No one needs this much of Joe Morgan
New York city taxpayers should know that, because of Joe Morgan, some of their finest police officers will be detained Wednesday, asked to form an escort for the ESPN analyst as he goes from the Dodgers-Mets telecast at Shea Stadium at 1 p.m. (PDT) to the Tigers-Yankees telecast at Yankee Stadium at 5 p.m. (PDT) because someone at the all-sports network decided America needs to experience as much of Morgan's fly-by-the-seat-of-his-pants commentary as possible during the baseball playoffs.
As if the guys who run the website FireJoeMorgan.com needed any more fodder.
Morgan works with Gary Thorne and former Mets GM Steve Phillips on the Dodgers-Mets game. If that starts to run long, he'll leave it before it's over, as any good analyst would do, so he can make it in time to join Jon Miller for Mike Mussina's first pitch at Yankee Stadium.
Two former Dodgers stars -- Orel Hershiser and Eric Karros -- are working for ESPN this postseason, but it seems the network is trying hard to keep them away from Dodgers games. Hershiser is held hostage with Chris Berman on the Padres-Cardinals series, while Karros is doing games 2 and 3 of the Athletics-Twins series.
Unfortunately, Fox is using Steve Lyons with Thom Brennaman on its Dodgers-Mets game 2 telecast Thursday (5 p.m.) Vin Scully will do the first three and last three innings on radio (KFWB-AM 980).
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RE: Joe Morgan escorted ride.
Back in the dim, dark late '80s, Don Drysdale asked me to work with him as a writer (I was with the late Her-Ex) on ABC's regional college football games. He told me how ABC always planned a "getaway" for its announcing crew including the legendary escape by Keith Jackson for his trip to his next assignment in an ambulance (legendary getaways might make a good column.) Our first game, Temple at Hawaii, at Honolulu, didn't require as escape. But for the next one, I met Big D in Phoenix and we flew to Dayton, O, for a matchup between Division III Wittenberg and Denison. Even I, at 5-11 and 215, was bigger than the offensive linemen on either team. We scoped out the Dayton Airport, went out for a few thousand drinks and checked into the hotel. After the game, Big D said, "Let's get out of here quick." There was one car in the parking lot at the airport.
I call dibs on the Grassy Knoll!