“Tripping In and Out of L.A.”

January 1, 2022

“My Holiday Season with Sports in Los Angeles”

Los Angeles, California - My last blog, published November 17th, came the day after I was tripping out at a Clipper game. A notification had come on my phone that the arena I was sitting in, Staples Center, was going to be renamed after a crypt, effective Christmas Day.  One thing I have known since starting Sports Stories with Denny Lennon (SSDL), I wouldn’t have to go far to find unique stories.

I grew up in the City of Angels in the 70’s, when USC in football and UCLA in basketball ruled the national scene, and the likes of Vin Scully, Chick Hearn, Dick Enberg and Bob Miller painted the pictures for our pro sports teams.  L.A. was a trip then, and remains one now.  These days, UCLA and USC have the right people in power and most of our pro teams are in the hunt for championships.

Living in and around Los Angeles is unlike anything else.  I know my “friends” in television law enforcement would agree, from Joe Friday to Colombo to Jim Rockford, Los Angeles, and particularly Venice, provided the perfect backdrop for a diversified life and a slanted view of the world.  “You got that right, brother” my new TV detective buddy, Harry Bosch would affirm.  And so, instead of a wrapping up the entire year of 2021 as 2022 arrives, I present just the holiday season in the trippiest of cities.  

Thanksgiving, Lawrence Welk Resort, Escondido, CA

November 25:  Escondido?  Yep, sometimes you got to get away.  It was Thanksgiving and I was lucky to enough to take a short trip out of LA and be with my family at the Lawrence Welk Resort in Escondido, North of San Diego.  Nothing like a resort named after a band leader born in 1903 in North Dakota to Roman Catholic ethnic Germans.  Coming up in more than modest circumstances, Welk didn’t speak English until he was 21, but that didn’t stop him from rising to fame and fortune in Los Angeles with his unique style of “Champagne Music”.  Welk died 30 years ago but his resort property just sold to Marriott for half a billion.  Can’t make this stuff up.  I am looking forward to seeing how much Marriott has to pay to keep the “Next to Real Neil” Neil Diamond tribute show playing at the Welk Theater.  Let me tell you, that show is in for a huge pay day, but not nearly the pay day a guy moving west from Oklahoma was in for. 

USC Football, LA Memorial Coliseum, Los Angeles

November 28:  Lincoln Riley was named the new football coach at USC, complete with a press conference starring the new coach, the skyline of L.A. and the Hollywood sign.  All the school had to do to land the coveted coach was back up a ship with a boat load of money to the new house they bought him in Manhattan Beach.  Lincoln Riley, eh?  Can we ever really trust a person with two last names?  I suppose so if you combine the “Great Emancipator” with some Irish guy who has a life filled with luck…and money.  

Now all Lincoln, um, er, Riley, has to do to is meet the expectations of a school and fan base who’d like for everyone to forget that USC has lead the nation in criminal activities these past few years.  A medical school dean on meth performing surgeries?  Yep. Basketball coach caught taking bribes and busted by the FBI.  Check.  A gynecologist sexually abusing hundreds of patients.  That happened.  “Varsity Blues” scandal, song girls in distress, federal charges against a councilman and a school dean, okay, okay, I think the point has been made.  One thing we all know is that the fastest way to fix institutional criminality by a university is to win football games.

So, as long as Riley can win national championships like Pete Carroll did almost 20 years ago and John McKay did some 50 years ago, everything will be just fine.  Legends like Carroll and McKay may cast their shadows over the USC football program, but no coach casts a shadow quite like the greatest collegiate basketball coach of all time. 

UCLA Basketball, Pauley Pavilion, Westwood 

Dec 1:  John Wooden was another guy from the middle of the country to find celebrity and success by making a trip to LA.  After the “Indiana Rubber Man” was the top basketball player in the country at Purdue in the 1930’s, he made his way to the City of Angels around the same time Welk arrived.  Coach Wooden made his music coaching the UCLA Bruins, famously winning 10 NCAA championships over a 12 year period.  

My friend Earl Goldberg, a UCLA grad and supporter of the athletic program, invited me to see my other friend, well, acquaintance is more accurate, Bruin coach Mick Cronin lead the Bruins against Colorado.  Cronin, the current man to fall under the Wooden shadow, is off to a great start as the coach, especially after last years run to the Final Four and this years high national ranking and 8-1 start.    

Wooden’s influence can be felt all over campus.  After parking and walking towards Pauley Pavilion, I pass by the Wooden Center where students enjoy their recreation time, pretty soon I walk by the statue of Coach to meet Earl for some pre game food and drink in the Pavilion Club, which of course was financed by the Wooden Athletic Fund.  

Sitting a couple rows behind the Bruins bench, on Nell and John Wooden Court, one thing is for sure:  Coach Cronin was a lot nicer to me at the Pump Foundation Celebrity dinner than he is to his players.  Miss a defensive assignment playing for Cronin and that man can be cold as ice.  Yes, there is ice in L.A., we keep it at the Staples Center, in the er, uh, the crypt?   

LA Kings Hockey, Staples Center, DTLA

Dec 2:  The only time you really get to see ice on the ground in L.A. is if you go to a hockey game.  The most compelling story line of the Kings playing host to the Calgary Flames that night was not the impending name change of the arena, but the trip back to Los Angeles for Flames coach Darryl Sutter.  Sutter, from Alberta, one of the prairie provinces in Canada (which sounds a lot like North Dakota, Oklahoma and Indiana), was back on the bench in the arena where he coached the Kings to two Stanley Cup triumphs in 2012 and 2014.  I miss Sutter’s post game press conferences, with his unique drawl, direct approach and homespun reasoning.  “I guess I don’t get to see the cows for a while”, he noted when the Kings hired him.  

