James Kenneth McManus died today. He was 86. He was my hero.
Along with millions of Americans of my general age, Jim McKay introduced me to the beauty, the grandeur, the full width and depth of the Olympics. More than any other, Mr. MckKay ignited in me a life-long love for the Games and all they represent, in spite of the forces and elements that would corrupt and cheapen them. When drugs, bid-fixing and gigantism threaten to render the Olympic Movement irrelevant, I remember all those things Mr. McKay would say in those post-Games monologues. He'd use those few post-Closing Ceremony minutes to remind us about how those past 16 days had represented the best parts of the human spirit, how the modern Games can serve as a fleeting glimpse into a truly peaceful world, one where sport promotes cross-cultural understanding.
Jim McKay never felt the need to oversell anything. He'd tell you what was going on, in simple and direct language, in a honest and forthright manner. If the 1980 U.S. Olympic hockey team had just won, he didn't need to raise his voice or convince you how important it all was -- he'd provide color commentary to make you feel like you were there instead of just watching via satellite. If the news was bad, as it was at Munich in 1972, he didn't sugarcoat the truth. When he said, "They're all gone," that was all anybody needed to say.
He brought the same unadorned tellitlikeitis style to 12 Olympics worth of forgotten moments, too, as well as countless horse derbies, golf tournaments and auto races. And, as well, to decades of odd events on Wide World of Sports, personally spanning the globe to bring us barrel riding and freestyle rodeo and freestyle skiing and bowling and (if I remember right) motoball. No matter how strange the event was, Jim McKay's mild-mannered curiosity made it immensely less so. No matter how much the event stretched the modern American definition of "sport," as long as it contained those three magic ingredients (the thrill of victory, the agony of defeat, and the human drama of athletic competition), that was enough for him.
A lot of tributes will be written in the next days and weeks, many by people who actually knew Mr. McKay, as well as by those of us who were merely inspired or influenced by him. Some of those tributes, undoubtedly, will raise the question as to whether there's a place anymore for the McKay style: that blazer, that haircut, that oversized microphone or the unending honesty ("This program was on videotape.") Or rather, if there's a place for what all these things represented -- if value-added style points can be less important than acting as an effective and efficient conduit between audience and event. Never did his work feel like anything other than humble service to both.
But in an age of 100 sports channels, catch-phrases, perfect hair, audience pandering and wink-wink snark, we need new Jim McKays more than ever. Anybody who takes that bold step and follows his example, who carries themselves with the same kind of unvarnished dignity he did, can be rewarded with differentiation from the vast majority of sportscasters and sportswriters who shamelessly vie for audience attention and ultimately get in the way of the events they cover. No matter how boring or old-fashioned the values may seem, there will always be a place for truth, candor and simplicity, for love and for service. Mr. McKay proved that for over 40 years.
