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<\/a>RUSH: You still did it, and you\u2019ve maintained your humility throughout all of this, which is unique. Now, was it CBS, because CBS had the Masters, was it the Masters that you wanted to do or was it a combination of the two?<\/p>\nNANTZ: I think it was really the fact that CBS had the Masters and even back then they were, you know, in this long stretch, this wonderful relationship that is very old-fashioned and just the way that it\u2019s set up, it\u2019s always a one-year agreement, and we\u2019re now 53 years in a row of broadcasting that tournament on one-year agreements. So I\u2019m a young man, and I just hear these stories by these gentlemen like Pat Summerall and Jack Whitaker, who were working the broadcasts back in those days for CBS and they were just waxing poetic, and I loved their erudition about everything, beyond just the golf tournament itself. All their knowledge really struck me, and I wanted to be one of one of those men, one of those voices that had this worldliness, if you will, and awareness and appreciation for all things, all cultures, all places and people.<\/p>\n
RUSH: One of the things I want to convey to the audience, Jim, and I mentioned this in an e-mail to you about what we would do here today. This book is a fantastic thing. You all have watched Jim Nantz and you\u2019ve heard Jim Nantz for 23 years in some cases, but you don\u2019t know Jim Nantz because Jim Nantz is the best at what he does. He never makes whatever event he\u2019s at about him. He always makes sure that he brings the event to you, and this book is an opportunity for people to get to know you, Jim, in a personal way, and I want to tell people, if they ever get a chance to meet you, you are going to be exactly what they hope you would be from having known you on television all of these years. A lot of people meet people in prominent positions, primarily in media, and they want them to be what they see on TV, hear on radio, and oftentimes they\u2019re not, but you are.<\/p>\n
You\u2019re just as genuine and humble in person as you are on the air. Let\u2019s start here at the beginning of your book, because you\u2019re in Fort Worth, and you\u2019re doing a golf tournament, you\u2019re doing the Colonial, and your dad is with you, and I\u2019m jump-starting a little bit here, but this is I think the first time your dad is going to — not the first time — but that\u2019s the beginning of his illness that happened there, and it was very tragic thing, and they didn\u2019t tell you about what actually happened to him \u2019til after the tournament, correct?<\/p>\n
NANTZ: That\u2019s correct. My father was 66 at the time, healthy, strapping, smart, self-made man who came out of a little town in North Carolina, a real entrepreneurial spirit about everything in his life, always wanted to better himself, always wanted to learn, live life like you do, Rush, with zest to the fullest, wanted to take it all in. So he would often go out with me on the road to various sporting events, Final Fours, Masters, in this case it was the Colonial tournament. I thought he was overheated when he came to the tower as we were about to go on the air. Ken Venturi is sitting by my side, and something I could tell right away was terribly wrong. What it was was he was actually suffering a stroke right before my very eyes. Now we\u2019re going on the air, and he\u2019s trying to make his way back to the clubhouse. I didn\u2019t realize it was that desperate, but he collapsed at the base of my tower and what it really was, it was triggering the onset of Alzheimer\u2019s. His life was never the same.<\/p>\n
Now, I had been at the network ten years. Not only did I have this dream — some may have called it far-fetched when I was a young boy to work for CBS one day — but now it\u2019s happened, and I have now dream part two, and that is the one I want my father to be with me every step of the way, traveling with me from sport to sport, seeing all the great championships that we have here in our country.<\/p>\n
RUSH: Yeah, but you wanted to do this as a team, and he didn\u2019t want any part of that.<\/p>\n
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NANTZ: Well, you know, he was starting to kind of cede to it. He initially passed it off as, ‘We\u2019ll see, son,\u2019 but, you know, he maintained his independence. But I really thought that we were moving within a couple of years of that becoming a reality, where I really could find purpose for him being on the road. It\u2019s a busy life that\u2019s always in a different city every week, and correspondence and otherwise it\u2019s difficult to stay on top and manage things, and I just could see as the only son, I could see that father-and-son bond now transitioning to the point where even to this day he would have been 79 years old, and there I go again, I\u2019m talking about him in the past tense.<\/p>\n
