WIP Blog By Joseph Santoliquito
|
Joe Santoliquito shares his thoughts on all things Philly Sports.
Don’t let the bulbous head and round features fool you. Joseph Santoliquito was once an Academic all-America athlete at Temple University, where he received an undergraduate degree in journalism. He has been covering high school sports in the Philadelphia area since 1993, specifically for the Philadelphia Daily News since 2005. He has written for ESPN The Magazine, Sports Illustrated, SI.com and ESPN.com, and was nominated for an Emmy Award in 2006 for his ESPN.com feature on blind baseball. He is also a frequent guest on Daily News Live and 610 WIP. He also works as the managing editor for Ring Magazine, where he has been since October 1997 and has been the WIP blogger since 2007.
MILLER HITS A GRAND SLAM WITH HARRY THE K
All great men have flaws. Sometimes we don’t like hearing about them. We like looking the other way, preferring instead to remain steadfast in the belief that the shining, glimmering figures we idolized as children had no warts. We sometimes don’t want to believe our hero didn’t turn right, when he should have turned left. He may have had a drink of two, and his attention may have wandered toward the direction of a passing young lady in tight jeans. We like to carry a naiveté when it comes to certain sports heroes in this city.
The kind that do no wrong.
Harry Kalas was one of them.
Randy Miller brings all the many facets of the great man into the bed of our laps in his definitive opus, Harry The K. It’s a magnificent read, possibly one of the best sports-related local autobiographies in recent years of a true Philadelphia icon—identified as much with the team as the great players that wore the Phillies’ cherry pinstripes.
When the galley arrived at my door two weeks ago, I first started paging through it, reading some passages here and there. Before I knew it, I was immersed in chapters involving a man who brought the Phillies into our homes.
Miller deserves serious points for the pain-staking, exhaustive research and reporting he did in finding out almost every tidbit and morsel of Harry’s great life.
Harry wasn’t perfect—who is, maybe with the fine exception of some in our local media—but he was far, far from a demon. In fact, after reading Miller’s book, you may find yourself liking Harry Kalas even more, if that’s possible. Miller adds a human quality to the man, sharing great anecdotes of Harry’s generosity to his fans, and his incredible commitment, love and devotion to the Phillies, though he was grossly underpaid for years.
The most intriguing chapter, in my opinion, is “The Wheels Come Off.”
In the chapter, Miller made sure to go completely out of his way to present a balanced account of the schism that occurred between Kalas and long-time partner Chris Wheeler. I personally like Wheeler and think Chris is one of the best baseball broadcasters in the game. He adds perspective, a genuine passion for the Phillies, and educates fans as to what goes on behind the scenes. I also feel Chris is one of the good guys in what can often be a shark-infested, nit-picky, back-sniping milieu in the press area of Citizens Bank Park (imagine a kindergarten recess of whiny children and you get the picture).
In some media circles in this city, however, Wheeler gets bashed. But in this chapter, Miller makes sure the story behind the Harry and Wheels split is even. Miller literally read the whole chapter, word-for-word, to Wheeler over the phone to make sure there were no factual errors. He went out of way to find Wheeler allies and in the end, Wheels did help Harry, as age began depleting the legend’s eyesight. Though there are many areas where Wheeler doesn’t look good at all.
The Phillies don’t come off looking real good, either. Eileen Kalas, Harry’s second wife, didn’t like how the team treated her husband, and she has no problem expressing that in Miller’s book. The gut punch comes when Rob Brooks, the Phillies’ director of broadcasting, has to tell Harry he can’t bring his stepdaughter Julie to the White House, and instead finds Harry collapsed in the pressbox the fateful day Harry eventually passed away.
Harry The K will make you laugh, make you cry, make you reminisce of what baseball was like when you were a kid and the game carried an aura of grandeur. All made possible by a special man with a special voice that had a special connection to his audience—our Harry The K.
Joseph Santoliquito is an Emmy Award-nominated writer based in the Philadelphia area who can be contacted at Jsantoliquito@yahoo.com.
|
|
|
|
|
