It was quite a hello …
I got to meet Tom Brady!
My Fox crew had a practice game last Sunday out in San Francisco, so after a Fever game Friday night, a Colts game Saturday night, there was a 5:40 Sunday morning flight through Dallas to San Jose, which is the closest airport to the 49ers stadium.
Tom (we are on a first-name basis now) is on our crew (our should I say, I’m on his crew) this season, and we all gathered to work a game off-air before the regular season starts the weekend after Labor Day.
It was cool to meet this guy who we see on television and all over the internet, but hey, I work in a business where I meet these folks all the time.
I’m looking forward to working with Tom, and I know he will be a great addition to our crew.
The weekend travel to and from California had bits and pieces of the many trips I have taken to California over the years, but they always add up.
My trip literally went to the dogs as I got on board for my early flight in Indy on Sunday morning.
The lady in the window seat was toting a service dog.
It was a little thing, I think it was a Shih Tzu.
Not because I know anything about dog breeds, but it’s just fun to type an almost naughty word in my column …
Well, this little thing was traveling in style, because the lady had ever gadget and gizmo I have ever seen to coddle, mollify or otherwise make it comfortable.
There was a crazy-looking watering “fountain” that she could run a little liquid into a cup, and the little dog could lap up a drink. She held the dog in her lap the entire trip, and even took it with her on a trip to the lavatory. Don’t know who needed to use it …
She had it on her lap, looking out the window, staring at the stars.
Well, that was leg one of the four-legs on the weekend. The second leg started with the pilot getting up and leaving the plane three minutes before we were supposed to leave.
Not a good sign.
He was back on board and it was only seconds later that the dreaded announcement came on.
“Folks we have a delay.”
I had exactly a minute of spare time when I got to San Jose — there was no room for delay!
As luck held out, it was only a couple minutes. The maintenance logbook didn’t upload properly, so they got that glitch fixed and away we went, but I assure you, I was needing a dog bone to chew on for a couple minutes.
The rest of flying wasn’t too bad. I got to San Jose on time, caught an Uber ride with a guy named Tim who was straight out of a television poker show. Cowboy hat and sunglasses to boot.
The best part is that he was headed for a casino in another hour to play in a poker tournament! He was sure dressed for the part.
Our football game was a practice run, and preseason, so it was not as intense as normal.
Did I mention that I got to meet Tom Brady?
I had a 6 a.m. flight Monday, so it was a fast turnaround, and managed to make my 45-minute connection in Phoenix to catch the flight home to Indy.
Oh, yeah, and the Indy traffic on Monday afternoon. They had 465 all orange-coned to death and it was rush hour, so by the time I escaped Indy, I was in Danville and it was 90 minutes after I left.
It felt like driving in Chicago or LA.
But things got done mostly on time, and mostly OK.
Now for the goodbye.
Bill York passed away earlier this week, and there is zero exaggeration in my writing when I say he was the most influential person in my 40 years in Indiana.
The story goes back 39-plus years, only a couple months after I moved here in November of ’84.
I had gotten on the Purdue stats crew as soon as I moved here, through a connection of a sports person in South Dakota and one at Purdue.
At the end of the basketball season, my Purdue guy gives me a business card and says, “you need to call Bill York in Indianapolis.”
I asked who this Bill York guy was, and he said, “Bill runs the stats crews for the Colts, the Pacers, the 500 and who knows what else. You need to be doing stats for him, and you need to call him.”
So I called Bill, and my life changed forever.
Remember that in the spring of 1985, the Colts had been in Indiana exactly one season, but the Pacers and the 500 were well-known commodities.
I called Bill. He lived in Clarmont, which comes into play later in the story.
He said, “I was expecting your call. The Purdue guys seem to think you are an OK stats guy.”
Now, it was a year later that I found out that Bill was a Purdue grad, so this recommendation came with icing on top.
He invited me to meet him at the Colts complex, and I took a stats test for him.
Things went fine there, and I left that day as a member of the Colts stats crew.
I had done radio and television stats, and had worked on the South Dakota State stats crew for years, so I became Bill’s everyman. One week, I was with visiting radio, the next with CBS and the next tracking tackle stats and getting post-game quotes in the locker room.
Somewhere during that first Colts season, Bill asked me if I did basketball stats too. I said I did.
The next game he handed me a season credential to the Pacers. He said, “I won’t have work every game, but I’ll sure have some.”
There was plenty.
In 1986, we were all getting asked to help out at the Pan Am Games. Bill was handling all the basketball, and he asked me to be one of the two official scorers for the whole event. I was on the book when the coach from Venezuela tossed a chair, and I did the bronze medal game.
The Clarmont note? I lived at Bill’s house for the two weeks that we worked at the Games. His wife Jay did laundry, made meals and snacks, and always had a clean bed ready for whenever we got back, and had breakfast no matter what time we left in the morning. I crashed at their place a number of times after Colts or Pacers nights.
From there on, there was one thing or another.
Some producer would call and it started the same almost every time …
“I was talking to Bill York, and he told me to get in touch with you about doing stats.”
The media room at the Speedway, at Gainbridge Fieldhouse and at Lucas Oil Stadium are ALL named the Bill York Media Room. That is the impact this guy had. The media room at the Hoosier Dome and Market Square Arena were also named after Bill, and what they called the media room at the Coliseum should have been, because of all the ABA stories.
The stories from the track alone would run into another page today, but leave it to say, Bill loved the track, and the 500, more than anyone not named Tony Hulman. Just a tiny bit more than he loved Slick Leanard and the Pacers.
Bill leaves us at 91 years on this earth, and the memorial service may run for days, because there will be countless stories about the impact he had on lives, and events, in Indianapolis.
I’m just one guy who was blessed to have known him and was blessed by his generosity. I probably wouldn’t have worked a Super Bowl, and will work another, if it wasn’t for Bill York. There are many, many, many more whose lives he touched in a great manner.
Godspeed Bill. Save me a seat in the Bill York Media Room in Heaven.
Because if there wasn’t one, there soon will be.
Safe travels.
Jeff Nelson is a frequent contributor to the Journal Review and works professionally for Fox Sports working with the Indiana Pacers, Indianapolis Colts and many more professional teams.