High School Basketball, Staples Center, DTLA

Dec 4: The Chosen 1’s Invitational, a prep basketball showcase event, took to the Staples Center court with selected, “chosen” I suppose, boys and girls teams from across the country.  I was there with SSDL cinematographer “Bad Boy” Bobby MacColl to cover the subject of an upcoming Sports Stories docuseries on the sensational Juju Watkins, the top rated girls high schooler in nation.  

It appears that Juju, now playing for the Sierra Canyon School Trailblazers, was “chosen” to administer a beat down of Christ…the King, the school from from New York City!, Jeez, take it easy! Christians really can jump to conclusions when you take your time to write something out.  Pretty sure my mother-in-law and 8th grade teacher Sister Martha would administer me with a beat down if they read my blogs. 

Watkins, as great of a kid as she is a hooper, put on a show on L.A.’s biggest basketball stage.  She tortured, wait, no, not the right word.  She dominated, yes, that’s better, the Royals, scoring 39 points, grabbing 10 rebounds and swatting away six shots.  

It would be another Trailblazer’s turn, some four nights later, on the same floor, to go Medieval on some Celtics. 

LA Clippers Basketball, Staples Center, DTLA

Dec 8:  Yes, I went to the soon to be “crypt” three times in a week.  I must have some kind of death wish.  It’s not that bad of a trip from my place in the Centinela Adobe Corridor.  Just your basic 405 to 105 to 110, exit Figueroa and you’re there.  Also there? The dreaded Celtics…from Boston!  

Brandon Boston (no relation to the city) is a 19 year old playing for the Clippers that got his shot, literally, that night because Paul George (I find people with two first names suspicious too) was out.  Brandon, who two years previous was winning a high school state title at Sierra Canyon School, Trailblazed (word?) his way into scoring scoring 27 points in 25 minutes to bury the green clad clan.

Brandon, as exciting as any young player in the NBA, might want to consider changing that last name, to something like…Hollywood?   

Movie Premiere, Culver City Film Festival

Dec 9:  Movie?  That’s right!  Why would I bring up a movie premiere in a sports blog?  Because I am in it, that’s why!  This is LA, baby!  If it’s good enough for Dan Patrick, it’s good enough for me.  The movie, “Emily or Oscar?”, directed by Chris M. Allport, has been winning award after award at film festivals and soon my loyal readers will get to see me on the big screen pretending to play the piano in a cabaret scene.  

I also had a line in another scene, one where I scoffed at my friend Stephen Kalinich, who played a mystic in the movie but in real life is a poet that collaborated with the Beach Boys on some classic songs. Can’t make this stuff up.

L.A. Chargers Football, Sofi Stadium, Inglewood

Dec 12:  Remember when Sofia Loren came to Hollywood in the late 1950’s?  Me neither, I wasn’t born yet.  But I know that naming the most beautiful stadium in the world after her was a good idea.  And I know I have seen very few more beautiful passes than the 60 yard strike Charger QB Justin Herbert threw to end the first half against the Giants. 

NCAA Volleyball Final Four, Columbus, Ohio 

Dec 15-18:  Sometimes, the L.A. weather can wear you down, so getting a chance to “winter” in places like Columbus, Ohio is a bonus to being able to watch the Final Four of the most popular NCAA women’s sport.  I had a chance to see the future of the sport, when Wisconsin, behind 6’9” Anna Smrek and 6’8” Dana Rettke, led the Badgers to the title.  

These two athletic middles were the key factor in a thrilling final at a sold out Nationwide Arena.  There was, of course, L.A. connections.  Smrek is the daughter of former Laker Mike Smrek and Rettke was a finalist for the 90th AAU Sullivan Award in 2020, which was virtually hosted by yours truly from Los Angeles.      

Christmas Day in the Centinela Adobe Corridor

Dec 25:  Besides SSDL releasing the highly anticipated “Christmas in the Corridor, featuring The Boxcobbler” to rave reviews, it was time for a new beginning.  We will always remember this Christmas for the introduction of “Dodger”, our new puppy and aptly named for the home baseball team.  Dodger will do well to be as loved as our last dog, “Buck”, who we lost last holiday season.  Buck, named for Laker legend Magic Johnson, gained infamy as the tag line at the end of SSDL productions, as in “Kick it out, Buck!”.  Let’s Go Dodger!  

Pylon 7on7, Sofi Stadium, Inglewood

Dec 29:  Up to no good in the Ingle-what?  Ingle-WOOD!  Actually, these kids were up to a lot of good.  Some of the best high school senior football players in the nation had a chance to play in the most beautiful stadium in the world in the “Pylon 7on7 Experience”.  Wonder how many of those players know who they named the place after?    

Happy New Year!

It has been quite a trip these last six weeks in my city, and today the rest of the country stops in via ESPN to watch “The Grandaddy of the All”, the Rose Bowl parade and game.  The sky was recently scrubbed clean from rain, the snow-capped San Gabriel Mountains will be popping and I’m sure people from across the country will be inspired to take a trip.  

• Denny Lennon is the President of Sports Stories, Inc., and the host of the “Sports Stories with Denny Lennon” docuseries features and the “Preps To Olympians” live TV show, syndicated on cable TV and playing every weeknight at 7pm (PT) on LA36.

Sports Stories with Denny Lennon shows, including video podcasts, archived live shows and special features are available at:  YouTube.com/SSDL

Social media links, archives and more are available on our website:  SportsStoriesDL.com