He\u2019s now 13 years deep in the darkened stage of Alzheimer\u2019s. He\u2019s still alive and I catch myself talking about him in the past tense, and it crushes me.<\/p>\n
But I can still see him out there today with me, and that\u2019s why I took that backdrop last year, those three events, Super Bowl, Final Four, Masters and used that as the backdrop, as the place to kind of write about how this would have been the ultimate father-son sports road trip, but I wanted to make this like something you do, Rush, you inspire people, and you make things, you know, everything you have is a message. I wanted to really strike universal themes: faith, loyalty, love, family, relationships, optimism, courage, and grace, and that\u2019s what the book really is. It transcends. It\u2019s not a sports book. It\u2019s a book about love and relationships.<\/p>\n
RUSH: It is indeed. Now, we\u2019ve met your father here in this interview, in his sixties. Did he encourage you when you told him way back when you were a teenager that you wanted to work at CBS?<\/p>\n
NANTZ: Rush, he made me believe anything I ever wanted to achieve in my life was obtainable. He made me believe I could do it. He lifted me on his shoulders and actually, like people do with, you know, different things in life, whether they\u2019re playing golf or shooting a free throw or about to go in and make a speech, they visualize — my father taught me the power of visualization and all through my teens I envisioned this life, I saw it. There\u2019s no sense of entitlement at all, but I believed that one day it was going to happen, so when I got the chance to audition for CBS years later, at the age of 26, it was almost like I was just waiting for the script that I\u2019d already written for life to kind of evolve and catch up with my script. I felt totally comfortable and prepared and ready for that situation, because in my mind, I played it out. I knew one day it was going to arrive.<\/p>\n
RUSH: Did your mom and dad make you feel special?<\/p>\n
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NANTZ: Oh, of course. I was raised in just about as perfect a home environment as you could ever imagine. You know, my parents were very humble people. My mom, you talk about a hero, is still going strong and fit and active and smart and concerned with all things in the world, and my father was always one with a curious mind and wanted me to get broader and wider than just worrying about who was winning a game. He looked at the world of sports with a romance in his eyes. He liked to learn about people who overcame things. He wanted to watch sports to be taken to places and learn about cultures. You know, back in the Wide World of Sports days when Jim McKay was taking us behind the iron curtain or to the Great Wall of China, he loved that. And that\u2019s the way, alas, I look at the world of sports. I\u2019m not an agate type ESPN Sports Center highlight, in-your-face kind of a sports fan. You know, I\u2019m looking for something with a little more thought.<\/p>\n
RUSH: The life lessons?<\/p>\n
NANTZ: Absolutely. And that\u2019s the reason that — and people have said, ‘Man, you\u2019ve got so many interesting people you\u2019ve met in your life, you know, you ought to write a book about some of these events you do.\u2019 But to me that\u2019s a trip that\u2019s an ego trip. If I was going to write something, it had to be some important messages that would inspire all people.<\/p>\n
RUSH: Well, we\u2019ll talk about some of these people that you\u2019ve met because you\u2019ve met everybody in many realms, and they\u2019re all your friends. This man\u2019s got more friends than anybody I know. Jim Nantz, Always by My Side. We\u2019ll continue after this.<\/p>\n
BREAK TRANSCRIPT<\/p>\n
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RUSH: And we\u2019re back, Rush Limbaugh, the Excellence in Broadcasting Network, and we resume our conversation with Jim Nantz of CBS Sports, his terrific new book, Always by My Side: A Father\u2019s Grace and a Sports Journey Unlike Any Other. There are a lot of names in this book; you\u2019ve met a lot of people. President Bush 41 wrote the forward.<\/p>\n
NANTZ: Yes, he did. I didn\u2019t mean to come off like a name dropper there, Rush.<\/p>\n
RUSH: No, no, I\u2019m taking care of that. I\u2019m a good name dropper.<\/p>\n
