I’ve been involved with other animals. I bought two thoroughbreds with my buddy Rick Pitino. That was a disaster. They were beautifully bred at Claiborne Farm, where Secretariat stood, but these horses had psychological problems. When the gate would open before a race, one of them would just stand there, like he was the spectator. I told Rick we shouldn’t feed him if he didn’t want to work. The other horse just looked away whenever anyone approached. I don’t know if he didn’t like people or didn’t like what they wanted him to do. One of them was named “Rock Oliver” after Rick’s old strength coach. Every time I saw Rock, I tried to extort money from him. The other was called Monte D’oro, mountain of gold. More like mountain of dust. After changing trainers about every two months, and trying to win races from every small track in Kentucky to the mighty Saratoga, we finally sold the horses. I told Rick I could have had the same experience driving down the Jersey Turnpike, “throwing my money out the window.”
With seven-time NCAA Basketball Final Four participant and Hall of Fame coach Rick Pitino
CHAPTER 18
After covering thirty-five Super Bowls, a few of them really stand out. One of them was Super Bowl XXXVI, in 2002, almost five months after 9/11. The entire city, country—every heart, every emotion—just shut down on that day. At the time I was living on the Upper East Side. A group of us, not knowing what to do, went over to a hospital on First Avenue and lined up to give blood. Thank God, the line was three hours long, because everyone else had the same idea.
With 940 AM host Jeff DeForrest on Radio Row at Super Bowl XLII in 2008. Photo by Paula Breck.
Reporting from a Minnesota Vikings playoff game in Minnesota in 2010
My relationships were strong enough with both the Giants and the Jets that CBS sent me to Ground Zero with both teams to hand out sandwiches and water to the first responders—the firefighters, policemen, and first-aid workers. Many people don’t remember that Joe Andruzzi, an offensive anchor for the Patriots for many years, had three brothers who were firefighters and all first responders at Ground Zero. Their father and mother, Bill and Mary Ann, living on Staten Island with all communication shut down, didn’t hear from their sons for a week, not knowing if they were dead or alive somewhere in the seven stories of rubble. All of them lived, but one is still deeply shaken by what he saw more than fifteen years ago.
With brother Chris at the 2000 Super Bowl
I went to thirteen funerals, and the country was so depressed that I will be forever grateful to the late Wellington Mara, who offered me a ride on the Giants’ charter plane to Kansas City when the NFL resumed playing a week later. All the airports were still closed. At that game in Arrowhead Stadium, I will never forget when the Giants stood in the tunnel ready to take the field and all the Kansas City fans reached down to touch them as the players reached up to grab their hands. We were one country, indivisible. During the game, the late, great sportsman Lamar Hunt, owner of the Chiefs, passed firemen’s boots throughout the stadium to be filled with dollars and sent back to New York.
With former Red Sox manager and New York Yankees bench coach Don Zimmer at an event honoring those who died on 9/11
I guess that’s why my favorite Super Bowl was the Patriots’ first win in Super Bowl XXXVI in New Orleans, when New England beat St. Louis, 20–17. The Rams were heavily favored, with a 14–2 record and the nickname “The Greatest Show on Turf.” The game ended when Adam Vinatieri kicked a 48-yarder as time ran out, only five months after the terrorist attacks. At the end of the game, my brother Chris and I were on the field (he said I practically broke his hand from squeezing it so hard) as the red, white, and blue confetti rained down on the Superdome field and Patriot owner Robert Kraft said simply, “Today, we are all Patriots.”
For sheer entertainment, the Velcro catch on David Tyree’s head as Rodney Harrison tried to pull him down, and the touchdown pass from Eli Manning to Plaxico Burress to spoil the Patriots’ perfect season, rank as number two for me, with the Giants winning, 17–14, in Super Bowl XLII. The pregame drama was unequaled—finally, someone was going to challenge the Dolphins’ undefeated season from 1972—but Tyree almost didn’t play with an upset stomach. Yet he somehow caught the ball after Manning imitated Houdini to get free, followed by Burress’s heart-pounding reception in the corner of the end zone. The whole sequence was unique for its sheer tension. Coach Tom Coughlin had to look up on the Jumbotron to see if Plaxico caught the ball because the team was past the sideline, standing and jumping in front of him. I don’t think Glendale, Arizona, has been the same since.
