20 years ago today

I read that today is a special day in the sports world - 20 years ago today, on February 11, 1990, Buster Douglas knocked out Mike Tyson in the 10th round to become the undisputed Heavyweight champion of the world. It still remains the biggest upset in boxing.

Two thoughts come to mind:

1. This is one of those sporting events that you recall exactly where you were when it happened or heard the news of the event. I'm not talking about events in which you have an interest in - hell, I can tell you where I was for every game of the 2001 Cleveland Browns season - but events that you don't have a real rooting interest, yet captivates you.

Over the past 25 years or so, there aren't many "special" events that fall into this category. Off the top of my head:
- 1986 World Series
- 1986 Masters
- 1989 Princeton v Georgetown
- 1990 Douglas v Tyson
- 1991 World Series
- 1994 Stanley Cup
- 1996 Masters
- 1997 Masters
- 2001 World Series
- Super Bowl 36 (Feb, 2002)
- Super Bowl 42 (Feb, 2008)

Others?

Where was I? It was late Saturday night in my dorm room, I think about 1 am or so. I was a freshman. We were probably drinking wine coolers or some God-awful concoction like Wyler's Cherry Kool Aid and Jack Daniels*. And then I heard the news of the Boxing upset.........

2. But how did I get the news? It was 1990, and it was 1 am. The dorm room did not have cable. Our rooms were wired for the internet - Case was the first college campus to provide all students with a "fiber-optic" internet connection - but there was no espn.com or anything. News, sports stories and others could be read off of usenet - but stories on Usenet were at least 1 hour behind real time.

So how did I find out the news of Tyson's loss?

Well, remember "Dial-a-Phone"? This was a service from the phone compnay where you can call a number, punch in a four digit code, and get the latest news, sports, weather, and so forth on the phone? You had to listen to a 30-second advertisement for a law firm, or for a car dealership ("The Showcase of Beautiful Cars....Hal Artz.....5930 Mayfield"), or some such nonsense. Then you got a 90-second recap of your requested topic.

I would call this every 30-60 minutes on the weekend - I think I was in a fantasy NBA league, for God's sake, and I was still a big Sacramento Kings fan at that time. So the Kings were probabl playing late, I was trying to get an update (or a final) at 1 in the morning.....

...and that's when the news of Tyson's upset came across.

Was this a joke? How do you verify? There was no breaking news on the TV- again, we didn't have cable. They weren't going to break into SNL - or, worse "Showtime at the Apollo" to tell viewers that Tyson lost. I stood there, dumbfounded. I told some people in the dorm - half didn't care, and half thought I was joking them.

Looking back at it, this story must seems completely insane. However, this was cutting edge technology in 1990. Breaking news by touch tone phone!


* - I swear, this is the actual drink that made me sick for the first week of Freshman year.