In May, 1989 Mike Schmidt, the Phillies’ star third baseman for 18 years, retired. At a news conference, Schmidt, understandably, lost it, tearing up until his farewell words became truncated by sobs.
The next day on their morning drive-time show over two-year-old WFAN, station-maker Don Imus and his crew seized the tape of Schmidt’s emotional farewell and made — or tried to make — a fool of Schmidt, mocking and ridiculing his goodbye announcement as blubbering, hilarious unintentional comedy.
In March of last year, Imus, near the end of a farewell interview on CBS’s “Sunday Morning” following his retirement, was asked if he is going to miss radio. Imus had to cease talking a couple of times in order to sniff back tears and stifle sobs. Hmm.
So how do you want it?
Gilded, as if Imus’ career should be eulogized for fun times, good laughs and endless merriment? He certainly served bumper-to-bumper commuters on the LIE. as such a companion — sometimes.
Or should we recall him for his raw, often cruel, defamatory side he presented as reckless, vulgar humor that helped make it not only safe but mandatory for go-lower, drive-time shock jocks to deliver? As an historical figure — the first prominent shock jock — was he an acquired taste before he became a required taste?
As for his Waterloo — his reference to Rutgers’ mostly black women’s basketball team as “nappy headed hoes” — I’d heard that, that morning, but didn’t think it worse than Imus’ free-form, equal-opportunity bigotry and bully-boy norm to be worth attention let alone outrage.
After all, Imus frequently derided public figures he apparently didn’t like, making graphic suggestions that they were homosexuals. As sportscaster Len Berman prepared to leave his weekday slot on FAN, Imus repeatedly slurred him as “Lenny the Jew.” But WFAN took no action against Imus.
Yet, not until two days after his Rutgers crack — when the top blew off — did any WFAN/CBS Radio executive concede that Imus may have gone too far, as the bosses waited, calculating whether this thing would wishfully blow over or blow harder. When the latter occurred, Imus was forced to walk the plank, eventually to resurface at WABC Radio.
Imus never did invoke his only legitimate and indisputable defense: “Well, they hired me as a ‘shock jock,’ didn’t they?”
But in the days and weeks following Imus’ dismissal, it was particularly galling to survey the run-for-the-hills, non-responses of some of Imus’s biggest regular big-shot guests.
Imus was no fool. When he had politicians and newsmen and newswomen as semi-regular guests — the cross-promotional value was high — he’d clean up the content so they wouldn’t have to suffer immediate associative public risk. Or so it seemed.
Of course, these big shots —NBC News anchor Brian Williams, CBS News anchor Bob Schieffer, CBS Sports anchor Jim Nantz, among many — could not play stupid to the show’s coarse contents and reckless claims on either side of their appearances. Connecticut Sen. Joseph Lieberman, a steady advocate of family values, was a frequent guest on Imus’ show, as if he didn’t and no one on his staff knew better.
And so when Imus was feeling the heat of his racist cracks, those political and media big shots were forced to play stupid or disappear, as if they’d never played with fire and had no idea Imus was even capable of saying such things. Imus who?
One of those who chose to leave the Imus brand before the brand became a stain was Mike Breen. Already on his way to an esteemed career as the TV voice of the Knicks on MSG Network and the NBA on ESPN, Breen was asked one too many times how he reconciles his respectful NBA broadcasting with playing low-ball patty cake with Imus as the show’s weekday morning “sportscaster.”
Breen, taking the boxing ref’s advice to “protect yourself at all times,” bolted the Imus show before he’d be bolted to it.
Still, Imus & Co. could be funny, legitimately funny — without targeting some poor schnooks fall for further public punishment or without first running the gag through the compost patch.
But they seldom tried it. That wouldn’t have fit the terms of his engagement or legacy. He was, after all, a shock jock.
Consider that WFAN was so appalled by Imus’ repugnant words about the Rutgers women’s team, that it soon replaced him with Craig Carton, who soon asked pro tennis star Jennifer Capriati about her body, then whether she’d have sex with a woman, then whether she’d engage in a threesome with him and another woman before she became aware that she was the victim of a shock jock ambush.
And WFAN was so repulsed by Carton’s behavior on its air and payroll that the interview was promoted for re-airing on FAN’s website.
Interesting, too, is that all these post-Imus radio put-down artists — Howard Stern, Opie and Anthony, Carton — would throw sucker punches but couldn’t take a jab, let alone a punch.
Imus’ legacy is as a shock jock, and one who helped clear the paths for future, no better or higher ideas shock jocks. None could go too far without the wink-and-nod encouragement of those who hired them then pretended, on the day they fired or suspended, to be shocked that they went so far.
So ’round and ’round it goes. It began with Don Imus, dead, Friday, at 79. He was, for better and worse, the first. Did he leave the world a better place? That’s your call.