YouSaid · the spoken record

Bob Costas

lines on the record

72

first

2020-10-12

most recent

2020-10-12

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1

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podcast

Every line below is reproduced as it was said and linked to the record it came from. Nothing here is summarised or generated. Directory · Search · Corrections

1. “They've done a 180, Roger Goodell. Made plain. He flatly went on camera and made it plain, said we should have listened to the players, et cetera, et cetera. But as we talked about at the beginning of our conversation here, it's a tightrope walk for all the leagues, but especially the NFL and the NBA, where the overwhelming majority of players are black. You want to be sensitive to these concerns and to these legitimate issues, and you want to show respect for players using their visibility and platform. And in many cases, you want to facilitate that. But is the right way to do that? And the most effective way to do that going forward, having it be front and center during the games themselves. I think the evidence of that is that outside of this moment in time, which is unique, that going forward, they've got to thread that needle in a somewhat different way.”

   2020-10-12 · The Axe Files with David Axelrod · Ep. 411 — Bob Costas · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT · source

2. “That could be true of a Republican, that could be true of a Democrat. You take a look at the current occupant of the White House, and unless you're in some state of cognitive dissonance, if you can say that this president is intellectually, psychologically, An example of what you look for in a president. Well, you got me on that. I have no idea where you're coming from on that.”

   2020-10-12 · The Axe Files with David Axelrod · Ep. 411 — Bob Costas · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT · source

3. “Broadcast the game because you're saying something I don't want to hear. But if you are saying what I want to hear, the door is open. Come on in. But yeah, look, you know what Trump does. Trump, Trump seizes any opportunity to please his base, but his base, you're the expert here more than I, his base is not expanding. We'll see what happens on November 3rd, but his base is not expanding. And more and more it becomes clear that his entire presidency has been a daily soap opera about his psychology. And I don't think most Americans believe that that's what they want in a president of the United States. The president of the United States should be psychologically, emotionally, intellectually, and morally appropriate for the position. That doesn't, we're not talking about policy here.”

   2020-10-12 · The Axe Files with David Axelrod · Ep. 411 — Bob Costas · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT · source

4. “Isn't it ironic when people say stick to sports, which means in almost every instance, stick to sports unless you're saying something I agree with and want to hear? The person, as you mentioned, who really politicized this was the president of the United States, who has the larger forum, the larger megaphone. It's ironic that Fox News, after telling everybody who says something that they don't want to hear, to shut up and sing or shut up and dribble. If you are in line with their positions, whether you're John Voigt, a fine actor, or you're Lou Holtz or Bob Knight, or Kurt Schilling, you're welcome on Fox. The microphone is yours, and that is their right. There's nothing wrong with that. But where's the principle here? Where's the consistent principle? Shut up and dribble. Shut up and dribble.”

   2020-10-12 · The Axe Files with David Axelrod · Ep. 411 — Bob Costas · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT · source

5. “Right. Look what happened to Ali. Look what happened at Joe Frasier. At the end of his career. And Jerry Corry, there's no denying what it is. On the other hand, the participants get into it and we know exactly what it is. Defend yourself at all times. I think there are still some people who are in the state of denial about what football too often is to too many of its participants.”

   2020-10-12 · The Axe Files with David Axelrod · Ep. 411 — Bob Costas · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT · source

6. “Yeah, in retrospect, yes. I mean, I was never closely associated with the coverage of boxing. I hosted a few things like 20 years ago or so for HBO. And you can't help but think back to some of the epic fights and how interesting they were and a certain kind of athletic courage was involved. We talked about Frasier and Ali.”

   2020-10-12 · The Axe Files with David Axelrod · Ep. 411 — Bob Costas · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT · source

7. “With that. After all, football wasn't just the most important thing sports wise. And it just, I couldn't reconcile my... There. I realize that their presentation was fabulous. Sunday night football, Al Michaels, and now Chris Collinsworth and the way it's produced and directed, it's the finest sports presentation on television. But I just felt like I couldn't make a wholehearted contribution to it as I once had. And I'd been around it a long time. And I'd also hosted a dozen Olympics. And I just felt it was time before I reached the point of diminishing returns to step aside from it. And once I did, then I was even freer to express myself about some of these things.”

