February 17, 2023 • 56 mins
EPISODE 136: COUNTDOWN WITH KEITH OLBERMANN
A-Block (1:41) The death of baseball's legendary television analyst Tim McCarver, easily one of the most beloved people in the sport, and in broadcasting. I knew him for 42 years and for whatever criticisms he took late in his career from listeners who didn't realize all the other ones were merely doing impressions of him, in 1983 he literally, personally, saved my love of the game. He was a pleasure to work with, and as I have been saying for 20 years, his insight in literally the last 60 seconds of the bottom of the 9th inning of the 7th Game of the most emotional season in baseball history was the television equivalent of Bill Mazeroski's home run to win the 1960 World Series.
B-Block (19:55) POSTSCRIPTS TO THE NEWS: The Fox News texts are out. Tucker Carlson was afraid Trump would destroy them, but telling the truth about him would tank the stock price. He, Ingraham and Hannity all thought Rudy Giuliani was crazy. The News Chief tried to stop news. Perjury in the Trump Atlanta case? How many people did Senator Fetterman help yesterday? Now that he's proven he can live on his own, why is the Central Park Zoo setting a honey trap to re-capture Flaco the Owl? And can anyone stop the Killer Windows of Russia? (25:48) THE WORST PERSONS IN THE WORLD: Nikki Haley would struggle with the math part of her own Presidential Candidate Mental Competency Test, Ann Coulter makes you feel sympathy for Nikki Haley, and a German choreographer says: I am an artist and you have criticized me, so, I will now smear my dog's feces on your face.
C-Block (31:50) EVERY DOG HAS ITS DAY: Falcon, Rio, Titan, Torino, and Tundra - five pups with Parvo in Texas (32:50) FRIDAYS WITH THURBER: fittingly on the occasion of the loss of a great baseball broadcaster, Thurber's story that begins with the words of another great baseball broadcaster: "The Catbird Seat."
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Transcript
Episode Transcript
Available transcripts are automatically generated. Complete accuracy is not guaranteed.
Speaker 1 (00:04):
Countdown with Keith Olderman is a production of I Heart Radio.
This is a news and political podcast, and there is
(00:25):
much to discuss in both areas, from the extraordinarily slow
drip drip drip of the Trump Georgia grand jury, to
whether or not Nicki Haley could pass her own presidential
mental competency tests, to whether or not anybody can stop
the Killer Windows of Russia, and all that is coming up.
But Tim McCarver died yesterday, and I am heartbroken, and
(00:50):
I will make no apologies for devoting this first segment
to him. When I was twenty four years old and
working as a sports correspondent for CNN in New York,
I reluctantly admitted to myself that my affection for baseball
was ailing. I had seen my childhood team, the Yankees,
rise from the Ashes to win two World Series, and
(01:12):
I was in the stands in Boston as they completed
the greatest mid season come back in the game's history.
But the Yankees perpetual churn had exhausted me, and five
seasons of having to go to baseball games as a
professional rather than just wanting to go to them as
a fan had left me board and one night after
(01:33):
work in April or May of three, I was sitting
in my little apartment in New York, finding nothing to watch,
even on the cable system offering the world's widest assortment
of channels, fifty of them, and I somehow landed back
on the New York station, Channel nine, where as the
hapless New York Mets were cavorting on my screen. Two men,
(01:56):
we're laughing uncontrollably. I mean, I came in from channel
eight or channel ten, and the first thing I saw
was the ballgame at Chase Stadium. And the first thing
I heard was these two guys laughing. No words, no explanation,
no self control, just laughing. Well that was different. I
(02:19):
had never in my life been a fan of the
New York Mets. I grew up Yankee, and even as
that had begun to wane, I was not going to
become a Mets fan. I didn't hate them. At age ten,
I was overjoyed when my dad was able to get
us two tickets to a Mets nineteen sixty nine World
Series game. And I had seen the Mets on TV
(02:39):
hundreds of times before, but never to watch them, And
yet there I was having voluntarily stayed in wrapped attention
to a Mets telecast for twenty or thirty seconds now
as these two guys laughed their heads off. Eventually they
settled down, and Ralph Kiner, in his twenty second season
(03:02):
as a Mets announcer, said something to Tim mc carver
in like his twenty second day as a Mets announcer,
about how neither of them should ever try to say
that again. Just then the inning ended, McCarver said, the
Mets are retired in the third and management may very
well retire Ralph and me during the commercial We'll be
(03:22):
right back or not. Well, now I had to watch
by the next inning. By the time Tim McCarver, whom
the Mets had hired away from the Philadelphia Phillies the
previous winter, had explained the name that he and Ralph
Kiner so butchered that they dissolved into laughter. I was
a Tim McCarver fan. The Mets were awful that year,
(03:48):
promising but still the second worst team in baseball. They
had not finished last or next to last in seven years,
and laughing during their broadcast for any reason was better
than paying attention to their games. And yet it quickly
dawned on me that I was only laughing along with
McCarver and Kinner, but also I was paying attention to
(04:10):
the game. It was as if I were sitting with
these two guys in the stands somewhere, and we were
enjoying what we could of the three Mets, with McCarver
in particular pointing out something subtle on the field that
I would have otherwise missed. And in a much larger sense,
we McCarver, Kinder, and the viewer. We were sitting there
(04:32):
enjoying the fact of baseball. The individual game always mattered
to Tim McCarver. But where it fit into the jigsaw
puzzle of that season's games, or into the vaster jigsaw
puzzle of all the games he'd ever seen, all the
games there had ever been, that was far more important.
(04:53):
Well before the week was out, I was a Met
fan because of Tim McCarver, and my dying baseball fandom
had been resuscitated because of Tim McCarver. As of three
very few baseball broadcasts, in fact, very few sportscasts we're
interesting to watch as television programs. Tony Kubec had done
(05:16):
the baseball game of the Week and was crisp and informative,
and he enjoyed himself, and he taught me and other
kids and adults what to look for. But Vince Scully
had only returned to the national baseball stage that same year,
and Bob Costas had only become the backup on NBC's
Game of the Week the year before. Baseball television was,
(05:39):
if not a desert, a really arid place. Tim McCarver
was never arid. He was happy to criticize any player
or any manager at any time for strategical or logistical malfeasance.
But he was also happy to underline whenever he was
wrong and they were right. You can't shade the defense
(06:03):
that way and throw him a fastball in that situation,
he'll put it over the fence. If seconds after that
the batter hit not a home run but a soft
liner to the shortstop whose location McCarver had just criticized,
Tim's self flagellation would be short and exact, or maybe
you can I'll try to stop managing from up here now. Usually,
(06:26):
of course, he was exactly right. About fifteen years ago,
he kind of fell out of favor with some fans
and some critics because the freshness of his approach as
of three tell the viewer not just what happened, but
what's going to happen next, and what's going to happen
after that, and what's gonna happen after that. That had
been imitated by every baseball analyst, and indeed by every
(06:48):
TV sports analyst, and by a lot of sportscasters in studios,
and a lot of the imitators were younger and smoother
and with a less pronounced accent, and as is inevitable,
with time, they had become faster. Lost in that is
that they all were and are Tim McCarver imitators. McCarver
(07:14):
rose quickly in Baseball TV. He went right from the
Philadelphia Phillies active roster and he was a great catcher
to announcing for the Phillies and occasionally for NBC in
nineteen eighty, then to the Mets in nineteen eighty three,
as I mentioned, and ABC Sports in nineteen eighty four,
and his first of twenty three World Series in ninety five.
When CBS got baseball in nineteen ninety they hired him.
(07:36):
I was at the CBS station in Los Angeles and
got to interview him. I predicted that the underdog Cincinnati
Reds would win the World Series in nineteen ninety and
maybe even sweep and McCarver said, I think that way too.
I was afraid to say it. I thought I was
the only one. When CBS lost baseball in nineteen ninety four,
ABC re hired him. When Fox got baseball in nineteen
(07:57):
ninety six, they hired him away. And all that time
he was also doing full seasons in New York with
the Mets, And when the Mets hesitated to bring him back,
the Yankees grabbed him in and he was their lead announcer,
play by play man and a good one for three seasons.
I had met Tim McCarver when he was going from
player to announcer. At the nineteen eighty World Series. I
(08:20):
was startled to see him on the field at Veteran
Stadium in Philadelphia carrying the latest volume of Martin Gilbert's
series of biographies of Winston Churchill. I introduced myself and
I said I had just finished that book and hoped
he enjoyed it as much as I had. He asked
me how I thought it compared to Churchill's dozens of
(08:42):
volumes of his own autobiography. Well, I said, there are
fewer of them. McCarver laughed loudly. Good, this is heavy
enough on the plane, he said, And when in three
I became a mcarver fan and got to tell him, so,
he immediately asked me if there were things he could
improve on. Well, I gave him some technical voice tips
(09:04):
and told him not to worry too much about them,
that he was really pretty good at it as it was.
And I said, I suppose this had begun when he
was with the nineteen six St. Louis Cardinals. They had
thirty five players on the team that year, twenty five
of them making the roster for most of the season. Eventually,
of those thirty five, McCarver became a broadcaster, and his
(09:24):
teammates Bill White and Lou Brock became broadcasters, and Kurt
Flood and Mike Shannon and Bob Yucker and Bob Gibson
and Nelson Briles, and they would all become baseball announcers,
and then their teammate Dick Grot would become a basketball announcer,
and their teammate Bob Perkey would become a local sportscaster
in Pittsburgh. That's ten out of thirty five. McCarver said
(09:47):
on the team bus, it was a life and death
struggle to be heard. I got to work again with
Tim McCarver on a regular basis at Fox in two thousand.
I was the host of Fox's pregame show for the
Game of the Week that Tim did with Joe every Saturday,
and also the pregame show hosted our coverage of the
(10:09):
playoffs in the World Series. Mid season, I would appear
in their broadcast from the studio doing highlights of other games,
and then in October I would literally be in one
of the team dugouts. I am proud to say that
in the former role, I once managed to reduce Tim
McCarver to silence. On June two thousand, Tim and Joe
(10:31):
Buck were doing the Game of the Week from Dodger
Stadium in Los Angeles, and I was, as usual in
the l A studio doing the highlights for them, watching
all the games simultaneously on an array of television's stacked
one atop the other. In the fourth inning at Yankee Stadium,
the Yankee second baseman Chuck Nablock, whose defensive play had
(10:52):
been deteriorating for more than a year, charged a softly
hit ground ball and tried to throw it back behind
him to first base. He not only did not come
close to first base, but the throw, in fact, bounced
all the top of the Yankees dugout and hit a
fan in the stands. Now, I knew Yankee Stadium intimately.
(11:12):
I had more or less grown up there, and I
knew if the ball had not hit somebody in the
season ticket seats that my family had had there since nine,
it had come close. Probably hit my mother, I said
to the stage crew. Everybody laughed, and then the Yankees
broadcast cut to a shot of the afflicted fan holding
her head and being attended to buy stadium staff. It
(11:35):
was my mother. Nobody laughed. So moments later, after I
had gotten her on the phone, when Buck and McCarver
threw to me for a Fox game break, I narrated
that exact highlight, and I said that Chuck now blocks
throwing problems had now gotten personal, that he had now
hit my mother. We showed her her glasses are broken,
(11:56):
Joe and Tim, and she's going home. But I've just
spoken to her. She's okay, Joe, Tim, there was silence.
I mean a lot of silence. Finally, Tim McCarver said,
what huh is that? I'm speechless? Is that one of
Keith's jokes? Keith, are you still there? Was that? Really?
(12:17):
Your mother? I'm here? Tim? My? My goodness? She? What
did the odds? Tim? She's been going to Yankee games
since nineteen thirty four and nothing bad has ever happened
to her before today? I'd say the odds are pretty good?
But did she? She's fine. She'll be back in that
same seat tomorrow. She's a gamer, won't She asked me
to tell you she likes you better now that you're
worth the Yankees and not the Mets. After that, I
(12:39):
never saw Tim McCarver without him asking how my mother was.
In fact, he called me after his game ended that
day to make sure. After my mother passed away, Tim
would say he had been thinking of her. Nobody I
know who knew Tim McCarver personally could recall a difficult
experience with him. He was a sweet man who enjoyed himself,
(13:02):
enjoyed baseball, enjoy broadcasting, enjoyed talking, enjoyed listening, enjoyed meeting you,
enjoyed singing, he put out a jazz album, and he
saved my love for baseball when it nearly died, literally
forty years ago. And one last thing, Tim McCarver said
(13:23):
something once on a baseball broadcast that is, to my mind,
the greatest piece of predictive analysis I have ever heard
in any sport, possibly in any realm, in television, politics, news,
the weather, but definitely sports. And it wasn't just that
(13:44):
he pointed out what everybody else in the stadium had
seemingly missed, including a manager who had just led his
team to three consecutive World Series championships. It was when
he said it. This was in the bottom of the
ninth inning of the seventh game of the World Series,
in literally the last seconds the most emotional two months
(14:06):
of the most emotional baseball season ever. This was on
November fourth, two thousand and one. As in a horror
film or a disaster movie, there was just enough time
for one person, and one person alone, to see that
the monster was not dead, or that the damn would
(14:27):
not hold. And in this case that person was Tim McCarver.
And this audio from the Fox broadcast of that World
Series game. It's not slick. It doesn't sound scripted. There
are no catch phrases. It isn't hip, it isn't full
of metrics. It merely predicts the exact outcome to the
(14:48):
inch of the play that would decide and end the
entire baseball season. Seconds afterwards, that chance of a lifetime
for Luis Gonzalez to t bottom of the knife. Game
seven of the World Series basses loaded infield in one out,
(15:11):
strong wader. The one problem is Libera throws inside the
left handers, and left handers get a lot of broken,
bad hits in the shallow outfield, the shallow part of
the outfield. That's the danger in bringing the infield in
(15:32):
with a guy like Ribera on the mountain Florida Center
Traild the Diamondbacks part World sampparents Louis Gonzalez's hit landed
(15:57):
exactly where Tim McCarver had said the Yankees should have
had their infielders playing but didn't. When I saw Tim
the next season, I said this to him, and I
said this about him to every TV writer who asked that.
That was the Bill Mazeroski World Series winning home run
of all baseball analysis ever, and so in the last
(16:22):
twenty years, Whenever it was my privilege to see Tim
McCarver at a ballpark, he would always say two things
to me, as if he were saying them to me
for the first time. He would say, thank you, Keith
for what you said about two thousand one, And Keith,
I was just thinking of your dear mother, as so
(16:45):
many of us will now be just thinking of our
dear friend and colleague, Tim McCarver. This is countdown with
Keith over me. Pos scripts to the news, some headlines,
(17:06):
some updates, some snarks, some predictions. State Line twelve eleven
sixth Avenue, New York City. When Jackie Heinrich of Fox
News tweeted on November twelve, two twenty, that quote there
is no evidence that any voting system deleted or lost votes,
or was in any way compromised, Foxes Tucker Carlson texted
(17:26):
his pal Sean Hannity quote, please get her fired, seriously,
What the blank. I'm actually shocked. It needs to stop immediately.
It's measurably hurting the company. The stock prices down. The
message got to Fox's PR person, the eternally loathsome Arena
Briguante and Fox News CEO Suzanne Scott, nominally in charge
(17:52):
of news at Fox News. Scott sent Briguanty a text
about the reporter who had actually reported the truth. Quote,
she has serious nerve doing this and if this gets
picked up, viewers are going to be They're disgusted. This
is the head of news at Fox News deliberately undermining
the news all. This part of a one ninety two
(18:14):
page document filed a month ago by Dominion Voting Systems
and its suit against Fox News, revealed yesterday. It is
full of internal Fox texts and memos. The story gets
as far as Rupert Murdoch, who got up out of
his crypt and emailed Suzanne Scott about the real issue
here that News Max was taking away Fox News as audience.
(18:37):
They quote should be watched if skeptically, Trump will concede
eventually on what you should concentrate on. Joja helping anyway
we can. Rupe, of course, meant that Georgia's Senate runoff,
which they lost. We don't want to antagonoliged chump Feather,
but Giuliani taken with a large grain of salt, everything
at steak care. Should he never use the words steak
(19:02):
like you know, draculum The real problem for Fox. Maybe
Carlson's text to somebody named Piffer on January that Trump
is quote a demonic force, a destroyer. Twenty days later,
Carlson added, what Trump's good at his destroying things. He's
the world champion of that. He could easily destroy us
(19:23):
if we play it wrong. There is so much in
the page document about the canceling of an entire Janine
Pierro show after it was recorded, Texts in which Sean
Hannity says Rudy Giuliani is acting like an insane person,
and Laura Ingram calls him sanchin anniant and to lou Dobbs,
(19:43):
producers refer to Giuliani's insanity lately and how he is
so full of blank. There's so much in here they
should make it into a Netflix series, and the title
of the Netflix series should be morons never write anything down.
(20:23):
Thank you, Nancy Faust, Dateline, Atlanta. Man. At this rate,
we're going to find out whether they're indicting Trump sometime
in the year forty seven sixty six. A judge has
now released another part of the special Grand Jury investigation
into Trump's attempt to overthrow democracy and alter the outcome
of presidential vote in Georgia. And among the endless dribs
(20:44):
and drabs, this drib says the jurors at the grand
jury believe one or more of the witnesses they heard
committed perjury. That is, out of seventy five witnesses, So
we can have no idea who the one or ones
might have been. Rudy Rudy Dateline, Washington. Senator On Fetterman
(21:05):
of Pennsylvania not only had the guts to check himself
into Walter Reid because he did not feel right, but
he had the guts to issue a statement indicating was
because he was suffering from acute depression. Not only do
doctors expect a quick recovery, but lord knows how many
people who are afraid or ashamed of that diagnosis just
got the courage to seek help because of what Senator
Fetterman did at date Line, New York the Central Park
(21:28):
Zoo here in New York. I know I flackoed you
to death. But two weeks into his freedom, the escaped
eagle owl has proved he can survive on his own.
He loves Central Park and is exploring it. He feeds
himself by eating rats and he seems to have learned
to perch only where people can see him and photograph
him easily, So naturally, the zoo is rumored to have
(21:51):
set a honey trap to try to recapture him after
two weeks. Put a female eagle owl, or possibly just
a recording of a female eagle owl. It's hard to
be sure in the dark, right because in a trap
to snare him, why he's functioning beautifully. He still lives
in the neighborhood. What's the greater risk that Flacco might
(22:13):
eat a rat that just ate rat poison, or that
he has to live another fifty years in a small
room and dateline St. Petersburg, Russia, the head of the
Financial Support Department of the Russian Defense Ministry there is dead.
Fifty eight year old Marina Yankina fell out of a window,
and she, of course is the first prominent Russian government
(22:36):
official or military official to die in that fashion. In
nearly eight weeks ahead Fridays with Thurber and fittingly with
the passing him a great baseball broadcaster, I'll read you
Thurber's story, which starts with the words of another great
baseball broadcaster first time for the daily Roundup of the miscreants, morons,
(22:59):
and Dunning Kruger effect specimens who constitute today's whereas persons
in the world the bronze. Nicki Haley I forgot something yesterday.
In my screed about her presidential candidacy announcement, she says
she would advocate for a mental competency test for any
presidential candidate over the age of seventy five. Why over
(23:20):
seventy five? Why not over fifty? I mean, you think
Trump only went crazy on his seventy six birthday and
he wasn't crazy at fifty one. You know why she
doesn't want to make the test mandatory at fifty, right,
because she's fifty one. Last July, Nicki Haley tweeted out
a meme that looked like a register receipt. It read
(23:41):
Joe Biden's inconvenience store, and it showed price increases for
a hot dog fifteen point six percent, Annesota and condiments
eleven point nine percent, ice cream nine point six percent,
and bread eight point seven percent, and watermelon eight point
two percent, and then at the bottom it listed the
total sixty seven point two percent, which is not the
(24:02):
way percentages work. And why would Nicki Haley know that
just because her degree from Clemson is in accounting. Why
if I can go from two to four in each
state poll by the end of the day, I'll be
at a hundred percent in the polls for the whole country,
(24:22):
will not not the runner up? Culter Geist and Coulter
went on a podcast this weekend called Nicki Haley a bimbo,
made fun of India's reverence for cows and insisted Haley
should well. The quote was, why don't you go back
to your own country? Unquote? Nicki Haley was born in Bamburg,
(24:45):
South Carolina. As I have said ever since I first
heard Coulter claimed that she graduated from Cornell with a
history degree. I'm gonna need to see the actual diploma
because even us Cornell agg guys know how to use
the Google knitwit. But the winner, Marco get, a choreographer
(25:05):
from Germany. He says that the critic Vibka Hooster wrote
yet another personal attack on him, disguised in the form
of a review, so he responded as all thoughtful artists would.
He went up to miss Hooster at Hanover's Opera House
last Saturday and smeared dog feces all over her face.
(25:26):
She screamed, she got the cops. He apologized profusely, and
then the hanover State Ballet said it could only do
one thing under those circumstances, keep presenting his marvelous ballet works.
Feces be damned chastened by his good fortune. Geky then
said he was wrong to smear dog feces all over
the critics face, but he added that coverage of this
(25:48):
story was all wrong and should not be focused on
him smearing faces on her face, but on how wrong
she was as a reviewer. I'm still not free of
this anger, get added, since she had only written two
positive pieces about his work. Ever, he then said, if
(26:08):
I'd been a woman and the critical man, this would
be seen differently. Unquote now no, actually, And I say
this as a guy who for six years had a
TV critic in Los Angeles right hit pieces on me
and later it turned out he was taking bribes from
a rival TV station. I say it is that guy.
If Mr Giky, you were a real man, you would
(26:31):
not have smeared dog feces on a critic space. And
by the way, Marco who brings dog feces to the ballet.
Geker today's worse parson with dog feces. Thet least it
was his own dog. In the words Still Ahead on
(27:06):
Countdown Fridays with Thurber and in memory of my late
friend Tim McCarver, What better than the story that hinges
on the words of another immortal baseball broadcaster, Red Barber
The catbird seat First. In each edition of Countdown, we
feature a dog in need you can help. Every dog
has its day, and we'll go to outside Houston in
(27:26):
Spring Texas and Rio Falcon, Titan, Torino, and Tundra. Five
beautiful brown and brindle two month old stray pups who
have been filled by the dreaded word Parvo. Corridor Rescue
of Spring Texas has them. They are in the e
R at the local animal hospital. Parva virus is a
(27:47):
nightmarish scourge of young dogs. Two of the pups are
doing well, the other three are touch and go. Costs
to try to save them all a little over eight
hundred dollars each, Just eight hundred dollars each. Go to
giving grid dot com and search carridor Rescue and they'll
pop up, or you can just look for them on
my Twitter feed. Donate if you can your retweets will
(28:08):
also help greatly. I thank you and Rio, Falcon, Titan, Torino,
and Tundra. Also thank you to the number one story
on the Countdown. And since it is the weekend addition,
(28:30):
it's time for some James Thurber. The Catbird Seat combines
two of my all time favorite things, Thurber and baseball broadcasting.
As Thurber will reveal in the story, the title comes
from a catchphrase used by the Brooklyn Dodgers legendary announcer
Red Barber, the man who trained Vince Scully and is
my late friend Vin's only true competition for greatest baseball
(28:53):
play by play man of all time. I met Red
Barber once I interviewed him for CNN. He called me
Keith throughout the interview. I was so star struck. It's
pretty much all our member from the interview. Anyway. Bert
Lancaster bought the movie rights to this story and he
got Billy Wilder to commit to direct it. Well, how
(29:15):
come you've never heard of this perfect sounding film, The
Catbird Seat, directed by Billy Wilder. They sold the rights
and in nineteen sixty the film was made, but they
relocated it from Manhattan to Scotland. Starring Peter Sellers dressed
up as an old man as Mr Martin. It's okay
(29:37):
unless you've read the story or had it read to
you from the Thurber Carnival The Catbird Seat by James Thurber.
Mr Martin bought the pack of camels on Monday night
in the most crowded cigar store on Broadway. It was
theater time and seven or eight men were buying cigarettes.
(30:00):
The clerk didn't even glance at Mr Martin, who put
the pack in his overcoat pocket and went out. If
any of the staff at F and S had seen
him by the cigarettes, they would have been astonished, for
it was generally known that Mr Martin did not smoke,
and never had. No one saw him. It was just
(30:21):
a week to the day since Mr Martin had decided
to rub out Mrs Old Jean Barrows. The term rub
out pleased him because it suggested nothing more than the
correction of an error, in this case, an error of
Mr Fitzweiler. Mr Martin had spent each night of the
(30:42):
past week working out his plan and examining it as
he walked home. Now he went over it again for
the hundredth time. He resented the element of imprecision, the
margin of guesswork that entered into the business. The project,
as he had worked it out, was casual and bold.
The risks were considerable. Something might go wrong anywhere along
(31:06):
the line, and therein lay the cunning of his scheme.
No one would ever see in the cautious, painstaking hand
of Irwin Martin, head of the filing department at F
and S, of whom Mr Fittweiler had once said, man
is fellow little, but Martin isn't. No one would see
(31:26):
his hand, that is, unless he were caught in the act.
Sitting in his apartment drinking a glass of milk, Mr
Martin reviewed his case against Mrs Old Jean Barrows, as
he had every night for seven nights. He began at
the beginning. Her quacking voice and braying laugh at first
(31:50):
profaned the halls of F and S. On March seven,
Mr Martin had a head for dates Old Roberts, the
personnel chief, had introduced her as the newly appointed special
at isser to the President of the firm, Mr Fittweiler.
The woman had appalled Mr Martin instantly, but he had
(32:12):
not shown it. He had given her his dry hand
a look of studious concentration and a faint smile. Wow,
she said, looking at the papers on his desk. Are
you lifting the ox cart out of the ditch. As
Mr Martin recalled that moment over his milk, he squirmed slightly.
(32:32):
He must keep his mind on her crimes as a
special advisor, not on her peccadillos as a personality. This
he found difficult to do. In spite of entering an
objection and sustaining it. The faults of the woman as
a woman kept chattering on in his mind like an
unruly witness. She had for almost two years now baited
(32:53):
him in the halls, in the elevator, even in his
own office, into which she romped now and then like
a circus horse. She was constantly shouting these silly questions
at him. I left in the ox cart out of
the ditch. Are you tearing up the pea patch? Are
you hollering down the rain barrel? Are you scraping around
(33:15):
the bottom of the pickle barrel? Are you sitting in
the cat married seat. It was Joey Hart, one of
Mr Martin's two assistants, who had explained what the gibberish meant.
She must be a dodgeing fan. He had said, Red
Boba announces the dodging games over the radio, and he
(33:38):
uses these expressions picked them up down south. Joey had
gone on to explain one or two tearing up the
pea patch meant going on a rampage. Sitting in the
catbird seat meant sitting pretty like a batter with three
balls and no strikes on him. Mr Martin dismissed all
(33:58):
this with an effort. It had been annoying, it had
driven him near to distraction, but he was too solid
and to be moved to murder by anything so childish.
It was unfortunate, he reflected, as he passed on to
the important charges against Mrs Barrows, that he had stood
up under it so well. He had maintained always an
(34:22):
outward appearance of polite tolerance. Why I even believed you
liked the woman mispaired, his other assistant had once said
to him, he had simply smiled a gavil wrapped in
Mr Martin's mind, and the case proper was resumed. Mrs
all Jean Barrows stood charged with willful, blatant and persistent
(34:42):
attempts to destroy the efficiency and system of f and S.
It was confident material and relevant to review her advent
and rise to power. Mr Martin had got the story
from Miss Pair, who seemed always able to find things out.
According to her, Mrs Barrows had met Mr Fitweller at
(35:03):
a party where she had rescued him from the embraces
of a powerfully built, drunken man who had mistaken the
president of F and S for a famous retired middle
Western football coach. She had led him to a sofa
and somehow worked upon him a monstrous magic. The aging
(35:24):
gentleman had jumped to the conclusion there and then that
this was a woman of singular attainments, equipped to bring
out the best in him and in the firm. A
week later he had introduced her into F and S
as his special adviser. On that day, Confusion got its
(35:44):
foot in the door. After Miss Tyson, Mr Brundage and
Mr Bartlett had been fired and Mr Munson had taken
his hat and stalked out mailing. In his resignation letter,
Old Roberts had been emboldened to speak to Mr Fitweiler.
He mentioned that Mr Munson's department had become a little
disrupted and hadn't they perhaps better resume the old system there.
(36:09):
Mr Fitweller had said, certainly not. He had the greatest
faith in Mrs barrows ideas they he require a little seasoning.
Little seasoning is all, he had added. Mr Roberts had
given it up. Mr Martin reviewed in detail all the
changes wrought by Mrs Barrows. She had begun chipping at
the cornices of the firm's edifice, and now she was
(36:31):
swinging at the foundation stones with a pickaxe. Mr Martin
came now in his summing up to the afternoon of Monday,
November two, just one week ago. On that day, at
three pm, Mrs Barrows had bounced into his office boom,
She had yelled, are you scraping around the bottom of
(36:52):
the pickle barrel? Mr Martin had looked at her from
under his green eye shade, saying nothing. She had begun
to wander about the office, taking it in with her
great popping eyes. Do you really need all these filing cabinets,
she had demanded. Suddenly Mr Martin's heart had jumped each
(37:16):
of these files, he had said, keeping his voice even
plays an indispensable part in the system of f and s.
She had brayed at him while don't tear up the
pea patch and gone to the door. From there she
had bawled, but you share have got a lot of
fine scrap in here. Mr Martin could no longer doubt
(37:39):
that the finger was on his beloved department. Her pick
axe was on the upswing, poise for the first blow.
It had not come yet. He had received no blue
memo from the enchanted Mr Fitweller bearing nonsensical instructions deriving
from this obscene woman, But there was no doubt in
(38:00):
Mr Martin's mind that one would be forthcoming. He must actally.
Already a precious week had gone by. Mr Martin stood
up in his living room, still holding his milk glass.
Gentleman of the jury, he said to himself, I demand
the death penalty for this horrible person. The next day,
(38:27):
Mr Martin followed his routine as usual. He polished his
glasses more often and once sharpened and already sharp pencil,
but not even misspair noticed. Only once did he catch
sight of his victim. She swept past him in the
hall with a patronizing hi. At five thirty. He walked
home as usual and had a glass of milk as usual.
(38:47):
He had never drunk anything stronger in his life, unless
you could count ginger Ale. The late Sam Schlosser, the
s of F and S, had praised Mr Martin at
a staff meeting several years before for his temperate habits.
One of our most efficient workers. Neither drinks nor smokes,
he had said, The results speak for themselves. Mr Fittweler
(39:10):
had sat by, nodding approval. Mr Martin was still thinking
about that red letter day as he walked over to
the Shafts restaurant on Fifth Avenue near Street. He got there,
as he always did, at eight o'clock. He finished his
dinner and the financial page of the New York Sun
a quartered at the nine. As he always did, It
was his custom after dinner to take a walk. This
(39:32):
time he walked down Fifth Avenue at a casual place.
His gloved hands felt moist and warm, his forehead cold.
He transferred the camels from his overcoat to a jacket pocket.
He wondered as he did so, if they did not
represent an unnecessary note of strain. Mrs Barrows smoked only Lucky's.
(39:54):
It was his idea to puff a few puffs on
a camel after the rubbing out stub it out in
the ashtray, holding her lipstick, saying Lucky's Thus dragged a
small red herring across the trail. Perhaps it was not
a good idea. It would take time. He might even
choke too loudly. Mr Martin had never seen the house
(40:19):
on West twelfth Street where Mrs Barrows lived, but he
had a clear enough picture of it. Fortunately, she had
bragged to everybody about her ducky first floor apartment in
the perfectly darling three story red brick. There would be
no doorman or other attendants, just the tenants of the
second and third floors. As he walked along, Mr Martin
(40:39):
realized that he would get there before nine. He had
considered walking north on Fifth Avenue from Shrafts to a
point from which it would take him until ten o'clock
to reach the house. At that hour people were less
likely to be coming in or going out, But the
procedure would have made an awkward loop in the straight
thread of his casualness, and he had abandoned it. It
(41:02):
was impossible to figure when people would be entering or
leaving the house. Anyway, there was a great risk at
any hour if he ran into anybody. He would simply
have to place the rubbing out of Old Jean Barrows
in the inactive file forever. The same thing would hold
true if there was someone in her apartment. In that case,
he would just say that he had been passing by,
(41:23):
recognized her charming house, and thought to drop in. It
was eighteen minutes after nine when Mr Martin turned into
twelfth straight. A man passed him, and a man and
a woman talking. There was no one within fifty paces.
When he came to the house halfway down the block.
He was up the steps and in the small vestibule,
(41:44):
and no time pressing the bell under the card that
said Mrs Old Jean Barrows. When the clicking in the
lock started, he jumped forward against the door. He got
inside fast, closing the door behind him. A bulb in
a lantern hung from the hall ceiling on a chain
seemed to give a monstrously bright light. There was nobody
on the stair which went up ahead of him along
the left wall. A door opened down the hall on
the wall all on the right. He went toward it
(42:07):
swiftly on tiptoe. Well, for God's sakes, let who's here baled?
Mrs Barrows and her braying laugh rang out like the
report of a shotgun. He rushed past her like a
football tacker, bumping her. Hey quit shoving, she said, closing
the door behind them. They were in her living room,
(42:28):
which seemed to Mr Martin to be lighted by a
hundred lamps. What's after you? She said, You're as jumpy
as a goat. He found he was unable to speak.
His heart was wheezing in his throat. I yes, he
finally brought out. She was jabbering and laughing as she
(42:49):
started to help him off with his coat. No, no,
he said, I'll put it here. He took it off
and put it on a chair near the door. Your
hat and gloves too, She said, you're in a ladies house.
He put his hat on top of the oat. Mrs
Barrows seemed larger than he had thought. He kept his
(43:09):
gloves on. I was passing by, he said, I I recognized.
Is there anyone here? She laughed louder than ever, No,
she said, we're all alone. You're why is this sheet?
You funny man? Whatever has come over you? I'll mix
you a toddy. She started toward a door across the room.
(43:32):
Scotch and soda be all right, but say you don't drink,
do you? She turned and gave him her amused look.
Mr Martin pulled himself together. Scotch and soda will be
all right, he heard himself say. He could hear her
laughing in the kitchen. Mr Martin looked quickly around the
living room for the weapon he had counted on finding one.
(43:54):
There there were and irons, and a poker, and something
in a corner that looked like an Indian club. None
of them would do it, couldn't be that way. He
began pace around. He came to a desk. On it
lamb metal paper knife with an ornate handle. Would it
be sharp enough? He reached for it and knocked over
a small brash jar. Stamps spilled out of it and
(44:16):
fell onto the floor with a clatter. Hey, Mrs Barrows
yelled from the kitchen. Are you tearing up the pea patch?
Mr Martin gave a strange laugh. Picking up the knife,
he tried its point against his left wrist. It was blunt.
It wouldn't do. When Mrs Barrows reappeared carrying two highballs,
(44:40):
Mr Martin, standing there with his gloves on, became acutely
conscious of the fantasy. He had wrought cigarettes in his
pocket a drink prepared for him. It was all too
grossly improbable. It was more than that, it was impossible.
Somewhere in the back of his mind, a vague idea
(45:04):
stir sprouted. For Heaven's sake, take off those gloves, said
Mrs Barrows. I always wear them in the house, said
Mr Martin. The idea began to bloom, strange and wonderful.
She put the glasses on a coffee table in front
(45:24):
of a sofa and sat on the sofa. Come over here,
you odd little man, she said. Mr Martin went over
and sat beside her. It was difficult getting a cigarette
out of the pack of camels, but he managed it.
She held a match for him, Laughing well, she said,
handing him his drink. This is perfectly Mira, bless you
with a drink and a cigarette. Mr Martin puffed, not
(45:50):
too awkwardly, and took a gulp of the highball. I
drink and smoke all the time, he said. He clinked
his glass against hers. Here's nuts to that old windbag fitweiler,
he said, and gulped again. The stuff tasted awful, but
he made no grimace. Really, Mr Martin, she said, her
(46:11):
voice and posture changing. You are insulting our employer. Mrs
Barrows was now all Special Adviser to the President. I
am preparing a bomb, said Mr Martin, which will blow
the old goat higher than hell. He had only had
a little of the drink, which was not strong. It
(46:32):
couldn't be that. Do you take dope or something, Mrs
Barrows asked coldly. Heroin said Mr Martin. I'll be cooked
to the gills when I bumped that old buzzard off,
Mr Martin, she shouted, getting to her feet, that will
be all of that. You must go at once. Mr
(46:53):
Martin took another swallow of the drink. He tapped his
cigarette out in the ash tray and put the pack
of camels on the coffee table. Then he got up.
She stood glaring at him. He walked over and put
on his hat and coat. Not a word about this,
he said, and laid an index finger against his lips.
All Mrs Barrows could bring out was a really. Mr
(47:16):
Martin put his hand on the door knob. I'm sitting
in the catbirds seat, he said. He stuck his tongue
out at her and left. Nobody saw him go. Mr
Martin got to his apartment walking well before eleven. No
one saw him go in. He had two glasses of
(47:39):
milk after brushing his teeth, and he felt elated it
wasn't tipsy in his because he hadn't been tipsy anyway.
The walk had worn off all effects of the whiskey.
He got in bed and read a magazine for a while.
He was asleep before midnight. Mr Martin got to the
office at eight thirty the next morning as usual. At
(47:59):
a quarter to nine, Old Jean Barrows, who had never
before arrived at work before ten, swept into his office.
I am departing to Mr Fittweiler now, she shouted. If
he turns you over to the police, it's no more
than you deserve. Mr Martin gave her a look of
shocked surprise. I beg your pardon, he said. Mrs Barrows
(48:20):
snorted and bounced out of the room, leaving Miss Pared
and Joey Harton staring after her. What's the matter with that,
Old Daniel now, asked Miss Pared. I have no idea,
said mister Martin, resuming his work. The other two looked
at him, and then at each other. Miss peared got
up and went out. She walked slowly past the closed
door of mister Fitweiler's office. Mrs Barrows was yelling inside,
(48:44):
but she was not braining. Miss Pared could not hear
what the woman was saying. She went back to her desk.
Forty five minutes later, missus Barrows left the President's office
and went into her own, shutting the door. It wasn't
until half an hour later that mister Fitweiler sent for
Mr Martin, the head of the filing department. Neat quiet, attentive,
(49:04):
stood in front of the old man's desk. Mr Fittweiler
was pale and nervous. He took his glasses off and
twiddled them. He made a small roughing sound in his throat. Martin,
He said, you have been with us more than twenty years.
Twenty two, sir, said Mr Martin in that time pursued
(49:27):
the President. Your work and your manner have been exemplary.
I trust so, Sir, said Mr Martin. I have understood, Martin,
said Mr Fittweler, that you have never taken a drink
or smoked. That is correct, Sir, said Mr Martin. Ah, yes.
(49:48):
Mr Fittweiler polished his glasses you may describe what you
did after leaving the office yesterday, Martin, he said, certainly, sir,
he said, I walked home. Then I went to Shrafts
for dinner. Afterward, I walked home again. I went to
bed early, sir, and read a magazine for a while.
I was asleep before eleven. Ah. Yes, said Mr Fittweiler again.
(50:14):
He was silent for a moment, searching for the proper
words to say to the head of the filing department,
Mrs Barrows. He said, finally, Mrs Barrows has worked hard, Martin,
very hard. It ringused me to report that she has
suffered a severe breakdown. It has taken the form of
a persecution complex accompanied by distressing hallucinations. I'm very sorry, sir,
(50:41):
said Mr Martin. Mrs Barrows is under the delusion, continued
Mr Fittweiler, that you visited her last evening and behaved
yourself in an unseemly matter. He raised his hand to
silence Mr Martin's little, pained outcry. It is the nature
of these psychological diseases, Mr Fittweiler said, to fit upon
(51:05):
the least likely and most innocent party as the source
of persecution. These matters are not for the lay mind
to grasp. Martin. I've just had my psychiatrist, Dr Fitch
on the phone. UH. He would not, of course commit himself,
but he made enough generalizations to substantiate my suspicions. I
(51:26):
suggested to Mrs Barrows, when she had completed her UH
story to me this morning, that she visit Dr Fitch
for I suspected a condition to watch seen. She flew,
I regret to say, into a rage and demanded requested
that I call you on the carpet. You may not know, Martin,
(51:49):
but Mrs Barrows had planned a reorganization of your department,
subject to my approval. Of course, subject to my approval.
This brought you, rather than anyone else to her mind.
But again that is a phenomenon for Dr Fitch and
not for us. So Martin, I'm afraid Mrs Barrow's usefulness
(52:09):
here is at an end. I'm dreadfully sorry, sir, said
Mr Martin. It was at this point that the door
to the office blew open with the suddenness of a
gas main explosion, and Mrs Barrows catapulted through. It is
the little rat denying it, she screamed. He can't get
(52:29):
away with that, Mr Martin got up and moved discreetly
to a point beside Mr Fittweiler's chair. You drank and
smoked at my apartment, she bawled at Mr Martin, And
you know it. You called Mr Fittweiler an old wind
bag and said you were gonna blow them up when
you got coked to your gills on your heroine. She
(52:50):
stopped yelling to catch her breath, and a new glint
came into her popping eyes. If you weren't set to drab, ordinary,
little man, she said, I'd think you'd planned it all,
sticking your tongue out, saying you were sitting in a
cat buried seat because you thought no one would believe
me when I told it. My god, it's really too perfect.
(53:14):
She brayed loudly and hysterically, and the fury was on
her again. She glared at Mr Fittweiler. Can't you see
how he has checked as you, old fool? Can't you
see his little game? But Mr Fittweiler had been surreptitiously
pressing all the buttons under the top of his desk,
and employees of F and S began pouring into the room.
(53:35):
Stockton said, Mrs Pittweiler, you and Fishbone will take Mrs
Barrows to her home. Mrs Powell, you will go with them. Stockton,
who had played a little football in high school, blocked
Mrs Barrows as she made for Mr Martin. It took
him in fish Mine together to force her out of
the door into the hall crowded with stenographers and office boys.
(53:56):
She was still screaming imprecations at Mr Martin, tangled and
contradictory imprecations. The hubbub finally died out down the corridor.
I regret that this has happened, said Mr Fittweiler. I
shall ask you to dismiss it from your mind. Martin. Yes, sir,
(54:17):
said Mr Martin, anticipating his chiefs. That will be all.
By moving to the door, I will dismiss it. He
went out and shut the door, and his step was
light and quick in the hall. When he entered his department,
he had slowed down to his customary gate, and he
(54:37):
walked quietly across the room to the double New twenty file,
wearing a look of studious concentration. From the Thurber conable
The Catbird Seat by James Thurber, Countdown has come to
(55:09):
you from the studios of Alderman Broadcasting Empire World headquarters
in the Sports Capsule Building in New York. Thank you
for listening. Here are the credits. Most of the music,
including our theme from Beethoven's Ninth arranged, produced performed by
Brian Ray and John Philip Channel the countdown musical directors Guitars,
bass and drums by Brian Ray, All orchestration and keyboards
(55:31):
by John Philip Chanelle produced by t Ko Brothers. Other
Beethoven selections have been arranged and performed by the group
No Horns Allowed. The sports music is the Alderman theme
from ESPN two. It was written by Mitch Warren Davis
and it appears courtesy of ESPN musical comments by Nancy Faust.
The best baseball stadium organist ever. Our announcer today was
(55:52):
Stevie Van's Aunt, and I thank him. As always. Everything
else was pretty much my fault. So let's countdown for this,
the seven seventy third day since Donald Trump's first attempted
coup against the democratically elected government of the United States.
Arrest him now while we still can. The next schedule
countdown with the holiday coming is Tuesday until then I'm
Keith Alderman. Good morning, good afternoon, goodnight, and good luck.
(56:25):
Countdown with Keith all Reman is a production of I
heart Radio. For more podcasts from I heart Radio, visit
the i heart Radio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you
get your podcasts.
Countdown with Keith Olderman is a production of I Heart Radio.
This is a news and political podcast, and there is
(00:25):
much to discuss in both areas, from the extraordinarily slow
drip drip drip of the Trump Georgia grand jury, to
whether or not Nicki Haley could pass her own presidential
mental competency tests, to whether or not anybody can stop
the Killer Windows of Russia, and all that is coming up.
But Tim McCarver died yesterday, and I am heartbroken, and
(00:50):
I will make no apologies for devoting this first segment
to him. When I was twenty four years old and
working as a sports correspondent for CNN in New York,
I reluctantly admitted to myself that my affection for baseball
was ailing. I had seen my childhood team, the Yankees,
rise from the Ashes to win two World Series, and
(01:12):
I was in the stands in Boston as they completed
the greatest mid season come back in the game's history.
But the Yankees perpetual churn had exhausted me, and five
seasons of having to go to baseball games as a
professional rather than just wanting to go to them as
a fan had left me board and one night after
(01:33):
work in April or May of three, I was sitting
in my little apartment in New York, finding nothing to watch,
even on the cable system offering the world's widest assortment
of channels, fifty of them, and I somehow landed back
on the New York station, Channel nine, where as the
hapless New York Mets were cavorting on my screen. Two men,
(01:56):
we're laughing uncontrollably. I mean, I came in from channel
eight or channel ten, and the first thing I saw
was the ballgame at Chase Stadium. And the first thing
I heard was these two guys laughing. No words, no explanation,
no self control, just laughing. Well that was different. I
(02:19):
had never in my life been a fan of the
New York Mets. I grew up Yankee, and even as
that had begun to wane, I was not going to
become a Mets fan. I didn't hate them. At age ten,
I was overjoyed when my dad was able to get
us two tickets to a Mets nineteen sixty nine World
Series game. And I had seen the Mets on TV
(02:39):
hundreds of times before, but never to watch them, And
yet there I was having voluntarily stayed in wrapped attention
to a Mets telecast for twenty or thirty seconds now
as these two guys laughed their heads off. Eventually they
settled down, and Ralph Kiner, in his twenty second season
(03:02):
as a Mets announcer, said something to Tim mc carver
in like his twenty second day as a Mets announcer,
about how neither of them should ever try to say
that again. Just then the inning ended, McCarver said, the
Mets are retired in the third and management may very
well retire Ralph and me during the commercial We'll be
(03:22):
right back or not. Well, now I had to watch
by the next inning. By the time Tim McCarver, whom
the Mets had hired away from the Philadelphia Phillies the
previous winter, had explained the name that he and Ralph
Kiner so butchered that they dissolved into laughter. I was
a Tim McCarver fan. The Mets were awful that year,
(03:48):
promising but still the second worst team in baseball. They
had not finished last or next to last in seven years,
and laughing during their broadcast for any reason was better
than paying attention to their games. And yet it quickly
dawned on me that I was only laughing along with
McCarver and Kinner, but also I was paying attention to
(04:10):
the game. It was as if I were sitting with
these two guys in the stands somewhere, and we were
enjoying what we could of the three Mets, with McCarver
in particular pointing out something subtle on the field that
I would have otherwise missed. And in a much larger sense,
we McCarver, Kinder, and the viewer. We were sitting there
(04:32):
enjoying the fact of baseball. The individual game always mattered
to Tim McCarver. But where it fit into the jigsaw
puzzle of that season's games, or into the vaster jigsaw
puzzle of all the games he'd ever seen, all the
games there had ever been, that was far more important.
(04:53):
Well before the week was out, I was a Met
fan because of Tim McCarver, and my dying baseball fandom
had been resuscitated because of Tim McCarver. As of three
very few baseball broadcasts, in fact, very few sportscasts we're
interesting to watch as television programs. Tony Kubec had done
(05:16):
the baseball game of the Week and was crisp and informative,
and he enjoyed himself, and he taught me and other
kids and adults what to look for. But Vince Scully
had only returned to the national baseball stage that same year,
and Bob Costas had only become the backup on NBC's
Game of the Week the year before. Baseball television was,
(05:39):
if not a desert, a really arid place. Tim McCarver
was never arid. He was happy to criticize any player
or any manager at any time for strategical or logistical malfeasance.
But he was also happy to underline whenever he was
wrong and they were right. You can't shade the defense
(06:03):
that way and throw him a fastball in that situation,
he'll put it over the fence. If seconds after that
the batter hit not a home run but a soft
liner to the shortstop whose location McCarver had just criticized,
Tim's self flagellation would be short and exact, or maybe
you can I'll try to stop managing from up here now. Usually,
(06:26):
of course, he was exactly right. About fifteen years ago,
he kind of fell out of favor with some fans
and some critics because the freshness of his approach as
of three tell the viewer not just what happened, but
what's going to happen next, and what's going to happen
after that, and what's gonna happen after that. That had
been imitated by every baseball analyst, and indeed by every
(06:48):
TV sports analyst, and by a lot of sportscasters in studios,
and a lot of the imitators were younger and smoother
and with a less pronounced accent, and as is inevitable,
with time, they had become faster. Lost in that is
that they all were and are Tim McCarver imitators. McCarver
(07:14):
rose quickly in Baseball TV. He went right from the
Philadelphia Phillies active roster and he was a great catcher
to announcing for the Phillies and occasionally for NBC in
nineteen eighty, then to the Mets in nineteen eighty three,
as I mentioned, and ABC Sports in nineteen eighty four,
and his first of twenty three World Series in ninety five.
When CBS got baseball in nineteen ninety they hired him.
(07:36):
I was at the CBS station in Los Angeles and
got to interview him. I predicted that the underdog Cincinnati
Reds would win the World Series in nineteen ninety and
maybe even sweep and McCarver said, I think that way too.
I was afraid to say it. I thought I was
the only one. When CBS lost baseball in nineteen ninety four,
ABC re hired him. When Fox got baseball in nineteen
(07:57):
ninety six, they hired him away. And all that time
he was also doing full seasons in New York with
the Mets, And when the Mets hesitated to bring him back,
the Yankees grabbed him in and he was their lead announcer,
play by play man and a good one for three seasons.
I had met Tim McCarver when he was going from
player to announcer. At the nineteen eighty World Series. I
(08:20):
was startled to see him on the field at Veteran
Stadium in Philadelphia carrying the latest volume of Martin Gilbert's
series of biographies of Winston Churchill. I introduced myself and
I said I had just finished that book and hoped
he enjoyed it as much as I had. He asked
me how I thought it compared to Churchill's dozens of
(08:42):
volumes of his own autobiography. Well, I said, there are
fewer of them. McCarver laughed loudly. Good, this is heavy
enough on the plane, he said, And when in three
I became a mcarver fan and got to tell him, so,
he immediately asked me if there were things he could
improve on. Well, I gave him some technical voice tips
(09:04):
and told him not to worry too much about them,
that he was really pretty good at it as it was.
And I said, I suppose this had begun when he
was with the nineteen six St. Louis Cardinals. They had
thirty five players on the team that year, twenty five
of them making the roster for most of the season. Eventually,
of those thirty five, McCarver became a broadcaster, and his
(09:24):
teammates Bill White and Lou Brock became broadcasters, and Kurt
Flood and Mike Shannon and Bob Yucker and Bob Gibson
and Nelson Briles, and they would all become baseball announcers,
and then their teammate Dick Grot would become a basketball announcer,
and their teammate Bob Perkey would become a local sportscaster
in Pittsburgh. That's ten out of thirty five. McCarver said
(09:47):
on the team bus, it was a life and death
struggle to be heard. I got to work again with
Tim McCarver on a regular basis at Fox in two thousand.
I was the host of Fox's pregame show for the
Game of the Week that Tim did with Joe every Saturday,
and also the pregame show hosted our coverage of the
(10:09):
playoffs in the World Series. Mid season, I would appear
in their broadcast from the studio doing highlights of other games,
and then in October I would literally be in one
of the team dugouts. I am proud to say that
in the former role, I once managed to reduce Tim
McCarver to silence. On June two thousand, Tim and Joe
(10:31):
Buck were doing the Game of the Week from Dodger
Stadium in Los Angeles, and I was, as usual in
the l A studio doing the highlights for them, watching
all the games simultaneously on an array of television's stacked
one atop the other. In the fourth inning at Yankee Stadium,
the Yankee second baseman Chuck Nablock, whose defensive play had
(10:52):
been deteriorating for more than a year, charged a softly
hit ground ball and tried to throw it back behind
him to first base. He not only did not come
close to first base, but the throw, in fact, bounced
all the top of the Yankees dugout and hit a
fan in the stands. Now, I knew Yankee Stadium intimately.
(11:12):
I had more or less grown up there, and I
knew if the ball had not hit somebody in the
season ticket seats that my family had had there since nine,
it had come close. Probably hit my mother, I said
to the stage crew. Everybody laughed, and then the Yankees
broadcast cut to a shot of the afflicted fan holding
her head and being attended to buy stadium staff. It
(11:35):
was my mother. Nobody laughed. So moments later, after I
had gotten her on the phone, when Buck and McCarver
threw to me for a Fox game break, I narrated
that exact highlight, and I said that Chuck now blocks
throwing problems had now gotten personal, that he had now
hit my mother. We showed her her glasses are broken,
(11:56):
Joe and Tim, and she's going home. But I've just
spoken to her. She's okay, Joe, Tim, there was silence.
I mean a lot of silence. Finally, Tim McCarver said,
what huh is that? I'm speechless? Is that one of
Keith's jokes? Keith, are you still there? Was that? Really?
(12:17):
Your mother? I'm here? Tim? My? My goodness? She? What
did the odds? Tim? She's been going to Yankee games
since nineteen thirty four and nothing bad has ever happened
to her before today? I'd say the odds are pretty good?
But did she? She's fine. She'll be back in that
same seat tomorrow. She's a gamer, won't She asked me
to tell you she likes you better now that you're
worth the Yankees and not the Mets. After that, I
(12:39):
never saw Tim McCarver without him asking how my mother was.
In fact, he called me after his game ended that
day to make sure. After my mother passed away, Tim
would say he had been thinking of her. Nobody I
know who knew Tim McCarver personally could recall a difficult
experience with him. He was a sweet man who enjoyed himself,
(13:02):
enjoyed baseball, enjoy broadcasting, enjoyed talking, enjoyed listening, enjoyed meeting you,
enjoyed singing, he put out a jazz album, and he
saved my love for baseball when it nearly died, literally
forty years ago. And one last thing, Tim McCarver said
(13:23):
something once on a baseball broadcast that is, to my mind,
the greatest piece of predictive analysis I have ever heard
in any sport, possibly in any realm, in television, politics, news,
the weather, but definitely sports. And it wasn't just that
(13:44):
he pointed out what everybody else in the stadium had
seemingly missed, including a manager who had just led his
team to three consecutive World Series championships. It was when
he said it. This was in the bottom of the
ninth inning of the seventh game of the World Series,
in literally the last seconds the most emotional two months
(14:06):
of the most emotional baseball season ever. This was on
November fourth, two thousand and one. As in a horror
film or a disaster movie, there was just enough time
for one person, and one person alone, to see that
the monster was not dead, or that the damn would
(14:27):
not hold. And in this case that person was Tim McCarver.
And this audio from the Fox broadcast of that World
Series game. It's not slick. It doesn't sound scripted. There
are no catch phrases. It isn't hip, it isn't full
of metrics. It merely predicts the exact outcome to the
(14:48):
inch of the play that would decide and end the
entire baseball season. Seconds afterwards, that chance of a lifetime
for Luis Gonzalez to t bottom of the knife. Game
seven of the World Series basses loaded infield in one out,
(15:11):
strong wader. The one problem is Libera throws inside the
left handers, and left handers get a lot of broken,
bad hits in the shallow outfield, the shallow part of
the outfield. That's the danger in bringing the infield in
(15:32):
with a guy like Ribera on the mountain Florida Center
Traild the Diamondbacks part World sampparents Louis Gonzalez's hit landed
(15:57):
exactly where Tim McCarver had said the Yankees should have
had their infielders playing but didn't. When I saw Tim
the next season, I said this to him, and I
said this about him to every TV writer who asked that.
That was the Bill Mazeroski World Series winning home run
of all baseball analysis ever, and so in the last
(16:22):
twenty years, Whenever it was my privilege to see Tim
McCarver at a ballpark, he would always say two things
to me, as if he were saying them to me
for the first time. He would say, thank you, Keith
for what you said about two thousand one, And Keith,
I was just thinking of your dear mother, as so
(16:45):
many of us will now be just thinking of our
dear friend and colleague, Tim McCarver. This is countdown with
Keith over me. Pos scripts to the news, some headlines,
(17:06):
some updates, some snarks, some predictions. State Line twelve eleven
sixth Avenue, New York City. When Jackie Heinrich of Fox
News tweeted on November twelve, two twenty, that quote there
is no evidence that any voting system deleted or lost votes,
or was in any way compromised, Foxes Tucker Carlson texted
(17:26):
his pal Sean Hannity quote, please get her fired, seriously,
What the blank. I'm actually shocked. It needs to stop immediately.
It's measurably hurting the company. The stock prices down. The
message got to Fox's PR person, the eternally loathsome Arena
Briguante and Fox News CEO Suzanne Scott, nominally in charge
(17:52):
of news at Fox News. Scott sent Briguanty a text
about the reporter who had actually reported the truth. Quote,
she has serious nerve doing this and if this gets
picked up, viewers are going to be They're disgusted. This
is the head of news at Fox News deliberately undermining
the news all. This part of a one ninety two
(18:14):
page document filed a month ago by Dominion Voting Systems
and its suit against Fox News, revealed yesterday. It is
full of internal Fox texts and memos. The story gets
as far as Rupert Murdoch, who got up out of
his crypt and emailed Suzanne Scott about the real issue
here that News Max was taking away Fox News as audience.
(18:37):
They quote should be watched if skeptically, Trump will concede
eventually on what you should concentrate on. Joja helping anyway
we can. Rupe, of course, meant that Georgia's Senate runoff,
which they lost. We don't want to antagonoliged chump Feather,
but Giuliani taken with a large grain of salt, everything
at steak care. Should he never use the words steak
(19:02):
like you know, draculum The real problem for Fox. Maybe
Carlson's text to somebody named Piffer on January that Trump
is quote a demonic force, a destroyer. Twenty days later,
Carlson added, what Trump's good at his destroying things. He's
the world champion of that. He could easily destroy us
(19:23):
if we play it wrong. There is so much in
the page document about the canceling of an entire Janine
Pierro show after it was recorded, Texts in which Sean
Hannity says Rudy Giuliani is acting like an insane person,
and Laura Ingram calls him sanchin anniant and to lou Dobbs,
(19:43):
producers refer to Giuliani's insanity lately and how he is
so full of blank. There's so much in here they
should make it into a Netflix series, and the title
of the Netflix series should be morons never write anything down.
(20:23):
Thank you, Nancy Faust, Dateline, Atlanta. Man. At this rate,
we're going to find out whether they're indicting Trump sometime
in the year forty seven sixty six. A judge has
now released another part of the special Grand Jury investigation
into Trump's attempt to overthrow democracy and alter the outcome
of presidential vote in Georgia. And among the endless dribs
(20:44):
and drabs, this drib says the jurors at the grand
jury believe one or more of the witnesses they heard
committed perjury. That is, out of seventy five witnesses, So
we can have no idea who the one or ones
might have been. Rudy Rudy Dateline, Washington. Senator On Fetterman
(21:05):
of Pennsylvania not only had the guts to check himself
into Walter Reid because he did not feel right, but
he had the guts to issue a statement indicating was
because he was suffering from acute depression. Not only do
doctors expect a quick recovery, but lord knows how many
people who are afraid or ashamed of that diagnosis just
got the courage to seek help because of what Senator
Fetterman did at date Line, New York the Central Park
(21:28):
Zoo here in New York. I know I flackoed you
to death. But two weeks into his freedom, the escaped
eagle owl has proved he can survive on his own.
He loves Central Park and is exploring it. He feeds
himself by eating rats and he seems to have learned
to perch only where people can see him and photograph
him easily, So naturally, the zoo is rumored to have
(21:51):
set a honey trap to try to recapture him after
two weeks. Put a female eagle owl, or possibly just
a recording of a female eagle owl. It's hard to
be sure in the dark, right because in a trap
to snare him, why he's functioning beautifully. He still lives
in the neighborhood. What's the greater risk that Flacco might
(22:13):
eat a rat that just ate rat poison, or that
he has to live another fifty years in a small
room and dateline St. Petersburg, Russia, the head of the
Financial Support Department of the Russian Defense Ministry there is dead.
Fifty eight year old Marina Yankina fell out of a window,
and she, of course is the first prominent Russian government
(22:36):
official or military official to die in that fashion. In
nearly eight weeks ahead Fridays with Thurber and fittingly with
the passing him a great baseball broadcaster, I'll read you
Thurber's story, which starts with the words of another great
baseball broadcaster first time for the daily Roundup of the miscreants, morons,
(22:59):
and Dunning Kruger effect specimens who constitute today's whereas persons
in the world the bronze. Nicki Haley I forgot something yesterday.
In my screed about her presidential candidacy announcement, she says
she would advocate for a mental competency test for any
presidential candidate over the age of seventy five. Why over
(23:20):
seventy five? Why not over fifty? I mean, you think
Trump only went crazy on his seventy six birthday and
he wasn't crazy at fifty one. You know why she
doesn't want to make the test mandatory at fifty, right,
because she's fifty one. Last July, Nicki Haley tweeted out
a meme that looked like a register receipt. It read
(23:41):
Joe Biden's inconvenience store, and it showed price increases for
a hot dog fifteen point six percent, Annesota and condiments
eleven point nine percent, ice cream nine point six percent,
and bread eight point seven percent, and watermelon eight point
two percent, and then at the bottom it listed the
total sixty seven point two percent, which is not the
(24:02):
way percentages work. And why would Nicki Haley know that
just because her degree from Clemson is in accounting. Why
if I can go from two to four in each
state poll by the end of the day, I'll be
at a hundred percent in the polls for the whole country,
(24:22):
will not not the runner up? Culter Geist and Coulter
went on a podcast this weekend called Nicki Haley a bimbo,
made fun of India's reverence for cows and insisted Haley
should well. The quote was, why don't you go back
to your own country? Unquote? Nicki Haley was born in Bamburg,
(24:45):
South Carolina. As I have said ever since I first
heard Coulter claimed that she graduated from Cornell with a
history degree. I'm gonna need to see the actual diploma
because even us Cornell agg guys know how to use
the Google knitwit. But the winner, Marco get, a choreographer
(25:05):
from Germany. He says that the critic Vibka Hooster wrote
yet another personal attack on him, disguised in the form
of a review, so he responded as all thoughtful artists would.
He went up to miss Hooster at Hanover's Opera House
last Saturday and smeared dog feces all over her face.
(25:26):
She screamed, she got the cops. He apologized profusely, and
then the hanover State Ballet said it could only do
one thing under those circumstances, keep presenting his marvelous ballet works.
Feces be damned chastened by his good fortune. Geky then
said he was wrong to smear dog feces all over
the critics face, but he added that coverage of this
(25:48):
story was all wrong and should not be focused on
him smearing faces on her face, but on how wrong
she was as a reviewer. I'm still not free of
this anger, get added, since she had only written two
positive pieces about his work. Ever, he then said, if
(26:08):
I'd been a woman and the critical man, this would
be seen differently. Unquote now no, actually, And I say
this as a guy who for six years had a
TV critic in Los Angeles right hit pieces on me
and later it turned out he was taking bribes from
a rival TV station. I say it is that guy.
If Mr Giky, you were a real man, you would
(26:31):
not have smeared dog feces on a critic space. And
by the way, Marco who brings dog feces to the ballet.
Geker today's worse parson with dog feces. Thet least it
was his own dog. In the words Still Ahead on
(27:06):
Countdown Fridays with Thurber and in memory of my late
friend Tim McCarver, What better than the story that hinges
on the words of another immortal baseball broadcaster, Red Barber
The catbird seat First. In each edition of Countdown, we
feature a dog in need you can help. Every dog
has its day, and we'll go to outside Houston in
(27:26):
Spring Texas and Rio Falcon, Titan, Torino, and Tundra. Five
beautiful brown and brindle two month old stray pups who
have been filled by the dreaded word Parvo. Corridor Rescue
of Spring Texas has them. They are in the e
R at the local animal hospital. Parva virus is a
(27:47):
nightmarish scourge of young dogs. Two of the pups are
doing well, the other three are touch and go. Costs
to try to save them all a little over eight
hundred dollars each, Just eight hundred dollars each. Go to
giving grid dot com and search carridor Rescue and they'll
pop up, or you can just look for them on
my Twitter feed. Donate if you can your retweets will
(28:08):
also help greatly. I thank you and Rio, Falcon, Titan, Torino,
and Tundra. Also thank you to the number one story
on the Countdown. And since it is the weekend addition,
(28:30):
it's time for some James Thurber. The Catbird Seat combines
two of my all time favorite things, Thurber and baseball broadcasting.
As Thurber will reveal in the story, the title comes
from a catchphrase used by the Brooklyn Dodgers legendary announcer
Red Barber, the man who trained Vince Scully and is
my late friend Vin's only true competition for greatest baseball
(28:53):
play by play man of all time. I met Red
Barber once I interviewed him for CNN. He called me
Keith throughout the interview. I was so star struck. It's
pretty much all our member from the interview. Anyway. Bert
Lancaster bought the movie rights to this story and he
got Billy Wilder to commit to direct it. Well, how
(29:15):
come you've never heard of this perfect sounding film, The
Catbird Seat, directed by Billy Wilder. They sold the rights
and in nineteen sixty the film was made, but they
relocated it from Manhattan to Scotland. Starring Peter Sellers dressed
up as an old man as Mr Martin. It's okay
(29:37):
unless you've read the story or had it read to
you from the Thurber Carnival The Catbird Seat by James Thurber.
Mr Martin bought the pack of camels on Monday night
in the most crowded cigar store on Broadway. It was
theater time and seven or eight men were buying cigarettes.
(30:00):
The clerk didn't even glance at Mr Martin, who put
the pack in his overcoat pocket and went out. If
any of the staff at F and S had seen
him by the cigarettes, they would have been astonished, for
it was generally known that Mr Martin did not smoke,
and never had. No one saw him. It was just
(30:21):
a week to the day since Mr Martin had decided
to rub out Mrs Old Jean Barrows. The term rub
out pleased him because it suggested nothing more than the
correction of an error, in this case, an error of
Mr Fitzweiler. Mr Martin had spent each night of the
(30:42):
past week working out his plan and examining it as
he walked home. Now he went over it again for
the hundredth time. He resented the element of imprecision, the
margin of guesswork that entered into the business. The project,
as he had worked it out, was casual and bold.
The risks were considerable. Something might go wrong anywhere along
(31:06):
the line, and therein lay the cunning of his scheme.
No one would ever see in the cautious, painstaking hand
of Irwin Martin, head of the filing department at F
and S, of whom Mr Fittweiler had once said, man
is fellow little, but Martin isn't. No one would see
(31:26):
his hand, that is, unless he were caught in the act.
Sitting in his apartment drinking a glass of milk, Mr
Martin reviewed his case against Mrs Old Jean Barrows, as
he had every night for seven nights. He began at
the beginning. Her quacking voice and braying laugh at first
(31:50):
profaned the halls of F and S. On March seven,
Mr Martin had a head for dates Old Roberts, the
personnel chief, had introduced her as the newly appointed special
at isser to the President of the firm, Mr Fittweiler.
The woman had appalled Mr Martin instantly, but he had
(32:12):
not shown it. He had given her his dry hand
a look of studious concentration and a faint smile. Wow,
she said, looking at the papers on his desk. Are
you lifting the ox cart out of the ditch. As
Mr Martin recalled that moment over his milk, he squirmed slightly.
(32:32):
He must keep his mind on her crimes as a
special advisor, not on her peccadillos as a personality. This
he found difficult to do. In spite of entering an
objection and sustaining it. The faults of the woman as
a woman kept chattering on in his mind like an
unruly witness. She had for almost two years now baited
(32:53):
him in the halls, in the elevator, even in his
own office, into which she romped now and then like
a circus horse. She was constantly shouting these silly questions
at him. I left in the ox cart out of
the ditch. Are you tearing up the pea patch? Are
you hollering down the rain barrel? Are you scraping around
(33:15):
the bottom of the pickle barrel? Are you sitting in
the cat married seat. It was Joey Hart, one of
Mr Martin's two assistants, who had explained what the gibberish meant.
She must be a dodgeing fan. He had said, Red
Boba announces the dodging games over the radio, and he
(33:38):
uses these expressions picked them up down south. Joey had
gone on to explain one or two tearing up the
pea patch meant going on a rampage. Sitting in the
catbird seat meant sitting pretty like a batter with three
balls and no strikes on him. Mr Martin dismissed all
(33:58):
this with an effort. It had been annoying, it had
driven him near to distraction, but he was too solid
and to be moved to murder by anything so childish.
It was unfortunate, he reflected, as he passed on to
the important charges against Mrs Barrows, that he had stood
up under it so well. He had maintained always an
(34:22):
outward appearance of polite tolerance. Why I even believed you
liked the woman mispaired, his other assistant had once said
to him, he had simply smiled a gavil wrapped in
Mr Martin's mind, and the case proper was resumed. Mrs
all Jean Barrows stood charged with willful, blatant and persistent
(34:42):
attempts to destroy the efficiency and system of f and S.
It was confident material and relevant to review her advent
and rise to power. Mr Martin had got the story
from Miss Pair, who seemed always able to find things out.
According to her, Mrs Barrows had met Mr Fitweller at
(35:03):
a party where she had rescued him from the embraces
of a powerfully built, drunken man who had mistaken the
president of F and S for a famous retired middle
Western football coach. She had led him to a sofa
and somehow worked upon him a monstrous magic. The aging
(35:24):
gentleman had jumped to the conclusion there and then that
this was a woman of singular attainments, equipped to bring
out the best in him and in the firm. A
week later he had introduced her into F and S
as his special adviser. On that day, Confusion got its
(35:44):
foot in the door. After Miss Tyson, Mr Brundage and
Mr Bartlett had been fired and Mr Munson had taken
his hat and stalked out mailing. In his resignation letter,
Old Roberts had been emboldened to speak to Mr Fitweiler.
He mentioned that Mr Munson's department had become a little
disrupted and hadn't they perhaps better resume the old system there.
(36:09):
Mr Fitweller had said, certainly not. He had the greatest
faith in Mrs barrows ideas they he require a little seasoning.
Little seasoning is all, he had added. Mr Roberts had
given it up. Mr Martin reviewed in detail all the
changes wrought by Mrs Barrows. She had begun chipping at
the cornices of the firm's edifice, and now she was
(36:31):
swinging at the foundation stones with a pickaxe. Mr Martin
came now in his summing up to the afternoon of Monday,
November two, just one week ago. On that day, at
three pm, Mrs Barrows had bounced into his office boom,
She had yelled, are you scraping around the bottom of
(36:52):
the pickle barrel? Mr Martin had looked at her from
under his green eye shade, saying nothing. She had begun
to wander about the office, taking it in with her
great popping eyes. Do you really need all these filing cabinets,
she had demanded. Suddenly Mr Martin's heart had jumped each
(37:16):
of these files, he had said, keeping his voice even
plays an indispensable part in the system of f and s.
She had brayed at him while don't tear up the
pea patch and gone to the door. From there she
had bawled, but you share have got a lot of
fine scrap in here. Mr Martin could no longer doubt
(37:39):
that the finger was on his beloved department. Her pick
axe was on the upswing, poise for the first blow.
It had not come yet. He had received no blue
memo from the enchanted Mr Fitweller bearing nonsensical instructions deriving
from this obscene woman, But there was no doubt in
(38:00):
Mr Martin's mind that one would be forthcoming. He must actally.
Already a precious week had gone by. Mr Martin stood
up in his living room, still holding his milk glass.
Gentleman of the jury, he said to himself, I demand
the death penalty for this horrible person. The next day,
(38:27):
Mr Martin followed his routine as usual. He polished his
glasses more often and once sharpened and already sharp pencil,
but not even misspair noticed. Only once did he catch
sight of his victim. She swept past him in the
hall with a patronizing hi. At five thirty. He walked
home as usual and had a glass of milk as usual.
(38:47):
He had never drunk anything stronger in his life, unless
you could count ginger Ale. The late Sam Schlosser, the
s of F and S, had praised Mr Martin at
a staff meeting several years before for his temperate habits.
One of our most efficient workers. Neither drinks nor smokes,
he had said, The results speak for themselves. Mr Fittweler
(39:10):
had sat by, nodding approval. Mr Martin was still thinking
about that red letter day as he walked over to
the Shafts restaurant on Fifth Avenue near Street. He got there,
as he always did, at eight o'clock. He finished his
dinner and the financial page of the New York Sun
a quartered at the nine. As he always did, It
was his custom after dinner to take a walk. This
(39:32):
time he walked down Fifth Avenue at a casual place.
His gloved hands felt moist and warm, his forehead cold.
He transferred the camels from his overcoat to a jacket pocket.
He wondered as he did so, if they did not
represent an unnecessary note of strain. Mrs Barrows smoked only Lucky's.
(39:54):
It was his idea to puff a few puffs on
a camel after the rubbing out stub it out in
the ashtray, holding her lipstick, saying Lucky's Thus dragged a
small red herring across the trail. Perhaps it was not
a good idea. It would take time. He might even
choke too loudly. Mr Martin had never seen the house
(40:19):
on West twelfth Street where Mrs Barrows lived, but he
had a clear enough picture of it. Fortunately, she had
bragged to everybody about her ducky first floor apartment in
the perfectly darling three story red brick. There would be
no doorman or other attendants, just the tenants of the
second and third floors. As he walked along, Mr Martin
(40:39):
realized that he would get there before nine. He had
considered walking north on Fifth Avenue from Shrafts to a
point from which it would take him until ten o'clock
to reach the house. At that hour people were less
likely to be coming in or going out, But the
procedure would have made an awkward loop in the straight
thread of his casualness, and he had abandoned it. It
(41:02):
was impossible to figure when people would be entering or
leaving the house. Anyway, there was a great risk at
any hour if he ran into anybody. He would simply
have to place the rubbing out of Old Jean Barrows
in the inactive file forever. The same thing would hold
true if there was someone in her apartment. In that case,
he would just say that he had been passing by,
(41:23):
recognized her charming house, and thought to drop in. It
was eighteen minutes after nine when Mr Martin turned into
twelfth straight. A man passed him, and a man and
a woman talking. There was no one within fifty paces.
When he came to the house halfway down the block.
He was up the steps and in the small vestibule,
(41:44):
and no time pressing the bell under the card that
said Mrs Old Jean Barrows. When the clicking in the
lock started, he jumped forward against the door. He got
inside fast, closing the door behind him. A bulb in
a lantern hung from the hall ceiling on a chain
seemed to give a monstrously bright light. There was nobody
on the stair which went up ahead of him along
the left wall. A door opened down the hall on
the wall all on the right. He went toward it
(42:07):
swiftly on tiptoe. Well, for God's sakes, let who's here baled?
Mrs Barrows and her braying laugh rang out like the
report of a shotgun. He rushed past her like a
football tacker, bumping her. Hey quit shoving, she said, closing
the door behind them. They were in her living room,
(42:28):
which seemed to Mr Martin to be lighted by a
hundred lamps. What's after you? She said, You're as jumpy
as a goat. He found he was unable to speak.
His heart was wheezing in his throat. I yes, he
finally brought out. She was jabbering and laughing as she
(42:49):
started to help him off with his coat. No, no,
he said, I'll put it here. He took it off
and put it on a chair near the door. Your
hat and gloves too, She said, you're in a ladies house.
He put his hat on top of the oat. Mrs
Barrows seemed larger than he had thought. He kept his
(43:09):
gloves on. I was passing by, he said, I I recognized.
Is there anyone here? She laughed louder than ever, No,
she said, we're all alone. You're why is this sheet?
You funny man? Whatever has come over you? I'll mix
you a toddy. She started toward a door across the room.
(43:32):
Scotch and soda be all right, but say you don't drink,
do you? She turned and gave him her amused look.
Mr Martin pulled himself together. Scotch and soda will be
all right, he heard himself say. He could hear her
laughing in the kitchen. Mr Martin looked quickly around the
living room for the weapon he had counted on finding one.
(43:54):
There there were and irons, and a poker, and something
in a corner that looked like an Indian club. None
of them would do it, couldn't be that way. He
began pace around. He came to a desk. On it
lamb metal paper knife with an ornate handle. Would it
be sharp enough? He reached for it and knocked over
a small brash jar. Stamps spilled out of it and
(44:16):
fell onto the floor with a clatter. Hey, Mrs Barrows
yelled from the kitchen. Are you tearing up the pea patch?
Mr Martin gave a strange laugh. Picking up the knife,
he tried its point against his left wrist. It was blunt.
It wouldn't do. When Mrs Barrows reappeared carrying two highballs,
(44:40):
Mr Martin, standing there with his gloves on, became acutely
conscious of the fantasy. He had wrought cigarettes in his
pocket a drink prepared for him. It was all too
grossly improbable. It was more than that, it was impossible.
Somewhere in the back of his mind, a vague idea
(45:04):
stir sprouted. For Heaven's sake, take off those gloves, said
Mrs Barrows. I always wear them in the house, said
Mr Martin. The idea began to bloom, strange and wonderful.
She put the glasses on a coffee table in front
(45:24):
of a sofa and sat on the sofa. Come over here,
you odd little man, she said. Mr Martin went over
and sat beside her. It was difficult getting a cigarette
out of the pack of camels, but he managed it.
She held a match for him, Laughing well, she said,
handing him his drink. This is perfectly Mira, bless you
with a drink and a cigarette. Mr Martin puffed, not
(45:50):
too awkwardly, and took a gulp of the highball. I
drink and smoke all the time, he said. He clinked
his glass against hers. Here's nuts to that old windbag fitweiler,
he said, and gulped again. The stuff tasted awful, but
he made no grimace. Really, Mr Martin, she said, her
(46:11):
voice and posture changing. You are insulting our employer. Mrs
Barrows was now all Special Adviser to the President. I
am preparing a bomb, said Mr Martin, which will blow
the old goat higher than hell. He had only had
a little of the drink, which was not strong. It
(46:32):
couldn't be that. Do you take dope or something, Mrs
Barrows asked coldly. Heroin said Mr Martin. I'll be cooked
to the gills when I bumped that old buzzard off,
Mr Martin, she shouted, getting to her feet, that will
be all of that. You must go at once. Mr
(46:53):
Martin took another swallow of the drink. He tapped his
cigarette out in the ash tray and put the pack
of camels on the coffee table. Then he got up.
She stood glaring at him. He walked over and put
on his hat and coat. Not a word about this,
he said, and laid an index finger against his lips.
All Mrs Barrows could bring out was a really. Mr
(47:16):
Martin put his hand on the door knob. I'm sitting
in the catbirds seat, he said. He stuck his tongue
out at her and left. Nobody saw him go. Mr
Martin got to his apartment walking well before eleven. No
one saw him go in. He had two glasses of
(47:39):
milk after brushing his teeth, and he felt elated it
wasn't tipsy in his because he hadn't been tipsy anyway.
The walk had worn off all effects of the whiskey.
He got in bed and read a magazine for a while.
He was asleep before midnight. Mr Martin got to the
office at eight thirty the next morning as usual. At
(47:59):
a quarter to nine, Old Jean Barrows, who had never
before arrived at work before ten, swept into his office.
I am departing to Mr Fittweiler now, she shouted. If
he turns you over to the police, it's no more
than you deserve. Mr Martin gave her a look of
shocked surprise. I beg your pardon, he said. Mrs Barrows
(48:20):
snorted and bounced out of the room, leaving Miss Pared
and Joey Harton staring after her. What's the matter with that,
Old Daniel now, asked Miss Pared. I have no idea,
said mister Martin, resuming his work. The other two looked
at him, and then at each other. Miss peared got
up and went out. She walked slowly past the closed
door of mister Fitweiler's office. Mrs Barrows was yelling inside,
(48:44):
but she was not braining. Miss Pared could not hear
what the woman was saying. She went back to her desk.
Forty five minutes later, missus Barrows left the President's office
and went into her own, shutting the door. It wasn't
until half an hour later that mister Fitweiler sent for
Mr Martin, the head of the filing department. Neat quiet, attentive,
(49:04):
stood in front of the old man's desk. Mr Fittweiler
was pale and nervous. He took his glasses off and
twiddled them. He made a small roughing sound in his throat. Martin,
He said, you have been with us more than twenty years.
Twenty two, sir, said Mr Martin in that time pursued
(49:27):
the President. Your work and your manner have been exemplary.
I trust so, Sir, said Mr Martin. I have understood, Martin,
said Mr Fittweler, that you have never taken a drink
or smoked. That is correct, Sir, said Mr Martin. Ah, yes.
(49:48):
Mr Fittweiler polished his glasses you may describe what you
did after leaving the office yesterday, Martin, he said, certainly, sir,
he said, I walked home. Then I went to Shrafts
for dinner. Afterward, I walked home again. I went to
bed early, sir, and read a magazine for a while.
I was asleep before eleven. Ah. Yes, said Mr Fittweiler again.
(50:14):
He was silent for a moment, searching for the proper
words to say to the head of the filing department,
Mrs Barrows. He said, finally, Mrs Barrows has worked hard, Martin,
very hard. It ringused me to report that she has
suffered a severe breakdown. It has taken the form of
a persecution complex accompanied by distressing hallucinations. I'm very sorry, sir,
(50:41):
said Mr Martin. Mrs Barrows is under the delusion, continued
Mr Fittweiler, that you visited her last evening and behaved
yourself in an unseemly matter. He raised his hand to
silence Mr Martin's little, pained outcry. It is the nature
of these psychological diseases, Mr Fittweiler said, to fit upon
(51:05):
the least likely and most innocent party as the source
of persecution. These matters are not for the lay mind
to grasp. Martin. I've just had my psychiatrist, Dr Fitch
on the phone. UH. He would not, of course commit himself,
but he made enough generalizations to substantiate my suspicions. I
(51:26):
suggested to Mrs Barrows, when she had completed her UH
story to me this morning, that she visit Dr Fitch
for I suspected a condition to watch seen. She flew,
I regret to say, into a rage and demanded requested
that I call you on the carpet. You may not know, Martin,
(51:49):
but Mrs Barrows had planned a reorganization of your department,
subject to my approval. Of course, subject to my approval.
This brought you, rather than anyone else to her mind.
But again that is a phenomenon for Dr Fitch and
not for us. So Martin, I'm afraid Mrs Barrow's usefulness
(52:09):
here is at an end. I'm dreadfully sorry, sir, said
Mr Martin. It was at this point that the door
to the office blew open with the suddenness of a
gas main explosion, and Mrs Barrows catapulted through. It is
the little rat denying it, she screamed. He can't get
(52:29):
away with that, Mr Martin got up and moved discreetly
to a point beside Mr Fittweiler's chair. You drank and
smoked at my apartment, she bawled at Mr Martin, And
you know it. You called Mr Fittweiler an old wind
bag and said you were gonna blow them up when
you got coked to your gills on your heroine. She
(52:50):
stopped yelling to catch her breath, and a new glint
came into her popping eyes. If you weren't set to drab, ordinary,
little man, she said, I'd think you'd planned it all,
sticking your tongue out, saying you were sitting in a
cat buried seat because you thought no one would believe
me when I told it. My god, it's really too perfect.
(53:14):
She brayed loudly and hysterically, and the fury was on
her again. She glared at Mr Fittweiler. Can't you see
how he has checked as you, old fool? Can't you
see his little game? But Mr Fittweiler had been surreptitiously
pressing all the buttons under the top of his desk,
and employees of F and S began pouring into the room.
(53:35):
Stockton said, Mrs Pittweiler, you and Fishbone will take Mrs
Barrows to her home. Mrs Powell, you will go with them. Stockton,
who had played a little football in high school, blocked
Mrs Barrows as she made for Mr Martin. It took
him in fish Mine together to force her out of
the door into the hall crowded with stenographers and office boys.
(53:56):
She was still screaming imprecations at Mr Martin, tangled and
contradictory imprecations. The hubbub finally died out down the corridor.
I regret that this has happened, said Mr Fittweiler. I
shall ask you to dismiss it from your mind. Martin. Yes, sir,
(54:17):
said Mr Martin, anticipating his chiefs. That will be all.
By moving to the door, I will dismiss it. He
went out and shut the door, and his step was
light and quick in the hall. When he entered his department,
he had slowed down to his customary gate, and he
(54:37):
walked quietly across the room to the double New twenty file,
wearing a look of studious concentration. From the Thurber conable
The Catbird Seat by James Thurber, Countdown has come to
(55:09):
you from the studios of Alderman Broadcasting Empire World headquarters
in the Sports Capsule Building in New York. Thank you
for listening. Here are the credits. Most of the music,
including our theme from Beethoven's Ninth arranged, produced performed by
Brian Ray and John Philip Channel the countdown musical directors Guitars,
bass and drums by Brian Ray, All orchestration and keyboards
(55:31):
by John Philip Chanelle produced by t Ko Brothers. Other
Beethoven selections have been arranged and performed by the group
No Horns Allowed. The sports music is the Alderman theme
from ESPN two. It was written by Mitch Warren Davis
and it appears courtesy of ESPN musical comments by Nancy Faust.
The best baseball stadium organist ever. Our announcer today was
(55:52):
Stevie Van's Aunt, and I thank him. As always. Everything
else was pretty much my fault. So let's countdown for this,
the seven seventy third day since Donald Trump's first attempted
coup against the democratically elected government of the United States.
Arrest him now while we still can. The next schedule
countdown with the holiday coming is Tuesday until then I'm
Keith Alderman. Good morning, good afternoon, goodnight, and good luck.
(56:25):
Countdown with Keith all Reman is a production of I
heart Radio. For more podcasts from I heart Radio, visit
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get your podcasts.
Host
Keith Olbermann
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