Reggie Handling Legend Role Better 2nd Time Around

When Reggie Jackson was the host of “Greatest Sports Legends” in 1976, things, you might say, didn’t go too well.

During a two-week taping session, Jackson was unreasonable and demanding, according to what the show’s executive producer and creator, Berl Rotfeld, told a Philadelphia writer. Rotfeld’s comments received national attention.

So who is back as host of the show?

Reggie Jackson.

“Greatest Sports Legends,” in its 16th year, is the longest-running syndicated sports show in television history.

One legend that Rotfeld has wanted to profile more than any other is Jim Brown.

But Brown always declined. He had said, for one thing, he didn’t think a half-hour show was long enough to accurately portray him. For another, he thought the original fee of $500--it is now $1,000--was not enough.

So who was Jackson’s guest for a “Greatest Sports Legends” taping session this week at the Dana Point Resort hotel in Orange County?

Jim Brown, of course.

“The reason I am here,” Brown said shortly after arriving by limousine from his home in the Hollywood Hills, “is because of Reggie Jackson.”

Brown said it wasn’t just the fact that he and Jackson are friends. He said he thought Jackson would be the type of interviewer who would listen to what he had to say and ask the right follow-up questions. And, as things turned out, Brown was right.

The interview went so well that Rotfeld is considering making this segment, to be shown early next year, the first one-hour “Greatest Sports Legends” on one person.

Jackson, while walking with Brown, Rotfeld and a reporter, reflected back to 1976.

“I was a brash, immature, self-centered 29-year-old,” he said. “I was full of . . . and vinegar. All I cared about was winning ballgames, driving around in my Rolls and eating big, thick steaks.” He then made a slurping noise.

Jackson, who retired from baseball after last season, doesn’t eat red meat anymore. He has also become an avid weightlifter and is stronger than ever, he said.

During lunch, he told the person next to him not to eat the avocado on her salad. “It’ll make you fat,” he said, only half-kidding.

The Jim Brown segment was the second of 10 “Greatest Sports Legends” that will be taped at Dana Point.

Two days earlier, it was Fred Biletnikoff. Wednesday it was Mike Schmidt, and Thursday it was John Newcombe. Yet to be done are shows on Bob Lilly, Johnny Rutherford, Alan Page, Franco Harris, Michael Spinks, and a show on Reggie Jackson with a yet-to-be-named host.

Rotfeld said, “Over the years, when I would tell people I produced ‘Greatest Sports Legends,’ often the response was, ‘Oh, you mean that show that Reggie Jackson hosts.’ ”

That is what inspired Rotfeld to try to get Jackson again.

“I had to think about it a little, but not too long,” Jackson said.

But what about Rotfeld’s negative comments? “To be honest, I had forgotten about that until just now, when you mentioned it,” Jackson said. “People say things, you forget. It’s no big thing.”

Jackson said he liked the idea of doing “Greatest Sports Legends” again mainly because it would help him hone his skills as an interviewer. “This show allows me to grow as a journalist,” he said.

During the taping, there are cue cards with questions written on them. Jackson realizes it’s important to ask these questions because often they lead into prepared footage, but he also asks many of his own.

Said Rotfeld: “We’ve had other hosts who just read from the cue cards and never took the interviews any further. But Reggie is a tremendous interviewer. And he’s been extremely cooperative.”

At one point director Matt Gibson asked Jackson not to put his hand in front of his mouth so much. Said Jackson: “You’re right about that. I’m aware myself that I do that a lot.”

Throughout the day, Jackson was anything but unreasonable or demanding.

So what is the big difference in Jackson between 1976 and now? “Maturity,” Jackson said. “That’s all, just maturity.”

Back on TV: Stu Nahan, who begins doing the weeknight sports for Channel 5 Monday, said: “I know when I took the job at KABC radio I said I’d never go back to television. I felt my mug had been on television enough. Now, don’t take this wrong. I don’t need my ego massaged by appearing on television, but I found that I did miss it a little.

“But the real reason I took the job was because my wife, Sandy (who is program manager at Channel 4), has gone back to school part time to get a master’s in psychology. Since she’s going to be in school two or three nights a week, I might as well be working.”

About the workload, since his long days will start with KABC’s “Ken And Bob Company” morning show and continue through KABC’s afternoon “Sportstalk” show, Nahan said: “I used to get up at 5 a.m. and stay up. Now I’ll get up and then go back to bed.”

TV-Radio Notes

Highlights from the first 15 years of “Greatest Sports Legends” shows will be shown as a one-hour special on Channel 7 Saturday at 1 p.m. . . . A number of young Olympic stars are profiled in another one of Bud Greenspan’s slick productions, “Olympic Dreams,” on the Disney Channel tonight at 7. Pieces on swimmer Janet Evans of Placentia, 4-foot 4-inch gymnast Alicia Fernandez of Spain and gymnast Missy Marlowe of Salt Lake City are particularly interesting. . . . Another pre-Olympics special, “Torch of Champions,” will be carried by Channel 4 in two one-hour segments, this Sunday at noon and the next Sunday at 12:30 p.m. The shows will spotlight stars from past Winter and Summer Olympics. Hosting are Peggy Fleming and Bob Mathias.

NBC celebrates the 10th anniversary of “SportsWorld” with a one-hour special tonight at 9. NBC will look back at the show’s first decade and also will look ahead to the Seoul Olympics. . . . Saturday night’s Raiders-Washington Redskins exhibition game at the Coliseum will be televised by CBS but blacked out in Los Angeles. . . . “The NFL With John Madden,” a 10-part CBS Radio series, will be carried by KNX nightly at 7:47, beginning next Monday. Madden looks ahead to the upcoming season.

The Phoenix Cardinals make their first national television appearance since moving from St. Louis Sunday at 5 p.m. on ESPN when they face the Minnesota Vikings. At halftime of that game, Roy Firestone offers an outrageously satirical segment on Cardinal owner Bill Bidwill. In the piece, produced by Ted Green, Firestone uses a game show called “Let’s Make an NFL Deal,” starring “Dollar Bill” Bidwill to examine, in a most unusual way, the Cardinals’ move, which Firestone calls the greatest single deal in the history of sports.

ABC’s “Wide World of Sports” Saturday, which will run from 4 to 6 p.m., lives up to its name. First, there will be the Arlington Million, which this year is being run in Toronto. Then there will be taped highlights of Wednesday’s track meet in Zurich, Switzerland, and possibly an interview with former 400-meter world record-holder Lee Evans from Africa, where he is visiting. Then there will be taped highlights of the men’s Olympic gymnastics trials, held two weeks ago in Salt Lake City, then a report from Indianapolis on diver Bruce Kimball. And finally the Travers Stakes in Saratoga, N.Y. Coverage of the two horse races will be delayed on the West Coast.

Bill Grimes has resigned as president of ESPN to become president of Univision Holdings Inc., the nation’s largest Spanish language communications company. Grimes, who begins his new job Nov. 1, will be replaced by Roger Werner, former ESPN executive vice president who left the cable network in March to become executive vice president of the ABC television network. . . . Michael Nunn, who doesn’t fight again until Nov. 4, when he meets Juan Roldan in Las Vegas, will handle the commentary during Z Channel’s coverage of the Frankie Duarte-Miguel Juarez bantamweight bout at the Country Club in Reseda Aug. 30. Tony Hernandez will handle the blow by blow. Nunn will also receive his International Boxing Federation middleweight championship belt, which he won from Frank Tate in Las Vegas July 28.