NANTZ: And you said I have a lot of friends and I am blessed. I count you as a very dear friend. I treasure all my friendships. My father was like that. I open my shows by saying, ‘Hello, friends,\u2019 and it\u2019s a testament, it\u2019s a tribute to my father, because all he had in his life were friends, and he treated everyone with such dignity and respect from all stations in life, and when I went on that three-championship journey last year, and I had the intentions if my father couldn\u2019t be figuratively by my side, you know, I realized at that very point he would always be by my side, I\u2019d carry his spirit. I\u2019d find surrogates who could continue to inspire and guide me and promote the positives that dad stood for, and no one more so than former President Bush.<\/p>\n
To write the forward to this book meant a great deal to me, obviously, but his friendship and his guidance for the last 15 years, it\u2019s just not some peripheral know him a little bit on the side, met him at a few events, he\u2019s very much part of my life. I saw him just a couple of days ago. I suspect he\u2019s probably listening right now because he knows I was going to be on your show and I hope he\u2019s feeling a little bit better because he\u2019s been a little under the weather here in recent days, and he wrote some things that I was trying to get across in the book about father figures and people who overcome adversity that really hit home. He wrote in the forward: ‘Few of us will walk this earth and be untouched by tragedy, and as the old saying goes, ‘adversity has a way of introducing you to yourself.”<\/p>\n
RUSH: How did you meet him?<\/p>\n
NANTZ: I met him just after he left office. The great city of Houston, I heard you talking in the first hour about this ant infestation down in Houston, and that got my attention, but the great city of Houston has lifted me on its shoulders and claimed me as their own. I went to college down there, my parents live in Houston. They\u2019ve taken great pride in my career that not only did they give me a chance, at the age of 20 I was anchoring on the CBS affiliate there in Houston on weekends, the sports, while still living in the dorm over on the University of Houston campus.<\/p>\n
RUSH: With who? Who were your roommates?<\/p>\n
NANTZ: Fred Couples, Blaine McCallister, both of whom have had big tour careers, and John Horne who was on the tour for one year back in the late eighties. But Houston became the launching point, they claim me, they\u2019re proud of me, and President Bush, of course, has Houston as a home, and he was well aware that there was this kid who had made it to the network. His family had a little history there with CBS. His father actually served on William Paley\u2019s first board at CBS. So anyway, unrelated to that, the president, you know, put out enough feelers and vibes that he wanted to have a chance to meet, and we did just after January \u201993 when he left office. We met, we played golf, and this incredible friendship was spawned.<\/p>\n
RUSH: Frank Chirkinian.<\/p>\n
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NANTZ: Frank Chirkinian wants to know why you canceled your golf lesson from a couple of days ago out at the great Emerald Dunes.<\/p>\n
RUSH: (laughing) Because I\u2019m working.<\/p>\n
NANTZ: Okay, now he said you desperately are in need of a lesson. I know you\u2019re going out to the national Boys & Girls Club function next week, which is a great charity event. But Mr. Chirkinian, for those who don\u2019t know, is the father of golf television, absolute legend in sports television, just got the lifetime sports Emmy a few weeks ago in New York, and he was a father figure to me, and he gave me that tough-love approach. You know, when I first started, I was working with the likes of Summerall and Venturi and some gentlemen I had been listening to, watching, my whole life. I couldn\u2019t believe now I was their colleague, and I was throwing it from hole to hole by, ‘Let\u2019s go back to Mr. Summerall. Mr. Venturi, let me ask you this.\u2019 And finally Frank, after a few shows, brought me to the office and just scolded me, ‘You don\u2019t call these guys mister this or that.\u2019 I had a lot of that tough love, but you know, at first I wasn\u2019t seeing a lot of the love part of the deal.<\/p>\n
RUSH: Now, you tell a funny story. I guess your first tower assignment was at the 16th hole.<\/p>\n
NANTZ: At my first Masters —<\/p>\n
RUSH: At Augusta, first Masters and very close to the green, and you asked Frank, ‘What do I say if someone hits a hole-in-one here?\u2019<\/p>\n
NANTZ: Yeah, I was about to head out for the final round, what would turn out to be maybe the greatest day in the history of the game because Jack Nicklaus would that day win his sixth green jacket. So, you know, I was aware, and I\u2019d watched the tournament forever, and I knew that back left hole location was vulnerable to a hole-in-one. ‘What should I say, Mr. Chirkinian, if someone makes a hole-in-one?\u2019 He said, ‘Son, this is a visual medium. You say nothing! Now get outta my office, and don\u2019t ever come in here and ask me a stupid question like that!\u2019 And I ran out to 16, and Jack almost knocked it in from the first tee. I took a peek at the hole. I couldn\u2019t get the words out, Rush.<\/p>\n
