Rolling Towards The Weekend...

My wife will insist to you that I do not like change.  Which is why for at least 25 years my chosen field was technology.  Because, you know, nothing at all changes in tech.  </Snark>

I am not much of a fan of change that appears to be needless.  I mean, things like new clothes.  I like some of them if they're particularly funny tee shirts, or provide a spark to a memory that I value greatly.  Or, ya know, other stuff like that.  But there are some changes which are kind of hard.

Locally, the television station which I watch regularly is about to go through one of those major upheavals.  Last fall, they celebrated their 70th anniversary, and earlier this year, Randy Shaver celebrated his 40th anniversary at the station.  Mr. Shaver joined the station back in the early 1980s as a sports reporter.  The staff around him was incredibly professional and very likeable through the years, as was he.  In fact, going back a chunk of time, Mr. Shaver's "boss" - the head of the sports department, Jeff Passolt, left the station to go to another.  

In their infinite wisdom, the management decided to find some clown from out west to come in and do the sports department stuff.  The uproar and outrage was totally contradictory to the stereotypical Minnesota reaction.  There were people pretty upset.  In fact, during this time, I had small children and a local market research firm had taken interest in my wife and I to provide opinions on things.  Sometimes these were one-evening visits where we'd make between $20 and $100 for our evening time and our opinions.  And I got called to come in because I'd fit the profile of a regular viewer of the channel and they wanted to know what someone like that thought about the new sports guy.

I cannot say that I was a ringleader, or even the most outspoken of the people in my session, but I can tell you that if that new sports fellow had heard some of those opinions, he would have high-tailed it out of town quickly.  

Which is pretty much how his tenure in the position came to an end.  In fact it was over so quickly that I do not to this day remember his name.  But Mr. Shaver got promoted to the head of the sports news department.

And you might think "well, he just does sports, what's the big deal?"  Hardly that.  What he brought in, in fact, was a sea change in local sporting news.  I was about a year out of high school when Mr. Shaver started there, and quickly I noticed the focus growing on local high school athletes.  It started with football in the fall, basketball and hockey in the winter, then spring sports - then a growing focus on Girls sports, too.  

This past fall celebrated his fortieth year of selecting an "all metro" male football team.  Football games also became cancer fundraisers, as Mr. Shaver himself had endured two battles with cancer and decided he really wanted to make a big difference.  And he has.  

But not just in cancer.  Friday evening newscasts are now shortened so that they can spend the last 10-15 minutes showing highlights of various football games around the state.  A large number of camera crews are out filming games, looking for highlights, because every following Monday has a series of three often spectacular plays, where viewers can vote for their favorites.

The other great thing about Mr. Shaver is you can't keep class and talent in the background.  After becoming the head of the Sports department, a few years later when one of the very well-respected anchors left, Mr. Shaver was the obvious choice to replace him.  You can say that the local management did learn their lessons and have tried very hard to look for locally connected people, or do cautious introductions of new folks who have come to the area.  

A friend of mine who was a former news photographer has pointed out that the Minneapolis-St. Paul area is a highly respected market because a number of formerly local reports have moved on to network jobs.  Three of NBC's national reporters passed through here.  And there are others who the networks would love to have, if only they'd consider moving farther from home.  

But the reason I do not like this change is because of the memories.  This evening, one of the "remember when" clips they showed was from the former anchor, Paul Magers, detailing how, when Mr. Shaver was going to be doing the evening news for the first time from the studio desk.  Mr. Magers looked over at Mr. Shaver's script, read the first line Mr. Shaver had written for himself to introduce the sports segment, which told how Kirby Puckett, a Minnesota Twins baseball player, had gotten five hits in the day's game.  When the cameras came back from break, Mr. Magers repeated the first line of Mr. Shaver's script, taking the wind completely out of his sails.

It says a great deal about Mr. Shaver in that his response was "yes, you're right, Paul" and he moved on to the rest of the script.  Shaver and Magers had a long-going batch of silly pranks, including "Count Randula" and a few others.  Watching them was a fun and pleasant way to get through the daily news, and smile even when the news was terrible, because they had so much fun doing their jobs.

But the bad news is that we're now reminded of things like how Kirby Puckett was forced to retire extremely early due to an eye problem, and a few years later he was killed in a car roll over.  After winning two World Series rings.  Or we're reminded of the thousands of boys who could use their appearance in various news segments to get recruited to bigger college programs.  I have not seen a count yet of the number of players who went on to the pro ranks from teams which he or his staff covered.  There won't be many, because very few people make it to that level of professional sports, but I'm sure there are a few.  

There are also other people whose lives have been touched by his work.  And more who will be helped by his cancer research foundation.  And there's forty years of events and dates which he helped lend a perspective to, including some painful sports losses.  While there will be people following him doing the news, it will take time for them to develop the connection with their audience that Mr. Shaver has.

And now that he gets to head into retirement and spend more time with his precious grandchildren, children, and wife, I how he has a wonderful time.  He deserves it - and a lot of weekly dinners with his wife at 5:30 - 6:30 pm.