   2020-10-12 · The Axe Files with David Axelrod · Ep. 411 — Bob Costas · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT · source

8. “And Dick, who had done so much for me personally and professionally, it meant a lot to him to put together what he called his Mount Rushmore. They were bringing Al Michaels and John Madden over from ADC, and he wanted me and Chris Collinsworth in the studio. And it was so important to him. And there were a variety of personal factors involved. And I said, okay, I'll do it. But my misgivings grew. But NBC allowed me for a long time to occasionally address some of these issues. I addressed the concussion thing way before it reached critical mass in the public mind. At least a half dozen times over the years where at halftime, even though it's only a couple of minutes, it's the largest audience in all of primetime television. I was able to address those things. But then as it got past 2012, 2013, I realized that NBC was more and more uncomfortable.”

   2020-10-12 · The Axe Files with David Axelrod · Ep. 411 — Bob Costas · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT · source

9. “Company, they were my team. But as I got closer and closer to it, even though I recognized that many of the finest people I met in sports, players, coaches, people associated with the game, were football people. I just felt uncomfortable. And I asked Dick Ebersel, my friend and patron who ran NBC Sports if I could step aside from football after the 93 season. And he said yes. And I did. Okay, now fast forward and NBC gets football back beginning with 2006 season with Sunday night football.”

   2020-10-12 · The Axe Files with David Axelrod · Ep. 411 — Bob Costas · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT · source

10. “I was becoming increasingly uncomfortable with football. There's a history here. In the early 90s, after having stood on the sideline during games, and what you see and hear on the sidelines about the contact on every play and the kind of celebration of violence, I just became uncomfortable with it. Baseball and basketball have always been my favorite sports, but I grew up as a football fan, YA Tittle and those giants of Frank Gifford and...”

    2020-10-12 · The Axe Files with David Axelrod · Ep. 411 — Bob Costas · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT · source

11. “Whenever tragedy strikes in sports, we hear the hollow cliche, well, that really puts it all in perspective. But that perspective disappears in about five minutes. If we're really searching for some perspective here, then we ought to take this as an opportunity to talk about domestic violence, to talk about the effects of football.”

    2020-10-12 · The Axe Files with David Axelrod · Ep. 411 — Bob Costas · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT · source

12. “Said to yourself, Thank goodness he had a gun. Could it happen in theory? Of course. Has it happened in society? Yes. And that's a good thing. But that was the point I was trying to make. And I did not do it as well as I would like to think I usually do. I took it for granted that the audience would understand my point and I didn't.”

    2020-10-12 · The Axe Files with David Axelrod · Ep. 411 — Bob Costas · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT · source

13. “Yeah, you know, David, that's one that if I could have mulligan on it, I wish I could have it back. What I said and what I intended has been misrepresented. There are people out there who think that if I could, I would revoke the Second Amendment, take their guns away. For the record, no. If you need to use a gun to protect your home and family, that's your right. And in many situations, it might be the right thing to do. My point was about a gun culture in sports, which definitely exists. And prior to that time, Sports Illustrated ESPN and the USA Today had all done pieces about a gun culture in sports. And if you were to Google athletes and guns, you'd find a long list of tragedies, criminality, and folly associated with athletes and guns. And you'd be hard-pressed to come up with one instance where a prominent athlete used a gun to turn a dangerous situation around for the better where you”

    2020-10-12 · The Axe Files with David Axelrod · Ep. 411 — Bob Costas · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT · source

14. “Instead of the boilerplate, here's the flag bearer, and here's somebody who might be able to win a medal in whatever event, I mentioned that, but not during the event.”

