MULTITHON: WE’LL GET ’EM NEXT TIME!

Phil Cobb and some folks from Prufrock restaurants recently invited the publisher of D to play in their fourth annual Multithon, a “friendly” 16-sport competition in which employees of Prufrock and their friends got together for some fun and games and a little good, clean competition.

One hundred talented athletes (including II females) competed in August. Although most of the teams were selected arbitrarily by Cobb and his lieutenant. Earl Brady, one team was an assemblage of “ringers” organized by Greenville Avenue Country Club owner Tom Stephenson. Nobody accused Stephenson of practicing good sportsmanship when a former national champion won the racquetball competition, a PBA pro won the bowling contest and Minnesota Fats’ nephew won the pool match.

D’s lone representative says that just when he was ready to think that Stephenson had gone above and beyond the recruitment of legitimate ringers, he ran into Jay Reardon, who ran the 100-yard dash in a swift 10.2 seconds. That raised a few eyebrows, until moments later, when Reardon long-jumped 24 feet, 6 inches. (That distance would have earned him a medal for the U.S. team during the Pan American games.)

Reardon really began to shine when the teams moved to the high-jump pit. While 99 “athletes” struggled at heights in the mid-5-foot range, Reardon simply passed until everyone else had missed. Then he set the bar at 6 feet and cleared it by a wide margin. Having easily won the contest, it was-as they sporting-ly say in the NBA- “showtime.” The bar was raised to 6 feet, 6 inches, which Reardon cleared by his long neck. The bar was then raised to 6 feet, 9 inches. Reardon cleared the bar with remarkable ease. The bar was raised to 7 feet. Reardon missed in three attempts. Each one was an eyelash away from successful clearance, and each one left the observer with the feeling that he had been lucky enough to witness an extraordinary athlete perform successfully on an uncommon afternoon.

Our publisher was so moved by the experience that he wants to enter a team from D Magazine next year. Sometime next August, we hope to hire relatively inexperienced editors, writers and photographers for a very special assignment. The pay for these new employees won’t be terribly competitive, and it would be nice if applicants were old journalistic hands like Steve Lundquist, Lee Trevino or Martina Navratilova. So if you’re considering applying for the job, don’t worry about syntax or dangling participles, but a modicum of hand/eye coordination is advisable. Send your r坢sum坢s to Aim坢e Larrabee at D Magazine; include personal bests where appropriate.