Thursday, September 1, 2011

The death of an all time great

I remember when I heard Wallace and Ladmo was going off the air.  It was like hearing the president died.  All those mornings watching cartoons and skits with Pat McMahon and laughing till it hurt came rolling back.  I would watch as I ate my Froot Loops and get every second of viewing time in before I had to bolt out the door and race off to school.  I remember thinking that if I could just get one Ladmo Bag, I would be the coolest kid in school. I would have probably carried it like a lunch sack and when the pretty girl asked me what was I carrying, I'd nonchalantly say "Its just my lunch...huh... wait, how'd that get there?  I must have switched this LADMO BAG for my lunch."  I think that one usually ended with me being carried off the playground by all the kids while that kid I hated stood by himself on the black top suffering miserably at my exhaltation.  Needless to say, Wallace and Ladmo was a major part of my childhood. 

Warp ahead 30 years; now I'm a big kid in my truck driving home from work and laughing along as my new favorite show is entertaining me to the hilt.  Except this time its on the radio.  People drive by me and wonder what I'm laughing at, and sometimes I'm sure they're wondering what I'm yelling at.  I park my truck on the side of my house and stay just a bit longer and eek out every second before I race off into the house to go be a dad.  Gone are the cartoons, replaced by sports talk radio.  Gone is Wallace and Ladmo, replaced by Gambo and Ash. 

I've been following them since I don't know how long.  They were on some other channels before 910, but that's where they hooked me.  My friends and I would listen every day after work and then go grab a beer and go off on how stupid Gambo is, or get into a heated debate about the worst QB in Cardinals history.  (that one is a sure fire fist fight starter).  Everything we would talk about in the bar would have something to do with what they brought up in the show.  Listening to that show was like listening to a couple of old friends talk about sports.  The only difference was Gambo was the king of inside information, while Ash was the perfect calm to Gambo's storm.  They were amazing at stretching a topic for hours and squeezing every bit off life out of it that they could.  I sat right along with them and enjoyed every minute.  They also were the best interviewers I've ever heard in sports.  I'm not exaggerating.  They make all the "professionals" on T.V. look like children.  I remember Bob Costas praising them to the highest on their professionalism.  My all time favorite interview was when the talked to Pete Rose about baseball for like an hour and not once bringing up betting on baseball.  It was so refreshing.  Yep, Gambo and Ash was my favorite show, not just on radio, but it beat out almost all T.V. as well.

And then they killed it.

I'm still not sure what happened.  KTAR was silent on it, except for a condescending statement that "We just needed to shake things up".  I'm not sure why the number one sports radio show needs shaking up, but there it was.  No more show.  Now I'm left with nothing else to listen to.  I'm left with feeling like a kid that just lost Wallace and Ladmo.

No comments:

Post a Comment