With my mentor and friend Robert Kraft, owner/CEO of the New England Patriots
My third favorite championship was personal. In Super Bowl XXXIV, Atlanta had been through an ice storm and driving was terrible, all slippery and slow. The morning of the game, tight end Roland Williams, who was always upbeat, told me that if I had a slice of “Grandmama’s pecan pie” the Rams would win. I did and they did. The first half of the game was defensive (although Tina Turner sang “Proud Mary” to lift the spirits in the Georgia Dome at halftime). The Rams had a 23–16 lead in the fourth quarter, and on the last play of the game, I was on the Rams sideline, only two yards from the end zone. (I was with ABC; it was the first game broadcast in high-definition.) Steve McNair hit six-foot Kevin Dyson on a slant. As Dyson was moving toward the end zone to tie the game, Rams linebacker Mike Jones saw him out of the corner of his eye and lunged. As Dyson was tackled, he stretched out his arm, bowing his tendon, to try and cross the goal line, but Jones held tight and Dyson fell inches short. NFL Films made a movie of the final play called “The Longest Yard.”
So many Super Bowls have meant so much to so many. I was privileged to be the first woman on the sideline of a Super Bowl, for ABC in Miami, when Steve Young threw six touchdown passes and the 49ers crushed San Diego; and I became the only woman to present the Lombardi Trophy, in 1992 at Super Bowl XXVI, when Washington beat Buffalo 37–24, but those were personal highs. It was also the year I became the first woman sportscaster in a Super Bowl commercial. Remember when Michael Jordan and Larry Bird played H.O.R.S.E.? McDonald’s had rented and painted old Joe Robbie Stadium for the filming, and this is how the script went. Two mooks showed up at the game and expected to get seats. When the ticket window shut them down, they sat down on a bench and ate a couple of Big Macs. Suddenly Michael Jordan said to them, “Hey, you guys need a couple of tickets? I’m kinda busy here.” They practically choked and the music was orchestral. The next scene was Jordan and Bird deciding to play H.O.R.S.E. for a large wager. Larry’s line was, “Through the goalposts, around the bench, off Lesley Visser’s head.” This was all fine, except Bird kept slurring, “off Lezi Vissah’s head.” Cut. I got to play myself on the sideline and even ad-libbed a line, but I was getting a migraine headache because we had to keep doing it every time Bird messed up.
When the advertising agency, Leo Burnett in Chicago, first called me and said, “Lesley, how would you like to do a Super Bowl commercial, with Michael Jordan and Larry Bird, for McDonald’s?” I stammered and said, “Really . . . I’ll pay YOU!” My agent was furious; he said it cost me about $100,000. After three hours of the basketball bouncing off my head, I wasn’t sure whatever the salary was would be worth it, but the commercial came out great. To this day, it’s voted one of the most popular Super Bowl commercials, and my family plays it every year.
A few years before that, I was shocked to be named the presenter of the winning Lombardi trophy at the Super Bowl. That honor had usually gone to people like Brent Musburger or Terry Bradshaw. But executive producer Ted Shaker decided that I could handle it, and it would be historic, the first woman to handle the trophy presentation. My strongest memory was asking a question of Redskins owner Jack Kent Cooke, who was not shy—after all, he owned the Los Angeles Forum and the Chrysler Building in New York. Cooke took the microphone from my hand and rambled on about his life selling Encyclopaedia Britannica door to door as a child in Canada, how h
e got into real estate and finally bought the Redskins—while this was being beamed to 130 countries around the world! Producer Bob Stenner was screaming in my ear, “Get the goddamn microphone out of Jack Kent Cooke’s hand!” I was trying not to act nervous, and people like Commissioner Paul Tagliabue and Coach Joe Gibbs, both gentlemen, made it much easier on me. I think I might have had an extra margarita that night.
