It was a night that will live on long after I’m dead and buried, long after Common pays for a round of golf, long after “Big Ticket” beats up Giovonnsie’s first boyfriend. 

It was the “Meatsauce Retribution Tour” at Canterbury Park.  Let me set this up for you.

Meatsauce had performed at Canterbury about six weeks earlier to a group of hardcore handicappers, the V.I.P.’s of the race track crowd.  Not his audience.  They never moved.  It was less than “warm and wonderful.”

So we tried it again.  This time we took a little different approach.  We promoted on The Fan.  The guys on The Morning Show were ruthless.  The pressure was intense.  Danny B (Big Ticket) jumped into the fray.  It was a mismatch.  Sauce never had a chance.  It was hardcore. 

It was also hard on me.  You have to remember “Saturday with Sauce” is a Dark Star Production.  This kid is like a son to me.  I root hard for him.  Harder than Chinese arithmetic.  So, I too, put my heart and soul into it.  I never thought once, not one time, that he would fold. 

We put the tickets on sale (150 of them) on a Wednesday and hoped for the best.  I checked on the following Wednesday, three days before the show, to see how it was going.  “How many tickets do we have left?”

None.

We moved it to a bigger room, holding 220 people.  I called the next morning.  “How many left?”

None.

Friday we moved to 320 capacity.  I called around 10:30am.

None.

Oh boy – what have we done?  We “done” good.  Maybe too good.

The night of the show it was unbelievable.  We opened the doors at 6:45.  The line was a mile long.  Jon Mikkelson who has been my producer for over twenty years pulled off a miracle getting the place ready.  It really looked like a nightclub.  Black table cloths with a candle in the middle.  It was really cool.  Jon hit a home run.  I was the M.C. The place was packed.  I was really excited for Sauce.  Dan Cole, The Common Man, the funniest man on earth and one of my best friends, would follow Sauce.  Dan is a professional.  He was a real big part of the success of the show.  He gave Sauce a big shot on the air everyday up to the program.  He “handed” Meatsauce the show on a silver platter.  Not everyone would have done that.  He did it and never batted an eye.  Off we go. 

Two acts played before Sauce.  Pete Stossle, who was really funny, and a KFAN listener who won the “Be a Part of The Show” contest.  He did really well for a first timer.  MNF (Monday Night Football Guy) was so bad he was actually good – really good. 

Now it was time.  Out came Sauce and he was on fire.  He killed the audience.  He did fifteen minutes and got a standing ovation.  Mike Morris, Cory Cove, Justin Gard, and Johnna (“Intern Gal”) were all there to support their guy, Meatsauce.  Paul Allen said it best.  “He was fantastic.”

I left after Common was on.  I was exhausted.  I reached into my suit pants (yeah, I wore a suit) and found what I believe to be the signature of the evening.  A five dollar “standing room only” ticket; the only ticket that we didn’t sell.

I hate to bore you with this again, but – someone has continued to use the name “The Real Dark Star” on the internet. 

It’s not me.

My attorney has been working on this for a month.  It’s sad.  This person has 1,700 followers.  My real outside KFAN website is – g.chapple@yahoo.com – if you know anything about this, or if you want to visit with me, the yahoo address will get it done.  Thanks so much.

It’s Tuesday night.

It’s 8:42pm.

Jeremy Lin just beat the Toronto Raptors all by himself. Amare Stoudemire returned to action tonight and, as only Amare can do, missed his first four shots. Lin, and the Knicks as an accomplice, have now won 6 games in a row and in doing so put playground basketball into a completely different light.

You think about playground play and you always think about one player scoring on a drive, a dunk or a 30-footer. One player. What we have here is a guy who wins the game on the last two possessions. An ‘and-1’, a threebie and a game-winner. For the last 6 games he has been the best player the NBA has seen in years. 27 points, 11 assists and a game-winner, unbelievable.

The Knicks suck.

Coach Mike D’antoni was on the verge of losing his job. Jeremy Lin changed that. Tonight the Raptors tried to kill him. They knocked him down; they hit him in the face. Ugly. No matter. He got up and won the game.

Black and white thing, this playground business? Hardly?

Kelly Tripucka was the asphalt pig of all time. Kris Humphries broke every Big-Ten record for minutes played with the fewest number of assists ever. Clyde Drexler hijacked the rock and cost his team a title.

So there you have it, every color in the rainbow. All playground players, all pigs.

So how many people do you think will order the NBA package tomorrow so they can catch Jeremy Lin? I say two zillion! He’s the bomb. If you don’t believe me, trust his teammate Jared Jeffries.

“It was all Jeremy, he’s the greatest.” Nuff said.

 Well, I guess we’ll see you again tomorrow night against Sacramento in the Garden. Channel 634 on Direct TV, 6:30pm. Don’t be tardy rubes!

NOTES ON A SCORECARD 
BY: Dark Star

It’s a fact.  Mike Morris knows more about football than anybody on the radio in this market.  That isn’t a knock on anybody who thinks they deserve the nod.  After it’s all said and done, Mike sees the game better because he is able to see the whole game with a glance where others break down film – analyze, scrutinize, etc, etc.  Mike feels the game.  It’s amazing.

Last week, Mike was kind enough to grant me about 20 minutes for a series of questions that I didn’t have answers for.   I’m really smart.  I have a 162 I.Q.  I scored 99.75 on the Schick/Taylor test which is twice as hard as the I.Q. Test.  I scored 0.00% on the “I Know Football Better Than Mike Morris” Test.  One thing is blatantly clear to me.  If you haven’t played football, and Mike is talking, then just keep it to yourself, please.  With great clarity Morris sees offense and defense with perfection, but he sees the emotional side of the game better than any player in any sport I’ve ever met.  Remember, I’ve been doing this for over a quarter of a century.  What Morris sees best is how the intellectual part of the game fits with the physical aspects of the premise. As he explained Christian Ponder’s short-comings and how they would affect his play, “He plays young.” After about five or six more things that came to fruition on Sunday, he said goodbye and I sat in a chair with my jaw on the floor.  It took me forty five minutes to write down everything he said. 

The next time you hear Morris talking about football, pay attention.  He knows 10,000 times more about it than you do.

Any thoughts? g.chapple@yahoo.com