April 2020 - Adamsonmedia.com

My sports ‘firsts’

With no live sports taking place due to the pandemic, all we can do is eye a future when they return and relive great moments from their past.

**Scott Adamson’s sports column appears whenever he feels sporty. Follow him on Twitter @adamsonsl and Instagram @adamsons60**

ESPN has reminded us how cathartic looking back can be thanks to its “The Last Dance” mini-series documentary. And aside from that, I haven’t been shy about jumping on YouTube and finding old clashes from the North American Soccer League and United States Football League.

Sometimes when you watch these events, you realize just how many details you’ve forgotten over time.

Anyway, all this has prompted me to do a lot of thinking (and a little research) and recall the first times I saw sporting events live. Turns out it was a fun mental exercise, and I highly recommend it.

Obviously there are some that I can’t pinpoint; the first times I saw college baseball and college soccer were when I was a student at UAB, but I don’t remember specific dates. However, there are other firsts that really stand out.

So even though I don’t expect you to care about my fan milestones, maybe this will at least inspire you to take a stroll down your own lane of memories.

Here are mine – presented in chronological order:

College Football

Virginia Tech vs. Alabama (September 19, 1970, at Legion Field).

When I woke up that morning I thought my dad was taking me to see Jacksonville State vs. Samford at Seibert Stadium, which was very exciting for me since I’d never been to a college football game. In fact, the only live football games I’d seen were the ones I played in as a member of the L.M. Smith elementary school YMCA league team.

You can imagine my disappointment when he came to my room about an hour before we were supposed to leave and told me we weren’t going.

Ah, but it was a trick play.

Before I could reach the eye watering, lip trembling stage, he produced tickets to the Alabama-Virginia Tech game, set for that night at Legion Field.

Alabama won, 51-18, but I don’t remember details – just feelings. And sitting in a football cathedral with my dad made me feel like I was the luckiest kid who ever lived.

Pro football

Southern California Sun at Birmingham Americans (July 10, 1974, at Legion Field).

I was a big pro football fan and the New York Jets were my favorite team. That all changed on a hot night in Birmingham when the World Football League debuted.

Sitting between my dad and brother, I watched the Americans take an 11-7 victory over the visitors and could finally brag that I had seen a professional football game live and in person.

It also led to an obsession with the WFL that remains today.

Pro Baseball

Oakland A’s at Birmingham A’s (March 15, 1975, at Rickwood Field).

OK, I’m cheating a bit here. The American League team and defending World champions were slated to play their Southern League farm club on this night, which was to be the first time I had ever watched a live game involving a major or minor league team. But lightning knocked out a bank of lights at the stadium, and inclement weather prevented the game from being played.

But, I got second baseman Phil Garner’s autograph, watched Reggie Jackson and Billy Williams take BP, and saw Vida Blue throw some pitches, so I’m counting it.

*Technically the first pro baseball game I saw was on April 14, 1981, when the Birmingham Barons defeated the Jacksonville Suns, 6-5, at Rickwood Field.

Pro Hockey

Atlanta Flames at Birmingham Bulls (September 21, 1976, at the Birmingham-Jefferson Civic Center Coliseum).

Once I found out the World Hockey Association’s Toronto franchise was relocating to Birmingham, I read anything and everything I could about ice hockey. And my, oh, my, did this game get me hooked.

Taking on the National Hockey League Flames at the brand new Civic Center, the Bulls’ Mark Napier (already a star at age 19) scored a hat trick – his last goal coming with 46 seconds left in sudden death – to give Birmingham a 7-6 victory.

It was just an exhibition game but it made me realize what a glorious sport this was.

College Basketball

Western Michigan vs. Alabama (December 28, 1976, at the Birmingham-Jefferson Civic Center Coliseum).

I first got interested in college hoops when Pete Maravich played at LSU, but my exposure to the game was confined to watching it on TV.

But my brother gave me an early birthday present and took me to see undefeated and No. 4-ranked Alabama play Western Michigan in the first basketball game ever staged at the Civic Center.

I was part of a sellout crowd that watched the Crimson Tide take an 83-74 victory.

Pro Basketball

Stroh’s Roundball Classic (July 9, 1983, at the Birmingham-Jefferson Civic Center Coliseum).

