Turn Out the Lights, The Party's Over

Inside Television 531

Publication Date: 12-10-10

By: Hubert O'Hearn

The Dream Team

It couldn't have been more than three weeks ago that I got to thinking about Don Meredith, who passed away this week of a brain hemorrhage at the age of 72. I was wondering if the man Howard Cosell nicknamed Danderoo might ever do a one-shot guest announcer appearance on one of the football broadcasts. God knows the NFL could use a little fun this year.

Yes, even the most fervent football fan – the one whose every kitchen appliance is decorated in team colours – knows that this year has been a dog. And that's even before Michael Vick starting contending for MVP honours. There are no undefeated teams, no one chasing records, the glam offensive units of San Diego, Indianapolis and New Orleans are lurching, James Harrison of the Steelers has paid more in illegal hit fines this season than you'll make in the next two years, the Dallas Cowboys killed their coach fir all the world to see, and the less said about Brett Favre and the Vikings would be a pleasant change.

Whomever wins the Super Bowl will have fans who will claim this as the bestest ever football season! The rest of us will know better and move on to the NBA or NHL.

But that was the thing about Don Meredith. He was at his best making some godawful Monday Night Football blowouts memorable. He's the first sports announcer I can remember who was truly funny. For instance, there was the famous moment during a blowout in, I think, Denver when the camera panned to a bored fan sat alone in the stands during the fourth quarter. The fan noticed the camera and instead of waving his arms like an idiot and putting on a rainbow wig, he just raised a middle finger. To which, Meredith commented, 'That means “We're Number One” Howard.' Classic.

Meredith also did not mind revealing the side of his personality that made him the rumoured (and more or less confirmed by him) of the two best football novels ever written: North Dallas 40; and Semi-Tough. Dallas was not the media centre that New York was in the 1960s, elsewise Meredith and the Dallas Cowboys would have given Broadway Joe Namath and the New York Jets a good run for the backpage party headlines.

There was the time when the Cleveland Browns brought into the game a new wide receiver, one who actually had a decent enough career. He had an unusual name: Fair Hooker. Over to you, Don. 'Ah nevah met one of those Frank.' As it would turn out 20 years later, neither did Frank Gifford when he was caught avec courtesan and landed on the front page.

ABC, or in recent years ESPN has never been able to get that magic formula of Cosell, Gifford and Meredith right again. They tried the comics, they tried the sportswriters, they came very close with Al Michaels and John Madden, but the first Monday Night Football crew was an unmatchable classic.

The final thought is what you would think it would be. The best thing about a bad game is that Meredith would essentially tell you to change the channel. Chick Hearn used to do the same kind of thing for the Los Angeles Lakers ('ladies and gentlemen, this game is in the refrigerator. The door's closed, the light's out and the butter's getting hard') but only Don Meredith would make you want to stick around to hear a southwestern baritone that poured out like the third Jack Daniels of the night:

'Turn out the lights,

The Party's over

It is time to say good night.'

Enjoy the eternal party Danderoo.

Be seeing you.