Historically great football championships have included Super Bowl III, when Broadway Joe “guaranteed” a win over Baltimore (although we can’t forget Johnny Unitas wasn’t at his best all year), or John Elway helicoptering his way toward the end zone in Super Bowl XXXII in 1998, or anytime Brett Favre took the field. The Steelers’ Super Bowls were the stuff of memory, none better than Super Bowl X, when Terry Bradshaw’s 64-yard touchdown pass to Lynn Swann and a near-perfect defense beat the Cowboys. Another great game was Super Bowl XLIII, Pittsburgh’s 27–23 win over Arizona in 2009. Just close your eyes and think of Santonio Holmes on tiptoes with the winning catch, or the epic 100-yard James Harrison interception. Super Bowl XXV had two New York teams, the war in Iraq, Whitney Houston’s national anthem, and Scott Norwood’s 47-yard field goal attempt that sailed right and will live eternally alongside Chris Webber calling time out at the Final Four and the Red Sox selling Babe Ruth. Everyone has a favorite Super Bowl, and some teams (like the 49ers or Steelers or Patriots) have a handful to choose from.
Here are two nuggets I learned during Super Bowl weeks that maybe you’ve heard and maybe you haven’t. You know, of course, it wasn’t even called the Super Bowl until the Jets beat the Colts in Miami—before that it was the AFL–NFL World Championship. But before you complain about your salary, the Packers got $15,000 each for winning and the Chiefs earned $7,500.
One of my strongest NFL memories, a game that really sums up everything I’ve known and loved about sports, was the 1996 NFC Championship in Green Bay. Before the game, the Packers played a video of Reggie White saying the words to “Amazing Grace.” Even the Carolina Panther players were moved. Carolina led at halftime, and it took the greatness of Brett Favre, Dorsey Levens, and Reggie White to bring the Packers back to their first NFC title in twenty-nine years. After the game, the University of Wisconsin band played “Roll Out the Barrel” and Reggie, who died too young, ran around the field with the Halas Trophy held high as a light snow fell. I thought I was the luckiest girl in the world.
With the late, great defensive end from the Philadelphia Eagles and the Green Bay Packers, Reggie White
I used to have to interview the singer at every Super Bowl, which meant that one year my little white hand got lost in Diana Ross’s huge hair as she belted out “God Bless America.” She also insisted (it was in her contract) that she couldn’t be seen on the field near the Oscar Meyer “Wienermobile.” I am not making this up. Jim Steeg, a quiet, intelligent man who ran Super Bowl week for twenty-six years, everything from Radio Row to halftimes, had to deal with things like this. Usually, the talent was Carol Channing (Who? Believe me, she was big.) or Up with People—a sort of “We Are the World” chorus group. One year in Pasadena, Disney produced “It’s a Small World” for halftime. The whole scene didn’t really take off until Jim McMahon mooned a helicopter when the Bears played in New Orleans in Super Bowl XX, and the next year, Phil Simms became the first quarterback to go to Disney World after the Giants beat the Broncos.
Interviewing Hall of Famer Brett Favre on the field after the NFC playoff game
On-site at Super Bowl XXXVIII in Houston, Texas, with Jim Nantz, Dan Marino, Deion Sanders, and Boomer Esiason. Photo by John P. Filo/CBS ©2004 CBS Broadcasting Inc. All rights reserved.
Super Bowl XXII in San Diego became famous when Washington quarterback Doug Williams thought a reporter had asked him, “How long have you been a black quarterback?” and the next year in Miami, Bengals running back Stanley Wilson talked about overcoming his drug addiction and then wasn’t seen for days, which sort of ended his NFL career. Super Bowl halftimes started to take off when Michael Jackson performed at Super Bowl XXVII. U2 performed one year, as did Bruce Springsteen, Paul McCartney, and Madonna. For Super Bowl XXXV in Tampa, Baltimore coach Brian Billick asked Hank Aaron to address the team, and the Ravens promptly went out and beat the Giants. Of course, they also had Ray Lewis. Super Bowl XXXVIII in Houston featured the infamous Janet Jackson “wardrobe malfunction,” where CBS’s LeslieAnne Wade and Gil Schwartz had to go into public relations overdrive, and few people even remember how great the Patriots–Panthers fourth quarter was. At Super Bowl XL in Detroit, there was a five-second delay on the Rolling Stones performance, because it was feared the lyrics to their songs “Brown Sugar” and “Rough Justice” might be considered offensive.