    2020-10-12 · The Axe Files with David Axelrod · Ep. 411 — Bob Costas · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT · source

15. “I'm sitting there at nine o'clock in the morning with Alison Camarada and John Berman. It's not the same thing. I did feel that there were times when these issues intersected. It's become obvious this past year, but there have always been occasions when it should be addressed. It's impossible to have an Olympics without some political overtones. How can you have an Olympics in Sochi and not talk about Vladimir Putin and not talk about the strong suspicions that the Russians were cheating with drugs? How can you have an Olympics in China and not talk about China's human rights abuses and the fact that there's no free press in China? How can the Israeli delegation come in in London on the 40th anniversary of the Munich terrorist tragedy when the Israeli athletes and coaches were slain and the IOC refuses to acknowledge it in any formal way? Somebody's got to say that. So when the Israeli delegation comes in”

    2020-10-12 · The Axe Files with David Axelrod · Ep. 411 — Bob Costas · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT · source

16. “Phelps was about to jump in the pool or when Derek Jeter was coming to the plate. No, but inevitably, certain issues intersect with sports. Anyone who's even vaguely aware of the history of it knows that that's true. And when that happens, somebody has to address it. And that somebody should be the host, not the person who's calling the action, should be the host. And it should be done judiciously. And I think that's what I did over the years. And I think also people got confused. If I'm asked to be on CNN and talk about some of these issues, that's not during the game.”

    2020-10-12 · The Axe Files with David Axelrod · Ep. 411 — Bob Costas · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT · source

17. “But a couple of things here, and I appreciate having the time to be a little bit more expansive. Contrary to what gets out there, and you know in a social media world, certain ideas get out there and they're repeated often enough. And even people who think they're being fair-minded accept them as true. So this notion that Costas, I really liked Costas, but then everything became political with him. 99% of what I did. Not just overall in my career, but in the last 10 years, was about the game or about the event. And I never talked about these issues unless it was parenthetically, never talked about these issues during the game or during the event. But I was most often the host of the football coverage or the Olympic coverage. So there were little windows in between when stuff wasn't directly going on. I would never do any of this stuff when Michael.”

    2020-10-12 · The Axe Files with David Axelrod · Ep. 411 — Bob Costas · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT · source

18. “If you were a kid somewhat of our age, okay, and let's say you're a Yankee fan for the sake of argument, you meet Mickey Mandel. And the next day, you meet Derek Jeter. Derek Jeter's wonderful, classy, great first-level Hall of Famer. Not going to have the same effect on you.”

    2020-10-12 · The Axe Files with David Axelrod · Ep. 411 — Bob Costas · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT · source

19. “Muhammad Ali Museum, which is awesome in Louisville. So I had that relationship. And the larger answer to your question is this, David. Is Michael Jordan incredible? Of course. Was I privileged to be around him? Of course. We talk about present day athletes. Is Tom Brady maybe the best of all time? He sure is. Or Mike Trout with the Angels. But no one can have the same effect on you as people you grew up watching. So Madam, Willie Mays, Hank Aran, Stan Museum, Wilt Chamberlain and Bill Russell and Jerry West and Oscar Robertson, these are the people that I grew up watching. And then pinch yourself, here I am. They know me by name. I'm interviewing them. That has a different effect. Think of it this way.”

    2020-10-12 · The Axe Files with David Axelrod · Ep. 411 — Bob Costas · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT · source

20. “You have to have that Muhammad Ali living in Al Capone's house. And so I did get to know him very well. And of course, I was the host of the Olympics in 96 when he lit the torch, which was one of the great moments that I've ever experienced in or out of sports. And so we did a documentary within it called Twice Born because Ali himself said that he felt that that was the moment of reconciliation and the moment where his status as sort of a world ambassador of goodwill and peace came together and was solidified. So yeah, I had a relationship with Muhammad and attended his memorial service in Louisville. His family, his wife Lani, they've always been very kind to me. I was part of trying to raise the funds for the”

    2020-10-12 · The Axe Files with David Axelrod · Ep. 411 — Bob Costas · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT · source

21. “No, I came a bit later, but I did come to know him. I took my kids to visit him at his home that was on, not so great on the geography here, but was on a lake on the Michigan border. And it was a house that previously had belonged to Al Capone. And it had an escape route. Like out the back door, it was on the lake. Capone used to have a motorboat there. So just in case he had to escape, either arrive.”

