O'Donnell: Foley and Olczyk - Nick Olczyk - will call NHL Winter Classic on radio
SOME STILL CALL IT West Madison Street.
Others use the more apropos "Bleak-Hawk Boulevard."
The Chicago season is a sloth parade that gives rebuilds a bad name. The organization is a civic albatross.
Bodies warming inside of the United Center for puck drops are presumably there only because of overflow at the Pacific Garden Mission.
AGAINST THAT HAPPY TABLEAU, the enduring Pat Foley is ending his odd retirement - even if it may be just for one day.
And he'll be working with an Olczyk - but not Eddie Olczyk.
Foley and Nick Olczyk will team to call the national radio syndication of the 2023 NHL Winter Classic on Monday, Jan. 2.
They'll be working the Bruins-Penguins game from Fenway Park for Sports USA. Locally, the 12:30 p.m. matinee will air on WGN-AM (720).
FOR FOLEY, IT WILL BE a nice return to where he once belonged.
That's the play-by-play perch, a slot he handled to Hall of Fame renown for the Blackhawks before "retiring" last spring.
As for young Olczyk, 26, it'll be a taste of coast-to-coast exposure as he continues to shadow his father in the broadcast scheme of the Seattle Kraken.
It was his ol' dad - Eddie - who sent the most resounding slap shot across the bow of Rocky Wirtz, Jaime Faulkner and all last spring when he told the Hawks to take their broadcast job and shove it.
Eddie O. broke away for Seattle and Nick skated along. Eddie continues to also work a full network slate for TNT.
IF PARTING CHICAGO WAS any kind of sweet sorrow, the Olczyks can find mitigation in being around winning hockey once again.
The second-year Kraken have the fifth-best record in the NHL's Western Conference.
The "Bleak-Hawks" have won one game since Thanksgiving and own the worst record in the league.
• • •
THE POWERS BEHIND GLOBAL SOCCER got the masterpiece theater they were hoping for with the FIFA World Cup title match Sunday.
And FOX and Telemundo got the audience numbers their projectionists were targeting.
Close to 33 million combined were tuned in at the end as Leo Messi and Argentina prevailed on penalty kicks over France after a 3-3 tie in regular and extra time.
The three-hour telecast averaged 22.3M with FOX drawing the high share (17.9M).
FOR MESSI, 35, IT WAS a cap point to a long and brilliant international career. Even in victory, he was passing the torch to France quicksilver Kylian Mbappé, 24, the future of the game.
The third goal by Mbappé - on a penalty kick - greatly pumped the tense theatrics that riveted even casual fans. It was impossible not to make comparisons to the young mastery of Pelé in leading Brazil to consecutive World Cups in 1958 and 1962.
THE 2026 WORLD CUP will be hosted by the United States, Mexico and Canada.
But Chicago will not be one of the 11 American cities in the mix.
Four years ago, then-Mayor Rahm Emanuel withdrew Our Town from consideration as a host site. He cited "unknowns" regarding bid and their uncertainty on "taxpayer risk."
For better or worse, Emanuel was right.
• • •
STREET-BEATIN':
So the Eagles, thick in the hunt for Super Bowl 57, will opt for caution with star QB Jalen Hurts and his aching passing shoulder. And the Bears - going nowhere - will throw Justin Fields to the vagaries of the wind (and Ford Field ventilation) for the next three weeks? Will someone please slap rookie Chicago GM Ryan Poles and tell him this isn't "Madden NFL 23." ...
Chris Collins is finally catching some breaks with his Northwestern basketball Wildcats. Few are more deserving - he's been living at the corner of high hoops and grand expectations essentially from the cradle. The 'Cats, if healthy, should post a statement victory over visiting Illinois on Jan. 4. ...
Bill Hill - a solid Bulls beat writer and later superb night sports editor at The Daily Herald - will greet the new year with a full-time teaching position at Arizona State's Walter Cronkite School of Journalism and Mass Communications. Bob Frisk once had three ace fellow Fighting Illini alums on staff including Hill, Don Friske and Mike Imrem. ...
Great for eleventh-hour Santas: 100 shares of Audacy stock. Cost: $23 (at 23 cents per share). If the parent company of WSCR-AM (670) and six other local stations goes much lower, stock certificates could wind up as prizes in boxes of Cracker Jack. ...
And Scott Thomson, on that reported Bulls-rupturing rift between DeMar DeRozan and Zach LaVine: "Maybe management can borrow Kyrie Irving to come in and broker unity."
• Jim O'Donnell's Sports and Media column appears Sunday and Thursday Reach him at jimodonnelldh@yahoo.com. All communications may be considered for publication.