Tuesday, August 24, 2010
IT has to be said that in the world of GAA broadcasting the late Michael O’Hehir left behind a distinguished pair of shoes. O’Hehir was a special fragment of our summer Sundays for what seemed like forever.
That voice is threaded through all the memories of the big games from Croke Park when life was simpler and we existed happily without pictures on increasingly larger flatter and brighter screens.
Yes indeed, he left behind a special pair of shoes and they said they would never be filled. But they have been filled.
Indeed, and it is hard to admit it, they were not big enough for the Kerry feet of the mighty Mícheál O Muircheartaigh.
His big hobnailed Brandon boots more than fill the space O’Hehir left behind. He is now an octogenarian since last week. The crowd honoured him in Croke Park on Sunday, the band played, and the full house echoed to the rousing strains of "Happy Birthday To You".
It was thoroughly deserved. The man is a living legend.
O’Hehir was the soaring tenor broadcaster of the mighty battles of the past and he was great too. In the times when there might only be a big dual-battery radio in every third or fourth rural home, Croke Park very far away, his was the voice that filled the kitchens when the championships got hot and the tensions electric. And woe betide if the wet battery started to give up the ghost at half-time!
His voice would climb to close to falsetto pitch when goals were scored or when what he always called "schmozzles" developed in goalmouths. He knew from which parish all the players hailed. He knew the people at home needed to be fed a little of the sights and excitements surrounding the action and he did that too.
But Mícheál O Muircheartaigh broadcasts a different presence along the same frequency. He’d be a baritone, now, rather than a tenor. The Kerry accent is powerful and so is its bilingual delivery at full throttle, sliding seamlessly from one language to another, yet missing no kick of the ball, no tackle, no move by any player anywhere on the field or even on the sideline.
He is, at a hale and hearty 80 years, still as good as ever he was, maybe even better. He is a master of his craft.
He is now the unchallenged voice of the special sporting organisation he has served so well for so long.
I know enough about the workings of the media to be aware of the intense competition that has always existed amongst those of us who service it across the scale. Never more so than now when new media facets are exploding on the scene about every second week. Who knew the word "podcast" a couple of years ago? What was "High Definition" then? The competition amongst the members of the Cork football panel for a place on the team doing duty in the All-Ireland final, for example, will be scarcely more intense than the competition for top places on the various media teams in action on the same day.
It was always that way and it is healthy and natural too.
See Mícheál O Muircheartaigh then, at 80 years of age, as you would see a veteran midfielder, an All Star, effortlessly holding his place on the first team despite all the spirited challenges from those who strive to take his coveted jersey. It would be exactly like that. The challenges would come from those who are younger, good at what they do, ambitious, determined, and slap-bang up to date with all the new technologies of broadcasting.
These are healthy challenges for any team. They improve the overall level of the team’s performances.
Especially they keep the veterans on their toes all the time.
Fair play then to the best-known new octogenarian in the country. He still tells the stories of the big games infinitely better than anyone else. There are many homes in the country to this day where they routinely turn off the TV sound and add O Muircheartaigh to the pictures! I’ve done it myself as often as not. His special sayings are now in the folklore of the game. He always finds niches in the action in which to remember special listeners away out in the diaspora in a heartwarming fashion. Not alone does he know everything about the players in action but he has also broadcast the prime feats of their fathers when they were wearing the county jerseys and also, probably, even a few of the grandfathers! And did he not once supervise the training sessions for the Dublin-based stars of the great Kerry team built by Micko? He knows football and hurling inside out and it percolates his commentaries with that special depth that matters so much.
Happy birthday to you Mícheál and many more of them. You are the Man Of All The Matches. Nobody else comes close. The best of them are lined along the sidelines of your enduring excellence. They are, despite their best efforts, still no more than the fluff in the turn-ups of your Kerry britches. It is the way of the world that some day one of them will eventually manage to take the jersey off your back. May that day be long delayed.
And God help the he (or she) who will some day attempt to fill those big Mount Brandon boots!
* cormac66@hotmail.com
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