    2020-10-12 · The Axe Files with David Axelrod · Ep. 411 — Bob Costas · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT · source

22. “Great contemporaries Willie Mays and Hank Aaron, but they sustained longer to their credit. So their careers were greater overall. But at his peak, if you live through it, you understood why there was an ongoing metal maze debate. It was like Larry Bird and Magic Johnson.”

    2020-10-12 · The Axe Files with David Axelrod · Ep. 411 — Bob Costas · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT · source

23. “I think a lot of younger people who take a look just at the statistics say, well, sure, he was a great player. He was a Hall of Famer, no doubt, but not as great as the mythology, but they have to look at it from the 10 or 12 year chunk when he was close to at his best. Right during that period of time, he was right there.”

    2020-10-12 · The Axe Files with David Axelrod · Ep. 411 — Bob Costas · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT · source

24. “Mantle's knee is ripped up. Now, with advanced surgical techniques, it might not have been such a bad thing, but it troubled him throughout his career. And he had other injuries. And in fairness, and I knew Mickey well, the extreme alcoholism really took hold after he retired. He wasn't the only ball player who drank. Players did not have the same sort of fitness and nutrition regimens and all the rest that they do now. The injuries were more significant, but certainly the late night carousing and whatnot didn't help. And he lived from 1969 on when he retired until his death in 1995 in deep regret about a number of things. But from a baseball standpoint, as great as he was, first ballot Hall of Famer, no question, he felt he could have been greater. And without getting too baseball nerdy here,”

    2020-10-12 · The Axe Files with David Axelrod · Ep. 411 — Bob Costas · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT · source

25. “Yeah, he himself wondered about that in fairness to him. He had osteomyelitis from a football injury in high school. Then he rips up his knee stepping on an exposed drain in Yankee Stadium when he's just a rookie. Oddly enough, talk about a convergence, a flyball to right field hit by the rookie Willie Mays. Joe DiMaggio in his last season comes over from center field. Madel is playing right. DiMaggio and Madel converge on the ball hit by Willie Mays.”

    2020-10-12 · The Axe Files with David Axelrod · Ep. 411 — Bob Costas · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT · source

26. “Joe Buck is immensely talented. And anyone who thinks he's where he is because of his dad is nuts. The door opened because of his dad. But then he barged through it because of his talent. But Joe was around it from the time that he was a little kid. So I think I rubbed some people unintentionally. I rubbed them the wrong way, even though I revered Jack Buck and Dan Kelly, the legendary voice of the St. Louis Blues and others who were there. I revered them, but I think that they, I was trying to compensate, they might have thought I was brash. I guess I was pretty good for 22, some precocious ability. And I think it took a while before I kind of reached some state of equanimity about it all. And then over time, everything resolves itself and they felt I would think as positively about me as I did about them.”

    2020-10-12 · The Axe Files with David Axelrod · Ep. 411 — Bob Costas · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT · source

27. “I was 22. I looked like I was 15. So that experience and then the wild days of the ABA, by the time I was 24, the most colorful experiences of my entire career had come and gone. Nothing since then, a lot of things have been great and wonderful, but nothing since then matched it for sheer lunacy. The Eastern Hockey League and the old ABA just for antics and absurdity, that was at the top of the list.”

    2020-10-12 · The Axe Files with David Axelrod · Ep. 411 — Bob Costas · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT · source

28. “You're on it. Yes, they did. What's called at various times the St. Louis Arena, then Ralston Purina briefly owned the St. Louis Blues, the hockey team. So then it became the checker dome. And yeah, we played there. We lasted for two seasons. And then the ABA folded, or it was absorbed by the NBA. And they only wanted to take four teams. They took the pacers, the nuggets, the Spurs, and the nets. They wanted the Nets not only because of the market, but because Dr. J, who was the symbol of the ABA, played for the Nets. And soon enough they traded him or some other deal was worked out and he wound up with a 76ers. But the spirits disappeared after those two seasons. They were two very colorful seasons.”

