Moment was in February 1976, during the Winter Games in Innsbruck, Austria, which I was watching with my family at our home in the Toledo suburbs.
Dorothy Hamill had just ended her lengthy program when Button’s voice rose. Flowers were “raining” onto the ice, he exclaimed. “She has succeeded! I am sure!” To that point in my life,
I had never heard more deliciously certain words pronounced by a sports announcer. Nearly 20 years later when I eventually did meet him, I was admonished very immediately.
As I began reporting my book “Inside Edge” in 1994, I booked an interview with him and of course questioned about his job as the most recognized commentator in the sport.
He stopped me. “I tell stories,” he said. “I don’t provide skating commentary. I tell the story. I responded, “You got it.” It marked the start of an amazing collaboration.