I was so overwhelmed and overmatched, and 26, not believing the network entrusted this weighty assignment with me and I said nothing after he hit the ball until about five minutes later when he knocked the putt in. Now, Frank never cut away off the scene of Jack walking around the pond up to the green, standing around, lining up his putt. I couldn\u2019t talk; my teeth were chattering; I had chill bumps up and down my arms, and thankfully I wasn\u2019t on camera to paint this picture because it would have been an ugly sight. In fact, I was concerned that the mic might be picking up my clicking molars as my teeth were chattering. Finally, Jack makes the putt to tie the lead, and I somehow mustered up enough courage to say, ‘The bear has come out of hibernation,\u2019 sounding, of course, much more mature than my 26 young years, and I was just trying to find a way, Rush, to get invited back the next year. I didn\u2019t want to be one and done and blow it right there.<\/p>\n
RUSH: Well, it turned out you had nothing to worry about.<\/p>\n
NANTZ: Well, I didn\u2019t know it at the time. I was consumed with self-doubt, believe me.<\/p>\n
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RUSH: All right, so you\u2019re a kid growing up, and you watch CBS, you have to have idols, you have to have people who inspired you, and in spite of that you have your own unique style, you\u2019re nobody else. What about Ray Scott?<\/p>\n
NANTZ: I love Ray Scott and I heard you say Jack Buck and Harry Caray, two icons, but Ray Scott was like the father of the NFL on CBS in those old Green Bay Packers days, and the ultimate minimalist on the air, you know, ‘Starr-Dowler. Touchdown. Green Bay.\u2019 I got to meet Mr. Scott early in my career, and he was so generous with his time. He was retired living in Arizona. But really the Ray Scott, Pat Summerall, Jim McKay, Jack Whitaker, Chris Schenkel, Dick Enberg, Curt Gowdy, that whole group, that really represented the group that really drove me to want to be in this business, the impetus to make this declaration, ‘I want to work for CBS,\u2019 because they were always so smart, erudite about everything. They didn\u2019t try to make the game about them.<\/p>\n
They were there to tell the story, it wasn\u2019t about the teller. I got hired, again it was back in the mid-eighties, all of them were alive at that time. Now we\u2019ve lost Mr. Gowdy and Mr. Schenkel. But they\u2019ve all become a part of my life, and I want to be a composite of all of them. I want them all to feel invested in my career. And, for example, Chris Schenkel, you remember Chris?<\/p>\n
RUSH: Yes.<\/p>\n
NANTZ: Chris Schenkel one time called me up — and they all call me up, you know, from time to time after a show — and usually they say something like, ‘Mr. Whitaker called after the Masters this year and praised the opening to the Masters show as the best in the history of the tournament,\u2019 which meant a lot to me.<\/p>\n
RUSH: You know why they\u2019re doing that? Because they know that you are preserving a tradition that\u2019s vanishing before their very eyes in terms of the way sports is brought into people\u2019s homes these days on television. Do you have a couple more minutes?<\/p>\n
NANTZ: I would love to, Rush.<\/p>\n
RUSH: We\u2019ll be back and continue with Jim Nantz, Always by My Side is his brand-new book. By the way, it debuted on the New York Times list already.<\/p>\n
BREAK TRANSCRIPT<\/p>\n
RUSH: We are in the midst of having a great time with Jim Nantz, CBS Sports, his book, Always by My Side, has debuted already on the upcoming New York Times best-seller list, A Father\u2019s Grace and a Sports Journey Unlike Any Other. I\u2019m really taken by what you said right before the break and I had to cut you short, but you talk about all these people that have come before you, Jim, and you want to be a composite of them. One of the things that, when we speak politically, you know, the traditions, the institutions that have made this country great are worth preserving, and that\u2019s what you\u2019re doing in your field, and that\u2019s why all these people have such reverence for you is because you revered what they did and the ground that they broke, and you\u2019re continuing that tradition against a whole lot of odds, you know, as the media markets expand and get filled with niche broadcasters, you still are defining the right way to do it, and that\u2019s why they\u2019re appreciative.<\/p>\n