    2020-10-12 · The Axe Files with David Axelrod · Ep. 411 — Bob Costas · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT · source

29. “You know what they did? They skipped right over the bachelor's degree and the master's degree. They gave me an honorary doctorate.”

    2020-10-12 · The Axe Files with David Axelrod · Ep. 411 — Bob Costas · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT · source

30. “All time, Jack Buck, the Hall of Fame voice of the Cardinals, Joe Buck's dad. Jack was the sports director there, and they had a whole roster of wonderful sports broadcasters. So to join that group and to learn from them in that environment, I've never regretted that decision.”

    2020-10-12 · The Axe Files with David Axelrod · Ep. 411 — Bob Costas · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT · source

31. “Yeah, there shouldn't be any dispute because I've never said otherwise. I left a few credits shy of graduation. What happened was just before my senior year, I got a job broadcasting Minor League hockey in the old Eastern League, the actual league that the Paul Newman movie slapshot was based on. In fact, I knew a lot of the players who were extras in the movie. I'm doing these games, and I decided, well, I got to cut back on my credit load. So I cut back from 15 to 9 credits in both the fall and in the spring. So what would have been my class graduated in the spring of 1974? And then it was my intention to enroll again in the fall semester, continue doing these hockey games, and finish up my degree. But then lo and behold, I lucked out again and I got hired by KMOX in St. Louis. And I don't think anyone in my position would have done anything different. I left and took the job in St. Louis at one of the premier radio stations of”

    2020-10-12 · The Axe Files with David Axelrod · Ep. 411 — Bob Costas · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT · source

32. “Creating that. And maybe if they were especially creative, peanuts, popcorn, that whole thing. And then what becomes legendary is the ticker tape breaks down. And Reagan or whomever has just said, it's a beautiful sunny day at Wrigley Field. Now the ticker tape breaks down and they have to all of a sudden have a storm move in from out of nowhere. Now there's a rain delay until we can resume or a dog runs on the field or a guy fouls off 10 consecutive pitches until the ticker tape resumes and we find out he grounded out to shortstop. Radio is that whole theater of the mind, that whole imagination thing. And I've always felt that if you first mastered radio, much easier to go to television and just write captions under the picture than it is to go from television to radio and figure out how you're going to paint the whole picture.”

    2020-10-12 · The Axe Files with David Axelrod · Ep. 411 — Bob Costas · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT · source

33. “Yeah, he was on WHO in Des Moines calling Cub Games, and most of those games were recreations where the bare bones facts of what had happened came over a ticker tape. And the broadcaster and maybe the engineer are sitting in a studio somewhere with rudimentary sound effects, a stick hit against a block of wood was the crack of the bat. A little bit of artificial crowd sound, which you're hearing now on games with no fans.”

    2020-10-12 · The Axe Files with David Axelrod · Ep. 411 — Bob Costas · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT · source

34. “Stick ball or whatever in the street. I was hearing Mel Allen or Red Barber. I was hearing Marty Glickman on the Knicks or on the Giants in football. And then those two years that I mentioned earlier, which we spent in California, I listened to Vin Scully. I was one of those apparently millions who snuck the transistor radio under the pillow. My parents thought I was asleep. And I'm listening to Vin Scully call the Dodgers. And that's where the notion took hold with me that a baseball game especially, all sports events, but a baseball game has a melody. It isn't just a nuts and bolts narration. It has a melody. And Scully, of course, was the absolute...”

    2020-10-12 · The Axe Files with David Axelrod · Ep. 411 — Bob Costas · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT · source

35. “Yeah, you know, I couldn't separate the voices who brought me the games from the games themselves. And I don't think I was alone in this. If I was shooting baskets by myself in the driveway or in the schoolyard or throwing a tennis ball or a rubber ball, which we in New York called a spaldean, even though it was made by spaldine. I do. Yes, I remember well. Pensie Pinky.”

