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November 10, 2009

Quintin Harlan: Where were you when ...

In sports, we have all kinds of moments that fans will always remember

By Quintin Harlan, Herald Bulletin Sports Writer

How many times have you heard this: “You will always remember where you were when …”

In my parent’ generation, that’s the line for the date Nov. 22, 1963, when President John F. Kennedy was assassinated in Dallas. In more modern terms, the date that’s forever etched in our memories is Sept. 11, 2001.

In sports we have all kinds of moments that fans will always remember where they were when something momentous occurred.

I’m sure Indianapolis Colts fans remember where they were the night the team won Super Bowl XLI. I was at a friend’s place and we had a friendly wager going on.

If my team had won, he’d make a delicacy known to his native Kokomo. Since the Colts beat the Bears, I had to make a Chicago-style deep dish pizza.

So really there were no losers there.

Another moment that the entire state of Indiana probably recalls is the day that they announced the firing of Bob Knight. I just remember it being announced after a Dick Jauron-led Bears team had been beaten and it took then-Indiana University President Myles Brand about 15 minutes to say that he had “removed Mr. Knight as head basketball coach.” I still wonder why it was dragged out so long.

Moments in history in anything become moments because of the feelings that they evoke.

On Nov. 1, 1999, I was a volunteer grunt for the Anderson girls basketball team. I was doing an inventory of the uniforms and had the television tuned to ESPN when they interrupted their scheduled programming with a bulletin that Walter Payton had passed away at the age of 45 from bile duct cancer.

That was a proverbial gut-shot, not just because I’m a Bears fan but more so for the fact that my non-family childhood hero had died. It took me a minute to wrap that around my head. Think about this: he was a star running back in the NFL for 13 years and missed one game in an era when the defense was allowed to be a lot more violent than it is today. And he’s gone at 45?

How about this one: Sept. 8, 1998. Mark McGwire breaks the single-season home run record.

Now most revisionist historians have tried to banish this moment from the sports record books after the “discovery” of baseball’s Steroid Era.

But what happened on that night in St. Louis should not be ignored for the sake of a conscience that members of the Hall of Fame voting committee suddenly grew the moment Jose Canseco’s first book was published.

There are so many memories and dates, that when you look at a calendar they come flooding back.

There’s sure to be many more memories made that will be filed under the heading “You’ll always remember where you were when …”

Hopefully they’ll be more of the happy life-affirming kind, as opposed to the shocking worldwide tragedy variety.

Contact Quintin Harlan: 640-4835, quintin.harlan@heraldbulletin.com.

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