NANTZ: I think I\u2019m lucky, Rush, in that I got in just in time. The industry definitely has changed, and I\u2019m talking about young broadcasters who come along today, they really feel like they have to do something that\u2019s outlandish to make them stand out. They have to say something provocative that maybe they don\u2019t even really truly believe in their heart and, you know, it\u2019s not really what their beliefs are, but they\u2019re going to sacrifice their beliefs to try to do something to gain attention and I\u2019ve just never tried to be anything other than who I am. And it\u2019s interesting that sometimes it gets you in a little bit of trouble, the old-fashioned conservative approach to doing it, but, you know —<\/p>\n
RUSH: What kind of trouble?<\/p>\n
NANTZ: Well, since it recently happened, let\u2019s say you do the Masters tournament, and there are some columnists, and this is not a rant at all, people are entitled to their opinion, but people sometimes don\u2019t get that sport. They don\u2019t understand golf, and, in fact, I find the mainstream media to be incredibly anti-everything golf. It\u2019s the easiest sport in the world to attack and all those who are associated with it, so it becomes a breeding ground for ridicule. You can come on the air and you can try to wax poetic and do something that\u2019s lyrical and write something that is written in television form. It\u2019s maybe not grammatically spot on, believe me, I have no grammarian in the world who has any issue with anything I say, but you write something and maybe it\u2019s got some drama to it, and the person that\u2019s reading it or hearing it, doesn\u2019t get it, they don\u2019t understand the sport, they don\u2019t understand what it\u2019s like to walk onto the grounds of Augusta, and for me it\u2019s the childhood dream.<\/p>\n
I have chill bumps even to this day when I show up there every year. So I don\u2019t look at the world through a prism of sarcasm. Anything I do, I take things face on. I tell you how I feel, and what you hear on the air is what I\u2019m feeling. I\u2019m not going to try to fake it, create synthetic drama. I\u2019m just going to be myself.<\/p>\n
RUSH: They\u2019re just jealous, Jim.<\/p>\n
NANTZ: (laughing) I don\u2019t know about that.<\/p>\n
RUSH: They\u2019re just jealous. They wish they had what you had, including your talent.<\/p>\n
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NANTZ: You know, my father used to look at people and he treated everyone with such respect, and he always believed that he would rather trust you face on and be disappointed perhaps down the road, be disappointed some of the time rather than never to trust someone, never to believe in someone, and alas, be disappointed all the time. There\u2019s a big difference there.<\/p>\n
RUSH: And you try to replicate that philosophy to this day?<\/p>\n
NANTZ: I do in everything that I do. I mean that\u2019s just the way I live my life. I was raised that way. I\u2019m wired that way.<\/p>\n
RUSH: I can confirm this. You won\u2019t remember this, but this was a big deal to me. It might have been my first or second AT&T. I was playing with Fuzzy Zoeller, and it was Saturday morning before the Saturday round at Pebble, and we were on the putting green, you and your crew were out there, and I think this is actually — I might have seen you at a golf course another day, but I think it was the first time we actually had a chance to talk, and right then and there you were taking people to an Italian restaurant somewhere outside of Pebble that night, and you invited me to go. You didn\u2019t invite me; you told me I was going. I had to fly back, we weren\u2019t going to make the cut, and I had to fly back, but it was the next year that I was there, you invited me.<\/p>\n
And he had no idea who I was other than by reputation, it didn\u2019t matter, I was going to his dinner. So that will confirm for people that you see the best in everybody first and let \u2019em disappoint you. One more sportscasting question based on all these guys that have come before you and did not insert themselves into the event. There\u2019s one big name who did, got away with it, Howard Cosell.<\/p>\n
NANTZ: You know, in the last few months I\u2019ve met Howard Cosell\u2019s grandsons. They actually live up my way here in Connecticut, and I have great admiration for them and for their grandfather, and I read all of the three books that Howard authored, and I thought he had a brilliant mind, and I met him on a couple of occasions when I was in school at Houston, and the first time I walked up very timidly and shook his hand and told him I wanted to be a broadcaster, you know, I loved all things ABC Sports back in that golden age of sports television. His wife, Emmy, was always with him, and that struck me. I just thought that meant a lot, and I see that now as I\u2019m someone that\u2019s, you know, living this life of the road warrior, but, you know, just a few months later the Houston Astros were playing, because I first met him at a football banquet, then I met him during the baseball playoffs, he was doing some baseball work for ABC with Keith Jackson, and I met him in Philadelphia, and I walked over, and he says, ‘You know, Emmy –‘ that was his wife, and she is unfortunately gone as well, ‘Emmy remembers you from down in Houston.<\/p>\n