    2020-10-12 · The Axe Files with David Axelrod · Ep. 411 — Bob Costas · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT · source

36. “And, you know, of all the great literature and commentary there's been over the decades about baseball and there's been a lot of it. If you want to just grasp the essence, I don't think you can do better than the four or five minutes of George Carlin's brilliant monologue about the difference between baseball and football. George was a master of language and of nuanced out-of-the-box perspective. And he brought it all together right there.”

    2020-10-12 · The Axe Files with David Axelrod · Ep. 411 — Bob Costas · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT · source

37. “A little, but more I feared what his fits of temper and the emotional swings would do to our family. It was hard on all of us. It was especially hard on my mother and my sister because in a strange way, all this stuff attached me to my dad because I liked sports to begin with. And this was the way that he and I connected. We didn't have all that much in common otherwise. I remember him sometimes coming home from work usually on a... And I had to feign excitement about it, but I just had no aptitude for it. But the sports part really, really connected us. And going to ball games, going to the old Yankee stadium, that kind of stuff.”

    2020-10-12 · The Axe Files with David Axelrod · Ep. 411 — Bob Costas · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT · source

38. “Yeah, in 1960, we abruptly moved, that was eight years old, we abruptly moved from Long Island to California. And back then, I guess it was harder to trace people. There's no internet. You could disappear and start over. And I learned afterwards that we were fleeing a debt. And then we came back east about two years after that. Now, a lot of people would consider that, use the word again, a traumatic childhood. And I won't deny it. In many ways it was. But I also looked at my father as an interesting and romantic figure. He was more interesting than, you know, the suburbanites of that era who mowed their lawn every Saturday.”

    2020-10-12 · The Axe Files with David Axelrod · Ep. 411 — Bob Costas · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT · source

39. “He counts out $14,000 in $100 bills, who's probably more than the annual income of the people who lived on either side of us in 1966. And then he says, hey, the Knicks are playing, Robert. Let's go to the garden. Now, that might have been, in many ways, a traumatic youth, and it was in many ways because he was volatile and he got angry and holidays. And you had to move.”

    2020-10-12 · The Axe Files with David Axelrod · Ep. 411 — Bob Costas · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT · source

40. “That your boy, nice boy. Give the kid a glass of milk and a donut. That's an awfully large gaster on your part. So now we go out. We go out to the car. And underneath a street light in Brooklyn.”

    2020-10-12 · The Axe Files with David Axelrod · Ep. 411 — Bob Costas · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT · source

41. “Pretty much. And normally an adult is a little softer with a kid. I remember open the door. John Holm? No, he isn't here. When will he be back? I don't know. Well, tell him Nunzio is here. I swear. Tell him Nunzio was here. What am I in the godfather? So now here it is. I was 14 in this case, it was 1966. And we go to this donut shop. And my dad was up. He was on a huge winning streak. And bookies don't mind that. It's all business to them. In the long run, they're going to win. They take 10% extra when they win. The odds are tilted in their favor at all times. So I'm sitting there and the guy slides a paper bag across the counter to my dad after saying,”

    2020-10-12 · The Axe Files with David Axelrod · Ep. 411 — Bob Costas · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT · source

42. “He actually knew guys named Fury and Threefinger. And one time a car pulls up on a Sunday afternoon in the summer, in the driveway. There's two cars in the driveway, so it's pretty clear that the family is at home. And he tells me, I'm like 12. He tells me, go to the door, tell him I'm not home. And here's a guy in a suit, looked like central casting sentiment, snap brim hat, pinky ring suit on a sweltering July day.”

    2020-10-12 · The Axe Files with David Axelrod · Ep. 411 — Bob Costas · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT · source

43. “Yes. We went to games. One in particular, I could give you hundreds of stories, but my dad took me with him when he met his bookie at a donut. Yeah, because he wasn't.”

