Jim Gray has hardly forgotten the last time he saw Rudy Martzke. They had lunch at The Cheesecake Factory, six or seven years ago, when the then-retired media icon and his wife, Phyllis, spent several days visiting family in Los Angeles.
Gray, the award-winning broadcaster who was frequently cited in Martzke’s popular Sports TV column in USA TODAY, remembered how Martzke – who died at 82 on Wednesday night due to complications from pneumonia – lamented that some things had changed in retirement.
During the heyday of his career, which was before Internet dominance and social media, Martzke was often instantly recognized as he checked into hotels or gave his name as he showed up for reservations at restaurants. He was a big draw with his Page 3 column in the hard copy of the newspaper. A typical greeting: “I read your column!”
When they last visited, in many ways Gray engaged with the same upbeat man that he knew for years. But something was different from Martzke’s perspective.
“ ‘You know what, Jim? Here’s the deal: They’re starting to forget my name,’ ” Gray recalled about their exchange during an interview with USA TODAY Sports after news spread about Martzke’s death. “It was a little melancholy. But it wasn’t morose.”
To the people who knew Martzke, or at least encountered him in the sports television industry, media or other walks of life, he is burned in their memories as a life-of-the-party force.
Martzke, who hailed from South Milwaukee, Wisconsin, lived in Kissimmee, Florida. He is survived by his wife of 58 years, Phyllis, affectionately as “Mouse,” sons Michael and Brett, and three grandchildren. A memorial service is being considered in January.
Bob Costas shared what another broadcasting legend, Al Michaels, succinctly noted of Martzke during a group chat: “Al said he was one of a kind. An unforgettable character.”
Costas knows. His connection to Martzke goes back to the mid-1970s, after Costas left Syracuse and landed a job with KMOX radio as the play-by-play announcer for the Spirits of St. Louis. When Costas applied, Martzke, director of operations for the American Basketball Association team, listened to the demo tape and knew it was a hit.
Although the legendary narrative maintains Martzke made the call, here’s the deal, according to Costas: KMOX technically made the hire.
“I was referred by the team,” Costas clarified.
In any event, looking back, it seems fitting that a future broadcasting megastar and future media power player would cross paths at that stage of their careers. And as a key front office figure for the team that played two seasons in St. Louis before it folded, Martzke had a vested interest in the young Costas’ work.
“Rudy got angry at me when I’d say something that was obvious, but was not from the ‘PR Handbook,’ ” Costas told USA TODAY Sports.
One night, a game against the San Antonio Spurs drew just 840 fans in the cavernous St. Louis Arena, which had a capacity of 19,000, Costas recalled. He suggested that Martzke announce the attendance at 1,012, because, well, some people may have gone to the concession stands or restrooms.
As Costas recalled, the response from Martzke included, “You little wiseass.”
He chuckled at the memory, then added, “I don’t think he had a malicious bone in his body.”
While Costas likened Martzke to the Oscar Madison character from the iconic TV series, “The Odd Couple,” another key industry figure compared him to a couple of renowned boxing promoters.
“Rudy had a little Don King and Bob Arum in him,” Michael Weisman, the former executive producer of NBC Sports, told USA TODAY Sports. “He had that ability to stir it up, cleverly.”
Weisman recalled that Martzke would sometimes bait him with a comment from an executive at a rival network, eliciting a retaliatory response that was even juicier.
“He knew how he could get that sexy headline in USA TODAY,” Weisman said.
Weisman landed his key role at NBC in 1982, the same year that USA TODAY launched with Martzke writing five columns per week. The son of a network publicist, Weisman sensed the value of becoming a much-quoted source of Martzke’s as they grew into their respective roles. So, if NBC was planning to use, for instance, a new isolation camera for its broadcast of NFL games, Weisman shared such tidbits.
“It helped fill his column,” he said. “I realized that you had to give him stuff that was at least interesting to the public. I was able to get attention because I gave him stuff.”
In turn, Weisman doesn’t hesitate in declaring, “Rudy made me a lot of money.”
That’s because senior executives who didn’t know Weisman by name learned it from reading Martzke’s column – and that helped during salary reviews.
In a larger context, though, Weisman said Martzke’s powerful impact was felt throughout the industry – by executives, producers and directors, on-air talent and others – because he provided feedback that wasn’t readily available on a national scale. That included negative critiques.
Although several industry figures readily shared reflections about Martzke, one longtime, award-winning executive contacted by USA TODAY Sports refused to comment. It’s possible that bad blood flowed from some of Martzke’s opinionated reviews.
“Everybody was going to read what he had in his column,” Gray said. “I believe he had significant influence. Whether he was praising you or criticizing you, I think it moved the needle for the people in charge. That was very rare.
“Nobody wanted the ‘Dreaded Glitch Award,’ “ Gray added.
The Monday columns that reviewed weekend broadcasts typically resonated the most.
“If you got an ‘Oops Award’ or the ‘Dreaded Glitch,’ it was going to be a bad day or a bad week,” Greg Hughes, executive vice president of communications for NBC Sports, told USA TODAY Sports. “This was before social media. He was like a ‘pass-fail’ for a lot of people.”
LeslieAnne Wade, formerly senior vice president of communications for CBS Sports, recalls waking up in hotel rooms many times during the 1980s and 1990s, and rushing to the door when she heard the thump of the USA TODAY being delivered outside the door on Monday mornings.
“You wanted to see what he wrote,” Wade told USA TODAY Sports.
She shared the strategy involved, especially when she worked as a publicist with a fledgling USA Network that starved for attention from Martzke.
“That real estate was so valuable,” she recalled. “You learned to say the smartest thing you could in the fewest words possible … to get into Rudy’s column.”
Then again, not everyone was eager to get a mention as Martzke’s negative critiques hampered some careers, according to several of the industry voices.
“He was revered and reviled,” said Rachel Shuster, a former columnist and editor who worked closely with Martzke. Shuster, who was the backup TV columnist before transitioning to a role where she often edited Martzke’s work, was as impressed by his ability to keep lines of communication open with sources that he criticized as she was by his vast network.
“He didn’t hold any punches,” Shuster said, “yet people still returned his calls.”
Listen to Hughes and the reason is apparent. Martzke had a knack for connecting with people. Hughes was a rookie publicist with Turner Sports in 1990 when he met Martzke and was assigned to handle his requests during the Goodwill Games in Seattle.
When Martzke, who graduated from the University of Wisconsin in 1964 with a journalism degree, found out that Hughes was a fellow Badger, it formed a bond that lasted decades. Hughes can recite from memory the date of Martzke’s last column in USA TODAY: April 15, 2005.
It’s no wonder that Hughes refers to the social skills that Martzke used in developing his network as “his secret sauce.” Yet he also vouched for his relentless hustle and wit in working the beat. Martzke reminded Hughes of Lieutenant Columbo, the 1970s-era TV detective played by Peter Falk, who would seemingly overlook a key detail – only to circle back after an initial exchange to ask a critical question that cracks the case.
“He was like Columbo,” Hughes said. “He’d call back and it’s ‘Hey, one more thing.’
“Oh crap, he remembered.”
Reid Cherner, who edited Martzke’s columns for about 15 years, can relate. Martzke wrote columns for 23 years until he retired in 2005, but in at least one way, it was not a clean break.
“The best part was when he left the paper, he kept calling,” Cherner recalled. “Because he had an opinion about what we were doing even after he left.”
Another reason why Martzke was so unforgettable.