She\u2019s here, why don\u2019t you go over and say hello to her. You made an impression on her young man,\u2019 and I went over, and I saw Emmy Cosell, I walked over and introduced myself, said, ‘I met you in Houston.\u2019 I couldn\u2019t believe it. I mean months later you think of all the thousands of people that he must have met, and for some reason, he had later shared that with his wife and they had discussed it and he knew that she would still remember me as well. I\u2019ll never forget that.<\/p>\n
RUSH: You know, I don\u2019t want to intrude on your space here, but I have a similar story, when I was in Pittsburgh working for an ABC-owned-and-operated radio station, Cosell would come in when they had a Monday night game for the Steelers, and the next morning he would go into the radio station, which is KQV, and he would do his Speaking of Sports commentary, and of course we would all make sure we were there to meet him. And this was 1972. About 1979 or \u201980, he came in with ABC to Kansas City when I was working for the Royals to do a game, and I\u2019m up in the press box where my assigned duties took place and he\u2019s down in the first base, before the gates are open, he\u2019s down in the first base dugout, the Royals dugout, and he\u2019s pretaping an opening, rehearsing it.<\/p>\n
So I got my courage up and went down there, and I told him I had met him in Pittsburgh, ‘Great to see you,\u2019 and his first reaction was: Howard Cosell, ‘How dare you insult me, interrupt me, when I\u2019m in the middle of this preparation for this broadcast. You expect me to remember you from Pittsburgh?\u2019 and then he totally changed, after I\u2019m sitting there quaking in my boots, ‘Of course, I remember, how are you? Nice to see you.\u2019<\/p>\n
NANTZ: Oh, isn\u2019t that great. Brilliant.<\/p>\n
RUSH: You know, these guys, one more name, two more names here. Don Ohlmeyer. I didn\u2019t know that you knew Ohlmeyer. I never associated Ohlmeyer with CBS.<\/p>\n
NANTZ: Well, Ohlmeyer was the executive producer of NBC Sports when I was a college sophomore, and along with my roommates, the ones we\u2019ve mentioned earlier, all professional golfers later to become, we marched out to the Houston Open on a school day, and there was the NBC compound and they all said, ‘Hey, you ought to go ask him for a job.\u2019 They knew, of course, I had this crazy dream one day I was going to work golf television or work sports for CBS, and I went over to the security guard and asked for Don Ohlmeyer to please come out, I\u2019d like to have a word with him, the guy says, ‘May I ask him who wants to speak to him?\u2019 ‘Yeah, tell him Jim Nantz is here to see him.\u2019 About five minutes later here comes Don Ohlmeyer with the security guard, ‘I\u2019m sorry, I\u2019m looking for Jim Nantz?\u2019 Suddenly, I realized I\u2019m kind of in the middle of a bad college prank, but I introduced him to my roommates, and he said, ‘How can I help you?\u2019 and I explained I was on the golf team and I wanted to one day carve out a career in his field and is there any employment available this weekend? ‘What do you have in mind?\u2019 And one of the guys blurted out, ‘He wants to be an announcer.\u2019 Well, he chuckled, ‘We have all the announcers we need this weekend, but I\u2019ll tell you what, the compound\u2019s out here at 17, the announcers have to park up by the clubhouse.<\/p>\n
I could get you a job if you would volunteer. I can\u2019t pay anything. You could drive the announcers, shuttle them from the parking lot to the compound and to their towers for the broadcast. Would you be interested in doing that?\u2019 Would I be interested in doing that? I figured if I couldn\u2019t be on the air, you know, hanging out with the announcers had to be the second biggest job, so that got me really my ‘in\u2019 to be honest. The next week I did go work for them again up at the Byron Nelson tournament and that was my start. I started calling radio stations and got work off of that.<\/p>\n
RUSH: See, now here\u2019s another life lesson which is what you said sports has taught you and what really still holds your interest today. You\u2019ve mentioned luck, a number of times today in discussing your career, but luck is where preparation meets opportunity, and whether it was a prank or not, you went up and asked for it.<\/p>\n
NANTZ: Yes, absolutely right, there is something about persistence or perseverance or just thinking out of a box a little bit, and you\u2019re right, ‘luck\u2019 often is the wrong word, good fortune maybe is a better description. I have a friend that plays with you out at the AT&T, Don Lucas, and he one time told me that I need to drop the luck thing a little bit and talk more about fortune, because, you know, you do get these moments of fate, and then what are you going to do with them? You know, it\u2019s like, Rush, I know you\u2019ve talked about this many times, but take 41 for example, 41 has this friendship that develops with President Clinton through all their efforts for tsunami relief over in southeast Asia, and later Katrina relief. Well, he calls me up one year at the Final Four in St. Louis and says, ‘Hey, Jimmy, I have a favor I need to ask.\u2019 Now, I know through experience that when President Bush, Sr., says he\u2019s got a favor to ask, that means he\u2019s about to lay the biggest favor in the world on you. So, ‘Sure, sir, how can I help you?\u2019 He said, ‘Well, you know, I\u2019ve been traveling around the world here with President Clinton.<\/p>\n
We\u2019ve decided we want to do something that\u2019s never been done before. We want to have like just a social get-together, and we don\u2019t want the media to know about it, and I just want to make sure that President Clinton has a good time. I don\u2019t want this thing to be political. I don\u2019t want to talk about world issues. My favor I\u2019m asking, would you consider being our intermediary?\u2019 Well, you know, you can assign me to go call a Super Bowl or host the Olympics or the Masters, what have you, but to think that the first time they had this social setting for two days —<\/p>\n
![](\"https:\/\/live-rush-limbaugh.pantheonsite.io\/wp-content\/uploads\/An_Hour_with_Jim_Nantz.Par.77391.ImageFile.jpg\")
RUSH: Was at Kennebunkport, right? Walker\u2019s Point.<\/p>\n
NANTZ: Yeah, Walker\u2019s Point. To think that my father would have been aware of this, this would have been something that he would have been most proud of, the fact that this was history in fact, that these two would get together for a quasi-vacation, that his son was the hand-chosen intermediary between two presidents and got invited back again the next year and the year after that, well, my goodness, in his eyes that would have been his son\u2019s greatest accomplishment.<\/p>\n
RUSH: And, you know, in addition to all this, you\u2019re really a great friend because you permitted yourself to be in the photo. You let them put you in the picture. You got it in your book. I think you\u2019re out on the president\u2019s boat.<\/p>\n
NANTZ: Well, you know, the second year President Bush called back for another favor and said, ‘You know, we need a fourth this year to play golf. I want it to be really fun for President Clinton. Do you have any ideas? I don\u2019t want anybody to travel too far to come here. Listen, you got a lot of friends, anybody close by?\u2019 I said, ‘How about Tom Brady?\u2019 He said, ‘You mean the New England Patriots quarterback?\u2019 I said, ‘Well, yes, sir, he\u2019s just 90 miles down the road in Foxboro, he\u2019s a good golfer, I\u2019ve got his number, good friend, I think he\u2019d come up.\u2019 ‘Do you really think Tom Brady would come up here and play golf with us?\u2019 I said, ‘I don\u2019t know, sir, let\u2019s see, President Bush, President Clinton, I kind of like our chances.\u2019 He said, ‘Well, then Jimmy, by all means invite him.\u2019 So we got Tom Brady to come up the next year. We had a glorious day of golf. We played sixes where everybody got to play with one another and switch the bags around so you rode for six holes and I\u2019m here to report to you the results, okay?<\/p>\n
RUSH: Yeah.<\/p>\n
NANTZ: Bush-Brady defeated Nantz-Clinton one up. Bush-Nantz played Clinton-Brady to a draw.<\/p>\n
RUSH: Yeah, but Brady is a scratch.<\/p>\n
NANTZ: He is. He shot 73 on the day. Now, the last six holes as Brady puts his bag on the cart to ride with me the final six holes, I turned to him and said, ‘Now look, Tom, you\u2019ve won three Super Bowls, that\u2019s all well and good, but there have been other guys who have won Super Bowls, okay? You have a chance now to do something truly historic here,\u2019 and he\u2019s kind of laughing, giggling, ‘What\u2019s that?\u2019 ‘Never in the history of our country have two former presidents, one of whom defeated the other, ever partnered up on a golf course to take on just, you know, two guys off the street.<\/p>\n