Here’s another case where I’m blurring the lines. The Stroh’s Roundball Classic was basically just a summer tour of NBA players who played defense-free exhibition games across the country. The stop they made in Birmingham featured stars like Magic Johnson, Isiah Thomas and Dominique Wilkins.

The cool part for me is that I was covering the game for my college newspaper (the Kaleidoscope) and got to interview Johnson.

I can’t recall who won (not that it mattered), but the winning team scored 182 points and Wilkins had at least 20 thunderous dunks.

Pro Soccer

New Orleans Riverboat Gamblers at Birmingham Grasshoppers SC (June 6, 1993, at Birmingham-Southern College).

Birmingham fielded a team in the United States Interregional Soccer League (which evolved into what is now known as the United Soccer League) in the early 1990s, and that gave me a chance to support my hometown club.

It was composed mostly of Birmingham-Southern players and it really wasn’t professional, but since it grew into a league that is, I decided to grandfather it in and define it as “pro” soccer. In an effort to spark my nephew’s interest in the Beautiful Game, I took him to see the Gamblers and Grasshoppers mix it up on a brutally hot Sunday afternoon.

New Orleans scored a 2-1 victory.

Welp, that’s all I got. Now it’s your turn …

I ain’t no handy man

With many of us under quarantine and spending more time at home than we could ever imagine, undertaking household projects is at an all-time high.

**Scott Adamson’s humor column appears whenever he has a funny feeling. Follow him on Twitter @adamsonsl and Instagram @adamsons60**

Instead of hearing the sound of cars whooshing down the road or the dull roar of planes flying overhead, my neighborhood cacophony is the result of chainsaws and hammers.

And with plenty of time on my hands, there are many things I should be doing with my hands to spruce up our domicile.

The patio is overdue for some pressure-washing, and the steps leading up to the porch are begging for a weatherproofing treatment.

My fan cave is in need of a fresh coat of paint, and the door knob leading into it ought to be replaced. Really, I could go into any room in our house and find something to repair.

However, I’m not gonna do any of that stuff because I have not now nor have I ever been what you might call “handy.” In fact, when it comes to that sort of thing, I’m what you might call “stupid.”

I was never mechanically inclined, and never had any inclination to want to be mechanically inclined.

I remember when I was a kid, Pop (my dad) would be down in the driveway working on his car and he’d ask me if I wanted to peer under the hood and watch what he was doing.

I did not.

I viewed cars then as I view cars now – vessels used to get me from one place to another. I didn’t care what they looked like on the inside, didn’t care how they worked – as long as a vehicle transported me, I had all the information I needed.

Once, our old-style television (the kind encased in luxurious wood) stopped working and Pop decided to open it up from the back and see if he could figure out what the problem was. He asked me if I wanted to “help” as he fiddled with the ol’ cathode-ray tubes.

I did not.

Again, all I wanted from the TV was the ability to see “Batman” and “Honey West.” I certainly didn’t want to get all up in its business.

As the years went by my interests started to vary, of course. I went from liking girls to liking women; playing and watching sports to watching and writing about sports; and being obsessed with reading comic books to being obsessed watching movies based on comic books.

At no point, however, have I ever looked at a broken appliance and said, “You know what – I’m gonna grab some tools and fix that bastard.”

Oh, there were times when I felt the need to make an effort. Once I was gifted a gas grill which came completely unassembled. There were nuts and bolts and levers and knobs, and I was only about three pages into the instruction manual when I started gently weeping.

I spent an entire Saturday morning, afternoon and early evening piecing together this monstrosity and once it was finished it looked like a broken Transformers toy.

I named it “Optimus What The Hell” and never even bothered to hook it to a propane tank because that would’ve ended quite horribly.

Years ago I thought I would impress Mary by putting up door blinds. This seemed like a simple enough task, requiring just some screws and brackets.

It took me several hours to get it done but when I was finished the blinds were nice and straight – although I was a little surprised that they didn’t seem to be the right length.

It was only later when Mary came home, opened the door and crashed through the blinds that I discovered they needed to be attached to the door itself, and not to the trim above the door.

My bad.

Oddly, I do have a savant-like talent for toilets. Give me a toilet ball cock and I’ll have it installed in no time. (First I’ll giggle, though, because “toilet ball cock” is hilarious).