With Chicago coach Lovie Smith and Indianapolis coach Tony Dungy at a pregame Super Bowl LXI dinner in Miami. Photo by Jeffrey R. Staab/CBS ©2007 CBS Broadcasting Inc. All Rights Reserved.
Jerry Jones was embarrassed, for maybe the first time, when his new Cowboys Stadium in Arlington wasn’t quite finished for Super Bowl XLV. More than twelve hundred seats weren’t ready, and Christina Aguilera flubbed the National Anthem. But Packer fans were happy; they beat the hated Steelers. I remember freezing at the first Super Bowl held outdoors in the North, Super Bowl XLVIII in East Rutherford, New Jersey, but that’s just because I’m too used to living in Florida. The scene was beautiful, and it was a wonderful tribute to the Mara family, who’d been so generous to the NFL for more than half a century. And thank you, Les Moonves of CBS, who decided to change Super Bowl L to Super Bowl 50, which looked so much better and saved every broadcaster, writer, and fan from either being confused or having to look it up.
CHAPTER 19
One player who won three Super Bowls is among my favorites for a different reason. Very few men have both served in the military and played in the NFL. The names that come to mind, of course, are Roger Staubach, Rocky Bleier, and Joe Bellino, who was on a ship in the blockade during the Cuban Missile Crisis and also commanded a minesweeper in Vietnam.
But one man, former Dallas Cowboys defensive tackle Chad Hennings, won three championships and flew forty-five combat missions over Iraq and Turkey. He said his time at the Air Force Academy helped shape the man he is today, a man who put off playing in the NFL for five years so he could fulfill his commitment to his country. Every Memorial Day, we should salute Hennings and everyone who has given us their protection and pride, along with their families.
“We don’t talk enough about character in this country,” Hennings said to me one time. “Our culture tells too many of us that we are victims, that we have no control over our surroundings. But we do have a choice in the way we live, in the way we act.”
The way Hennings lived has its roots in the small community of Elberon, Iowa, where his dad was a farmer and twelve hundred cattle had to be fed every day. There were a total of 194 people in Elberon; the closest neighbor was miles away. Trick-or-treating on Halloween meant going to the nearest small town, some ten miles down the road. “My dad taught my brothers and sister that someone had to feed and take care of the livestock,” said Hennings, who now has two college-age kids of his own. “We learned responsibility at an early age.”
I’d imagine most boys would love to fly jets and play for the Dallas Cowboys. But not many make that dream come true. In high school, Hennings was big and fast and recruited by Big Ten schools, but he wanted more of a challenge. He chose the Air Force Academy and the great coach Fisher DeBerry. Under DeBerry, the Falcons always won the Commander-in-Chief’s Trophy, the triangular rivalry against Army and Navy. DeBerry won it fourteen times in his twenty-one seasons. “We’d start singing, ‘Off we go, into the wild blue yonder’ as soon as the game ended.”
And then Hennings did.
Barely fitting in the cockpit at six foot four, Hennings flew A-10 jets, called Warthogs for the unattractive design of the powerful plane with a Gatling gun—the forerunner of the modern machine gun—attached to its nose that
could fire off four thousand bullets a minute. Climbing high into the sun, Hennings said that he yearned for the NFL, but nothing was better than being a brother-in-arms.
“I was actually drafted by Tom Landry, but I never got to play for him,” said Hennings, who graduated in 1988. “I finished my service obligation in 1992, flew back from the base in London, and went to try out for Jimmy Johnson and Gil Brandt in the same day. They liked what they saw and I became a Cowboy.”
It also meant that, within one calendar year, Hennings flew combat missions and played in a Super Bowl. The Cowboys beat Buffalo that year, 52–17, in Super Bowl XXVII in Pasadena. Hennings stood on the sideline and looked up as the traditional flyover zoomed past. “It was emotional for me,” said Hennings. “The lessons I learned in the military, about character and morality and taking care of your brothers, can never be replaced. It didn’t make dealing with Charles Haley or Michael Irvin all that difficult.”
Hennings has the greatest admiration for those who’ve come home from the military without an arm or a leg, yet somehow find the courage to continue their service. “We don’t do enough for veterans,” said Hennings, who’s written a book, The Forces of Character, that deals with building a life of impact. “Veterans don’t want a handout. They want to be useful to society. And they need our support.”
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