Memory

All the things we remember ... and all the things we don't

1972 Kentucky Derby winner Riva Ridge (Jerry Cooke/Getty Images)

Name a year. Any year. What’s that you say? Did you say 1972? OK. I was 5 that year.

Here’s what I remember about 1972 off the top of my head.

In 1972, the Oakland Athletics won the first of three consecutive World Series. Johnny Bench won the National League MVP award, his second MVP, and, of course, Dick Allen won the American League MVP award. That was the year Dick Allen appeared on the cover of Sports Illustrated with a cigarette dangling from his mouth as he juggled three baseballs.

There was not actually a story about Dick Allen in that Sports Illustrated. In those days, just because you were on the cover of the magazine did not necessarily mean there would be a story about you inside.

Obviously, I could do a lot more baseball — in 1972, the BBWAA voted Sandy Koufax and Yogi Berra into the Baseball Hall of Fame. One other player, too. I’ll remember it before we get to the bottom. But let’s move on from baseball.

In 1972, the Los Angeles Lakers finished 69-13 — the best NBA record until the Jordan Bulls — and won the NBA title. That was Jerry West’s one and only title as a player.

The starting five of the 1972 Lakers was Wilt Chamberlain, Jerry West, Gail Goodrich, Happy Hairston, and Jim McMillan. In my memory, I tend to put Elgin Baylor on that team, but if I remember correctly, Baylor retired early in that season because of injuries.

Of course, everyone remembers that in 1972, the Miami Dolphins went undefeated. They would go on to beat Washington in the Super Bowl 14-7, but that was 1973. The Pittsburgh Steelers won their first playoff game in 1972, and that was the Immaculate Reception game.

The five players most involved with the Immaculate Reception were Terry Bradshaw who made the pass (and was immediately knocked sideways so he didn’t see anything that followed), Frenchy Fuqua (the intended receiver), Jack Tatum (who deflected the ball 10 yards backward), Phil Vilapiano (who was supposed to be covering Franco Harris but raced toward the ball instead) and Franco Harris (who caught the deflected pass just inches above the ground and scored the game-winning touchdown).

The bar where the Oneders perform their soon-to-be hit song “That Thing You Do,” in the movie of the same name, was called Vilapiano’s after Phil.

The 1972 Olympics were in Munich, and are remembered, obviously and tragically, for the massacre of 11 Israeli Olympic athletes and coaches, killed in a terrorist attack by Black September. At that Olympics, Mark Spitz won seven gold medals, gymast Olga Korbut thrilled and delighted the world, and American Frank Shorter won the marathon.

The 1972 Winter Olympics were in Sapporo, Japan. I don’t have any other specific memories from that Olympics. I’m pretty sure that Dorothy Hamill won the figure skating in 1976. And I seem to recall that Peggy Fleming won in 1968.

The Boston Bruins beat the New York Rangers in the Stanley Cup final in 1972. I long thought that the famous photo of Bobby Orr flying through the air was from that 1972 Stanley Cup, but no, that was from 1970, when the Bruins played the Blues.

Jack Nicklaus won the 1972 Masters, and I believe that’s the one he won wire-to-wire. Nicklaus also won the U.S. Open that year, at Pebble Beach.

Billie Jean King won three of the four tennis Grand Slams in 1972. The only one she didn’t win was Australia. I don’t remember if she actually competed in Australia that year.

UCLA won the NCAA men’s basketball national championship, but that’s easy; they always won it in those years. They went undefeated. Bill Walton was the big star on that team, of course, but I believe that team had Henry Bibby and Jamaal Wilkes on it, too. Jamaal was known as Keith Wilkes then.

Riva Ridge won the Kentucky Derby. I know this because I once read a story about one of my writing heroes, Bill Nack, and it said that he could name every Kentucky Derby winner ever. So I tried to memorize every Kentucky Derby winner ever too. I didn’t get very far. But for some reason, Riva Ridge in 1972 sticks out on my mind.

Richard Nixon beat George McGovern in a historic landslide in the 1972 Presidential election. Nixon won 49 states. The only state McGovern won was Massachusetts. He didn’t even win his home state of South Dakota. If memory serves, he didn’t even come close to winning his home state of South Dakota.

Of course, there would be just a bit of controversy about how Nixon handled that election.

I said that thing about trying (and failing) to memorize every Kentucky Derby winner ever. Well, I actually DID memorize every Oscar-winning movie ever. I had that on my resume for a while, and interviewers would constantly test me. I’d fail that test miserably now. But a lot of it has just stuck in my brain.

So I know that The Godfather won the Academy Award for Best Picture in 1972.

And I also know that the winner at the Academy Awards HELD in 1972 was The French Connection.

Other movie things: Marlon Brando won best actor, and Liza Minnelli won best actress for Cabaret. That meant that Liza won one more Academy Award than her mother, Judy Garland, though Judy Garland won something called the Juvenile Academy Award, which was given occasionally by the Academy for special performances by actors under 18. Shirley Temple won the first Juvenile Academy Award.

The No. 1 television show in 1972, I’m pretty sure, was All in the Family.

The No. 1 song might have been “American Pie” by Don McLean. It also might have been that Roberta Flack song, I might get the title wrong, but it’s the “First I Ever Saw Your Face,” song.

For a while, yeah, I tried to memorize the No. 1 song from every year.

Early Wynn. That was the other guy elected to the Baseball Hall of Fame in 1972.

So why do I tell you all this? Is it merely to show off my awesome memory? I hope not. And I don’t think my memory is that awesome anyway. I’ll bet, if you’re of a certain age, you remembered most of this stuff too, maybe even all of it.

No. I tell you this because I was thinking this morning that my mind is filled with so much useless information. Maybe yours is too. We remember so many things — long ago summer lyrics, long discarded lineup cards, half-baked facts that might or might not be true, names of random celebrities like Foster Brooks and Fred Travalena and Nipsey Russell and Charo, telephone numbers that stopped ringing decades ago — that mean nothing to no one, not even ourselves.

What do those memories crowd out?

What have we forgotten that could help us? Save us? Soothe us?

I don’t know the answer to that. But I do know the Cy Young winners in 1972.