We have a chance to make history here today.\u2019 Well, suddenly, you know, there was a perceptible change in Tom\u2019s gaze. He suddenly looked like that quarterback on those rare occasions trying to lead his team down the field when the Patriots are trailing in the fourth quarter, and we defeated Bush-Clinton over the last six holes, five up. As we\u2019re coming up the 18th, Clinton looks over at us, slump shouldered and rasps, ‘Boy, you guys sure don\u2019t take it easy on a couple of old presidents, do ya?\u2019 And I responded, ‘Welcome to the National Football League, Mr. President.\u2019<\/p>\n
RUSH: ‘Couple of guys off the street.\u2019 Okay, look, I have to take a break. I\u2019m a little long. I got one more question to ask.<\/p>\n
NANTZ: Okay.<\/p>\n
RUSH: Do you have time for it?<\/p>\n
NANTZ: Okay.<\/p>\n
RUSH: Jim Nantz, Always by My Side is the book, A Father\u2019s Grace and a Sports Journey Unlike Any Other. Be right back.<\/p>\n
BREAK TRANSCRIPT<\/p>\n
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RUSH: Back to our final moments with Jim Nantz, whose new book is out, already on the New York Times best-seller list, Always By My Side — that doesn\u2019t mean don\u2019t get it, I\u2019m just telling you how widely, popularly received it already has been, Always By My Side: A Father\u2019s Grace and a Sports Journey Unlike Any Other. Jim, just a couple minutes here. You have a unique ability here to keep your childlike appreciation for what you do despite all of these people that you have met. And, by the way, I got e-mails from people saying: ‘Jim Nantz for president.\u2019<\/p>\n
NANTZ: (laughing) I like the sound of that, Rush. I\u2019d like to talk about politics because I would love to one day maybe even think about it. Go ahead.<\/p>\n
RUSH: Okay. The real question I want to know here is tell us something about Tiger Woods. And I\u2019ve got one broadcasting question after that, tell us something about Tiger Woods we don\u2019t know.<\/p>\n
NANTZ: Well, Tiger, you see the game face. You know the focus stories about how he\u2019s locked in and how he can walk right past a guy like Jack Nicklaus, the very man he wants to, you know, break every record that Jack holds. It\u2019s just part of this genius that his father instilled in him. I one time got him beyond the game face, if you will, he was coming up into my tower to be interviewed, he graciously accepted, and my daughter, Caroline, was just five years old at the time, and she was all excited, she was going to meet the great Tiger Woods, and I told Tiger on the way up to the towers, we\u2019re climbing the steps, ‘My daughter Caroline is going to be up there. She just can\u2019t wait to meet you, Tiger.\u2019 So we walk in, and everyone is pointing, and they\u2019re pointing underneath the chair. So I get it, she\u2019s playing kind of a hide-and-seek thing here and she\u2019s just nervous as all kids are about meeting some superstar celebrity.<\/p>\n
So Tiger instantly breaks into, you know, ‘the game.\u2019 He drops his voice down to like a childlike cadence and he\u2019s saying, ‘I thought I was going to see Caroline up here. This is why I came here. Caroline, where are you? Are you over here?\u2019 pushes back some curtains, ‘No, she\u2019s not there,\u2019 being very theatrical about it all the while knowing she\u2019s curled up in a ball underneath this one given chair. Goes to another place, ‘Are you here? No.\u2019 Gets down on all fours and crawls over to the chair, ‘Oh, there you are, peekaboo, I\u2019m Tiger. Come on out; let\u2019s play. I wanted to meet you.\u2019 And I just thought, what a wonderful snapshot of Tiger Woods, the Tiger we so seldom get to see because everybody in the world\u2019s trying to get into that world and trying to be a part of his universe, and it was just a lovely impromptu moment.<\/p>\n
RUSH: Jim, you\u2019ve led a remarkable life. You have one of the most solid foundations that a human being could have. I think it\u2019s fabulous that you\u2019ve written the book to share that with people, because it\u2019s inspirational. You have been fabulous in this hour. I thank you so much for the time, looking forward to seeing you on Tuesday out at Torrey Pines. Have a wonderful weekend, and, again, wish we had more time \u2019cause I got people still wanting to know if you had to get rid of your Connecticut accent. I\u2019ll find out about that and I\u2019ll tell \u2019em next week whatever you tell me, but again thanks for the time and all the best.<\/p>\n
NANTZ: I\u2019m so grateful, Rush, for the time to talk to you, and you\u2019re just a great friend. Thanks so much for having me on today.<\/p>\n
RUSH: You bet. Jim Nantz, Always by My Side. You\u2019ve just heard maybe about 30 pages of this book in this interview just now.<\/p>\n
END TRANSCRIPT<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
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<\/p>\n