luck, you’re a hockey guy, you’ll be fine. Apparently they knew something I didn’t. My days at MSG as a back-up, and any hopes of becoming a staffer, were over.

  This is how the TV business works sometimes.

  ~

  Naoko went on to handle the ice-level reporting on NESN until the spring of 2013. I understand she is doing freelance work in Massachusetts and New Hampshire.

  John Gianonne and Deb Placey still do ice-level for MSG. Joe Whelan and the network parted ways in 2012. In 2017, Joe landed the gig producing the Columbus Blue Jackets telecasts.

  Me on YouTube, doing God’s work: Simpson Live Demo

  ABOUT THE AUTHOR

  ROB SIMPSON is one of the only human beings in the last five years to bridge the rivalry between TSN and Rogers Sportsnet, having done live TV reporting and play-by-play for both. Formerly the host of NHL Live in New York, Simpson co-hosts an international radio talk show while residing in Toronto. Find him on Twitter @simmerpuck.

  DISCOVER ONLINE

  Find out what it’s like to have “the best job in town”

  Dave Perkins was once told by a bluntly helpful university admissions officer: “You don’t have the looks for TV or the voice for radio. You should go into print.” Which he did, first at the Globe and Mail, and then for 36 well-travelled years at the Toronto Star.

  In Fun and Games, Perkins recounts hysterical, revealing, and sometimes embarrassing personal stories from almost every sport and many major championships. After 40 years of encountering a myriad of athl
etes, fans, team managers, and owners, Perkins offers unique observations on the Blue Jays and Raptors, 58 major championships’ worth of golf, 10 Olympic Games, football, hockey, boxing, horse racing, and more.

  Learn why Tiger Woods asked Perkins if he was nuts, why he detected Forrest Gump in the 1996 Atlanta Olympics, and why Super Bowl week is the worst week of the year. Perkins exposes the mistakes he made in both thought and word — once, when intending to type “the shot ran down the goalie’s leg,” he used an “i” instead of an “o” — and to this day, he has never found a sacred cow that didn’t deserve a barbecue.

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  Copyright

  Copyright © Rob Simpson, 2018

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  To the best of his abilities, the author has related experiences, places, people, and organizations from his memories of them. In order to protect the privacy of others, he has, in some instances, changed the names of certain people and details of events and places.