Barry Tompkins: The cheap, the heartless, and the unforgivable – Marin Independent Journal

Barry Tompkins: The cheap, the heartless, and the unforgivable  Marin Independent Journal

Now that I am easing my way out of my day job, and into the nether world of figuring out what I really want to do when I grow up, I look back on 58 years of yammering about sports on television — 40 years of it bouncing from one network to another. And at times — all of them at once. And when I do, my first thought is “how did this little schnook from the Richmond District of San Francisco manage to survive the sharks that permeate — and often run — the business of radio and television?” I was told before I ever stepped in front of an open microphone, that I couldn’t have chosen a worse business.

Television sports is Fantasy Land, and having the ability to actually do the job in no way helps in getting the job. Over the years I’ve seen some of the most talented people I’ve been around in the industry be on the bricks, just hoping somebody will take a chance on them. The other thing that I was told back when I still had the option of selling women’s shoes at Chandler’s or maybe going back to my first job, working in the Accounts Payable Department of PG&E, was that at some point you will be fired. Likely more