SALT LAKE CITY — I could pick out his familiar stonewashed voice, even in the crowded room. I arrived too late to catch the details of his conversation, but early enough to know he had been spinning a story.
It's been a lifetime of stories, all about basketball, the game that took Hot Rod Hundley from West Virginia poverty to fame.
The Jazz bestowed their highest honor on him Friday night at EnergySolutions Arena. I'm not talking about naming the media work room after him — though they did. I'm referencing the banner to commemorate his 35 years as the team's play-by-play announcer. There it will hang, in perpetuity, just a hippity-hop dribble away from Pete Maravich, John Stockton, Karl Malone and other Jazz greats.
Some say it takes a legitimate three stars to win a championship. If so, I want to know where the trophy is. Stockton and Malone are true legends, but if you don't think Hundley is, too, ask anyone in any Utah town if they know his name.
"Good if it goes!" they'll likely call out, mimicking his trademark phrases. "Frozen rope!"
Some say unfurling a banner for a broadcaster is wrong, that it diminishes the accomplishments of those who actually played. But in the Jazz universe, banners are for legends, whether they played, coached or called the games. Hence, Frank Layden, the team's first general manger in Utah, has a banner. Jerry Sloan's will hang there someday, too.
But you won't hear many complaints about Hundley's inclusion. People loved him. Surveys the Jazz commissioned in the 1980s had his credibility rating highest in the Jazz organization. Today's NBA is all about tweets and texts and blogs and streaming video. Hot Rod's game was all in the voice: squeaking shoes, the tap-tap-tapping of leather on hardwood, the rumble of the crowd.
If you were in range to pick up Hundley's radio signal, you were there.
Jazz fans felt they knew him; that much was clear at his ceremony. That's in large part because there was nothing fake about him. He mostly raised himself, a kid so poor he says the best Christmas gift he ever received was when a friend down the street got a basketball.
For 31 of his 35 years, Hundley did the simulcasts. But he was at his finest when it was just his voice. It made him a Utah celebrity. He couldn't go to the gas station or the market and not be stopped. But it never appeared to annoy him. When someone would butcher his longtime calling card, "You gotta love it, baby!" he would just chuckle and say, "That's right, baby."
"Anybody that stops me, Ill talk to him," he said Friday.
Somehow through the years, Hot Rod and I fell into a pattern of joking with one another when we talked on game nights. I would say, "Don't I know you? I think I saw you in 'Casablanca.' "
And he would say, "That was me tending the bar." Or he would say, "Didn't you win gold in the 1960 Olympics — equestrian?" and I would say, "Actually, I won silver in diving, too."
He loved downplaying his fame and pretending I actually had some. He would put on his emcee voice and call out to nobody, "There he is, ladies and gentlemen, BradrocktheRockmonstaaaah!"
I'd wave to a pretend audience and we'd both laugh.
Friday night, as always, Hot Rod was the most popular guy in the room. Gray pinstriped suit, silk tie, his patrician hair combed back. When introduced at halftime, he drew a standing ovation from the crowd at EnergySolutions Arena. It had the same feel-good tone as when Jeff Hornacek, John Stockton and Karl Malone were similarly honored. At the dedication of the media center, several Jazz employees — as well as Hundley — shed tears.
"Too quick," he said, "it went too quick."
Hot Rod gave a few more remarks at halftime, closing by saying, "I love every one of you. God bless." He waved, hugged each player and walked to his seat on the front row, after one last hurrah.
He didn't have to pretend-wave to an adoring crowd, either. In his case, there was one.
I was tempted to stop him and ask if he once sang for Buddy Holly or played the part of Lun Tha in "The King and I."
But on this night, not even I could feign mistaking him for someone else.
The one and only Hot Rod was starring once again.
e-mail: rock@desnews.com