March 7, 2008

By E.J. Borghetti -

It was a typically frenetic Monday morning in the fall. Phones were ringing. Email inboxes swelled with unread messages.

Such is life in the media relations office during the football season.

Our weekly press conference was about to go "live" in 90 minutes and there was still a laundry list of preparations to make. With cell phone in one hand and sports coat in the other, I headed out the door of the Petersen Events Center en route to our football practice facility. That's when a voice shouted down the hall, "You've got a phone call. Myron Cope wants to speak with you."

Certain calls -- no matter where you are or what you're doing -- take priority.

I had only been in Myron's company a handful of times. The first occurred when he taped the "You are the Panthers!" introduction for our video jumbotron. A few years later I ran into him when we were both having dinner at DeBlasio's Restaurant in the South Hills.

I hustled back to my office and picked up the phone. The voice on the line was gravelly but unmistakable. The tone had weakened in recent years but there remained an obvious strength.

"Thanks so much for taking my call. I'm sure you're busy and I don't want to bother you."

It was far from a bother I said, awed by his humility and politeness.  

"I want to talk to you about LeSean McCoy."

Myron had watched one of Coach Dave Wannstedt's recent press conferences and was dismayed that we had failed to use LeSean's nickname "Shady" even once during the half-hour session.

"When you call him `LeSean' he's just another college running back," Cope said. "When you call him `Shady' you set him apart from every other player in the country."

Such was Myron's instinct. He knew a star could shine even brighter if you tilted the spotlight just right.

He even called Bill Hillgrove during a Pitt football game broadcast - at a timeout of course - to remind him of the "Shady" impact.

Sadly, that would be among the final pieces of advice and counsel Myron would dispense to us. He passed away on February 27 at the age of 79.

Synonymous with the Pittsburgh Steelers, Myron actually began learning his craft at the University of Pittsburgh, where he worked for the Pitt News before graduating in 1951.

Myron was one of the original "triple threats" in sports journalism. Whether it was at a typewriter, in front of a camera or behind a radio microphone, Cope excelled.

Today, that journalistic versatility is taken for granted. Over the last 25 years, networks like ESPN and CNN have taken once-faceless print journalists and made them TV stars. Back in 1970, when Cope first joined the Steelers' broadcast team, there was no "Pardon the Interruption" or "The Sports Reporters" on TV. Cope can be viewed as a multi-media pioneer in this regard.

In 1976, Cope covered the Panthers' march to the national championship by using three different mediums - magazine, TV and radio.

Watching the highlight film from that season, you can catch two glimpses of Cope reporting from New Orleans, where the Panthers played Georgia in the Sugar Bowl. He is first seen hosting his nightly radio show, cigarette in hand, interviewing future Pitt coach Jackie Sherrill and the legendary Paul "Bear" Bryant, who Sherrill played for at Alabama.

A later sequence has him standing outside of a Bourbon Street nightspot, this time a WTAE-TV microphone in hand, describing the Panthers' nighttime recreational activities.

Two months prior, Cope wrote a Sports Illustrated cover story about Tony Dorsett titled "My, How He Does Run On."  

Cope was on the original full-time staff of Sports Illustrated. Upon its 50^th anniversary, the magazine named Cope's feature on Howard Cosell as one of its 50 all-time classic articles.

Older Pitt fans may recall Cope's drive-time commentaries on WTAE Radio. He did a series of commentaries upon John Majors' arrival at Pitt lauding the new coach's enthusiasm and aggressiveness. With the William Tell Overture (the "Lone Ranger" theme), playing in the background, he would describe the exploits of "Major Majors" and his efforts to rally the troops and drum up support for his Panthers program.

It was a perfect example of Cope's talent for blending reporting and entertainment.

On the day of Cope's passing, the athletic department invited fans attending that evening's Pitt-Cincinnati basketball game at the Petersen Events Center to bring their Terrible Towels for a special tribute to Myron.

It was fitting that the first opportunity to pay tribute to Myron at a city sports event occurred on the Pitt campus. While he came to personify black and gold, there was always a special place in his heart for the blue and gold of Pitt, where his iconic career began.