    2020-10-12 · The Axe Files with David Axelrod · Ep. 411 — Bob Costas · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT · source

44. “Right out of college, I went to KMOX, the station I'd listened to as a kid through the crackle and static or WWL in Cincinnati. So I would not only be looking for the score, but I would hear Harry Carrey and Jack Buck on the Cardinals. And I hear Waite Hoyt, who was a teammate of Babe Roots, who's the announcer for the Reds. And so the styles of the announcers kind of seeped in by Osmosis. And then I'd run back in the house and report to my dad in my fledgling play-by-play style. And did you guys go?”

    2020-10-12 · The Axe Files with David Axelrod · Ep. 411 — Bob Costas · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT · source

45. “And my mom and sister often fled the house. They went to my grandmother's house. But I would always stick around. And remember, this is the 60s. I would sometimes have me climb up on the roof and spin the antenna around, the television antenna on the roof. We're on Long Island and we're trying to pick up the Red Sox game, which might have been on TV in Hartford or the Phillies. And he'd be sticking his head out the window. Little more right there. We come back in or he would send me out to the car. Where radio reception was better than in the house. If he had a bet on the Cardinals against the Reds, I'd be fiddling with the pickup”

    2020-10-12 · The Axe Files with David Axelrod · Ep. 411 — Bob Costas · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT · source

46. “Yeah, as an electrical engineer, he's a very smart guy. He could build a house if he gave them the materials. He could build a house on his own or take a car apart and rebuild it. And I had none of those tendencies, but we had in common was sports. And he almost always had a lot of money riding on games. I mean, whether we could pay the mortgage on time was often riding on whether YD Ford could get alkaline out or Will Chamberlain could make a couple of free throws, which was always Dicey and Wilts case.”

    2020-10-12 · The Axe Files with David Axelrod · Ep. 411 — Bob Costas · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT · source

47. “He was. He was, David. He was a compulsive gambler. And while he made a good living for a guy in the late 50s and through the 60s, he was an electrical engineer.”

    2020-10-12 · The Axe Files with David Axelrod · Ep. 411 — Bob Costas · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT · source

48. “Well, the father's side, Greece They were Ellis Island people. My dad was the last of eight children. He was actually born posthumously. His father died of a heart attack in 1927. On a subway car in New York, and my dad was born shortly after that. His mom didn't speak all that much English. Eight kids, six boys, two girls. They all grew up to be successful in their own ways. They were an extremely colorful family. My mom's side, mostly Irish and a combination of other things. My dad was a very colorful man mentioned in other places. He was an inveterate gambler. And that often created Some trauma within”

    2020-10-12 · The Axe Files with David Axelrod · Ep. 411 — Bob Costas · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT · source

49. “And it was freighted with all kinds of political and cultural meaning. That's what gave it that and the fact that it was the two greatest heavyweights and the contrast and styles. But you could watch the fight just as an extraordinary sports event. Was it freighted with all these other overtones? Of course it was. But during the fight itself, you might have been thinking about it, but that wasn't being put in front of you. The commentators weren't talking about it. So it could stand alone as a sports event, and then we could talk about it before and afterwards as a cultural event because it was both.”

    2020-10-12 · The Axe Files with David Axelrod · Ep. 411 — Bob Costas · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT · source

50. “Not a team sport. And for whatever this may be worth, you saw Muhammad always praying before the opening bell. And he almost always, when Howard Cosella, whomever would interview him after the victory, he would mention Allah. But when the ring girl, and that's a retro idea, and they still exist, when the ring girl came out holding up a placard that said round three, it didn't contain a social justice message. So even if you loved Ali, disliked him, or whatever, you could watch the fight as a fight. I remember the first Ali Fraser fight in March of 1971 at Madison Square Garden, one of the most electric sports events.”

    2020-10-12 · The Axe Files with David Axelrod · Ep. 411 — Bob Costas · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT · source