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| SportsFriday, October 19, 2007 11:15 PM CDT |
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IWU alum Matthews recalls days leading up to induction into Hall
BLOOMINGTON — From playing golf with Whitey Ford and Carlton Fisk to an enlightening discussion with Willie Mays on a bus, Denny Matthews gleaned a lifetime of memories from four July days in Cooperstown, N.Y. “George Brett told me it’s going to be four of the greatest days of your life,” said Matthews. “It’s going to go by like a flash so slow it down the best you can. Take mental notes, physical notes, whatever you need to do. But try to remember everything and just enjoy the heck out of it. I think I did a pretty good job of that.” A 1966 graduate of Illinois Wesleyan, Matthews returned to his alma mater Thursday and recounted winning the Ford C. Frick Award for broadcasting excellence and the subsequent induction into the broadcasters’ wing of the Baseball Hall of Fame. “It was a lot of great memories. It’s fun to look back on that,” said Matthews, a Kansas City Royals broadcaster since the team’s inception in 1969. “I don’t know when it sinks in totally. You come back and feel like you’re on cloud nine for a month or two.” Matthews was inducted along with former players Tony Gwynn and Cal Ripken Jr. and St. Louis Post-Dispatch writer Rick Hummel. “I knew most of the American League Hall of Famers throughout the years, but a lot of the National League Hall of Famers I had never met,” said Matthews, a Bloomington native. “It was fascinating to me. It was so neat to meet Sandy Koufax and Willie Mays and Ozzie Smith.” At the gathering just before the Hall of Famers are taken by bus from the hotel to the induction ceremony, Matthews followed a conversation with Al Kaline with a short chat with the reclusive Koufax. “He’s 72 years old and he looks like he could still pitch,” Matthews said of the former Los Angeles Dodgers’ left-hander. “He is very soft spoken. We talked three or four minutes. Nobody saw him the previous three days and he was gone right after the induction ceremony.” On the bus, Matthews found himself across the aisle from Mays, who openly discussed in great detail some of the elite hitters he played with and against. “I had heard Willie really wasn’t that friendly or outgoing. But he’s sitting right here so I introduce myself,” said Matthews. “You see him in that situation so sometimes it’s not always as it appears.” Ripken had approached Matthews the day before about the anxiety each was feeling in anticipation of their induction speeches. “Cal said ‘I’ve got two or three places in my speech I know I’m going to choke up and get emotional. I might have to back off and try to regroup,’ ” Matthews recalled. “I said ‘yeah, I’ve got a couple in mine, too.’ He said ‘you know what, if we’re not emotional and nervous and excited, we’ve got no business being up there.’ That was a good point.” Matthews said he “felt good” about his speech despite the inevitable nervousness and excitement. “I was told with the Hall of Fame everybody involved just brings you in. They embrace you,” said the 64-year-old Matthews. “I was thinking ‘gosh, how does that work.’ But it did. It was really wonderful. When the speech was over, all the Hall of Famers came down, shaking your hand. When it’s Yogi Berra — you could name any of them — it makes you feel like a million bucks.” Matthews got his start in radio on Bloomington’s WJBC while still an athlete at Wesleyan. “I got five dollars a game to do starting lineups, halftime stats and end-of-the-game stats,” he said. “Eventually, they let me do some play-by-play. In between (playing) football and baseball, I had the opportunity to do a lot of high school and college basketball my last three years at Wesleyan. My experience at WJBC was the bug that bit me.” Not long after graduating from IWU, Matthews heard of the expansion Royals starting play. “I figured they needed a broadcaster and maybe I’m the guy,” he said. “I had no reason to think that would possibly be true. But it came to pass. So I guess anything can happen.” Get area high school sports scores and statistics at Varsity Sports. E-mail this story | Print this story | Search archives | RSS Show comments |  Hide comments | Hide comments on all stories |
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Jim Hedrick wrote on Oct 24, 2007 11:38 AM:
Jim Johnson wrote on Oct 19, 2007 9:48 AM:
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