Sports World Mourns Passing Of Jim Murray

Gasoline Alley was never the same once Jim Murray got to the Indy 500 and wrote:

"Gentlemen, start your coffins."

A simple, declarative verse as acerbic as Seinfeld.

No wonder they all laughed.

And cried.

And loved Murray, the Los Angeles Times sports columnist who meant as much to the City of Angels as anyone with a star on Hollywood Boulevard.

Murray, a Pulitzer Prize winner known for revolutionizing sportswriting and one of the founders of Sports Illustrated, died of cardiac arrest Sunday night at his Los Angeles home.

Murray wrote just the other day on horse racing from Del Mar, Calif. He wrote last week on the PGA Championship at Sahalee:

"It ain't the Masters. But it ain't chopped liver. You play for the rent money at the Greater Milwaukee Open. You play for the history books at the PGA."

At 78, Murray's caustic wit was as sharp as ever. His legend kept growing.

"He was absolutely everlasting," said Mike Downey, an L.A. Times sportswriter turned metro columnist. "I feel like a face on Mount Rushmore fell off."

His columns have been syndicated to as many as 150 U.S. newspapers, including The Seattle Times. He charmed readers with insightful prose on athletes and games and incensed them with piercing commentaries about their cities.

Our friends east of the Cascades knew a good thing when they read one. Spokane civic leaders once begged Murray to add their city to his long hit list. He obliged:

"The only trouble with Spokane, Wash., as a city is that there's nothing to do after 10 o'clock," Murray began. "In the morning."

He sent Northwesterners into a frenzy Thanksgiving Day 1981 when commenting on Washington's Rose Bowl berth.

"All right, Miss World, take a memo to the Tournament of Roses committee. Mark it, `Bad News.'

" . . . Of all the possibilities . . . the worst one came home. That funny little school (Washington State) up there near Montana - I forget the name of the town - isn't coming. It's even worse than that . . . "

He explained how Washington clinched a berth, then said of the Huskies: "They win games in conditions that would make the Murmansk run look like a Club Mediterranee tour - or Bali Hai. . . . They got a chance - if they can play in Vladivostok."

Angry Seattle Times readers responded en masse with letters. They should have been honored to enter Murray's lexicon of putdowns. They surely had company.

Here's what he once wrote about Baltimore: "Baltimore's a great place if you're a crab."

And San Francisco: "It's not a town, it's a no-host cocktail party. If it were human, it'd be W.C. Fields. It has a nice, even climate. It's always winter."

When he won the Pulitzer for commentary in 1990, he was only the fourth sports columnist to be honored, joining Red Smith, Arthur Daley and Dave Anderson, all New York Times writers. Murray was inducted into the Baseball Hall of Fame in 1987 for "meritorious contributions to baseball writing."

"Murray didn't quote people; people quoted Jim Murray," Downey said. "He brought urbane wit and fun to sports so that when people woke up the next morning they knew they could have a good time again."

While covering Hollywood for Time, Murray struck up friendships with Humphrey Bogart, Marilyn Monroe, Bing Crosby, Marlon Brando and Ronald Reagan.

He also knew the athletes he covered.

Golfer Arnold Palmer once buried his ball in a bunker and, spotting Murray somewhere in the gallery, Palmer said: "OK, Jim, you're always writing about how great Ben Hogan was. How would Hogan do in a situation like this?"

Murray: "Hogan wouldn't have been in a situation like this."

Murray was at his finest when tackling life's serious side. His most gripping columns dealt with the death of his first wife, Gerry, terrorism at the 1972 Munich Olympics and losing much of his eyesight because of a detached retina.

Murray, who began his newspaper career in the 1940s as a campus correspondent for the Hartford Times while attending Trinity College, later became a police reporter. He joined Time magazine in 1948 and became the West Coast editor for Sports Illustrated, which he helped found, in 1953. He joined the L.A. Times in 1961.

Murray is survived by his wife, Linda McCoy Murray, and three children from his first marriage, Ted, Tony and Pam.