For reasons I’ll never be able to explain, I can take the lid off the tank of a toilet, survey the situation, figure out the problem, and quickly resolve it. I guess you could call me the “Shitter Whisperer.”

Otherwise, if you need a Mr. Fix-It you’ll have to get your fix from another mister, because I ain’t him.

It’s not that I’m too stupid to learn, it’s that I’m too stupid and too uninterested to learn.

My happy place

A case can be made that the ‘fan cave” at my house is a monument to failure, and it’s a relatively strong case.

The minute you walk into the hallway you’ll see a wall full of programs and artifacts from the original North American Soccer League, as well as the American Soccer League.

Step into the main room and there’s an entire side of it devoted to the World Football League and United States Football League, with special emphasis on the Birmingham Americans, Birmingham Vulcans and Birmingham Stallions.

Walk a little further and a World Hockey Association display is the main attraction – starring the Birmingham Bulls.

What do all these leagues and teams have in common?

Well, they’re dead.

They came, they went, and now they’re left to be judged by history.

Depressing stuff, right?

Not to me. Not at all.

In fact, my fan cave is my happy place – the room I retreat to when I want to clear my head and where I churn out many of my columns. I spent years decorating it, and now it serves as my own private sports museum and inspiration tank.

My collection of mostly Magic City sports history provides magic all its own, helping me travel back in time to some of the best times of my life.

When I look at my Americans pennant (and opening game ticket stub and homemade Ams helmet), I don’t dwell on the WFL’s financial disaster – at the time the worst in sports history.

Instead, I think back to July 10, 1974, when a young teenager saw his very first pro football game in person, sitting at Legion Field with his dad on one side and his brother on the other as Birmingham topped Southern Cal, 11-7.

I remember a team that hung 58 points on the Memphis Southmen while one of the loudest crowds I’ve ever been a part of cheered so loudly my ears were ringing when it was all over.

And when the Ams beat the Florida Blazers in the World Bowl, I can still hear myself cheering as I watched the game through the “miracle” of cable television at my brother’s house in Center Point.

If I glance at my Vulcans car tag or Vulcans Booster Club certificate, my first thought isn’t that the league folded 12 weeks into the 1975 season.

It’s joining more than 30,000 people at the “Football Capital of the South” on a scorching July day to watch a controlled scrimmage between the Vulcans and Southmen. That was the game that featured the debut of the WFL’s most famous players – Larry Csonka, Jim Kiick and Paul Warfield.

The USFL died by its own hand when it left a spring schedule in an effort to compete with the NFL in the fall, but it lives on when I look at the Joe Cribbs’ game-used Stallions jersey I have and my three custom-made player figurines.

And that ticket stub from the 1985 Eastern Conference final against the Baltimore Stars at Legion Field might’ve been Birmingham’s last game in the USFL, but it was also a clash that helped me realize these were great teams that could’ve held their own in football’s biggest league.

I guess I should tell you that admiring my Birmingham Barracudas display – featuring a replica jersey, cap, season press pass and Legion Field parking pass – does still sting a little.

The Canadian Football League is my favorite brand of tackle football, and knowing it plays on while the Cudas played out after a one-and-done season saddens me.

But, you know the old saying: “Don’t cry because it’s over, smile because it happened.”

Hey, I got to sit in the press box and watch CFL Hall of Famers Matt Dunigan and Anthony Calvillo duke it out in the first CFL game ever played in Birmingham. That’s unforgettable.

There are also physical reminders of the Birmingham Fire (World League of American Football), Birmingham Steeldogs (Arena football 2), Birmingham Thunderbolts (XFL) and Birmingham Iron (Alliance of American Football), and even a good deal of gridiron memorabilia that has nothing to do with Birmingham at all – it’s just stuff I collected and enjoy.

And of course my shrine to the Bulls isn’t merely a tribute to the WHA and stars such as Frank Mahovlich and Mark Napier, but a reminder of when hockey became my favorite sport.

Going to the Birmingham-Jefferson Civic Center Coliseum and rooting for the Bulls – even though they usually sat near the bottom of the WHA standings – made for some of the best times I ever had.

So sure, you can visit my fan cave and think it’s a room full of bittersweet memories and broken dreams. I won’t argue with you because in a technical sense, you’re right.

For me, though, it’s far more sweet than bitter. It represents days gone by, but they’re days that – in my mind – will last as long as I live.