Get Well Soon Steve Sabol!

I read the news today-- oh boy.... sounds like the beginning of a Beatle song, and it might just well be! However, I did read the sad news that broke today (Sunday March 20th, 2011) that a stall worth of a man, a pioneer in an industry that his dad created with just a few movie cameras and an idea, and turned it into an Empire that one of the greatest sport leagues has ever come to know, to help promote and drive to fans, so they can become closer to the action like never before.

It started with a company in 1964 called Blair Motion Pictures, named after the founders daughter-- he called his son up who was going to school at Colorado State, and informed him that the only two things he knew that his son was doing, was going to movies and playing football, and that made him uniquely qualified for his new position with Blair Motion Pictures, the father was Ed Sabol, his son is Steve Sabol.

This past February, Ed Sabol, the patriarch was voted into the Pro Football Hall of Fame in Canton, Ohio, a little overdue I suspect, but none the less he is now being placed in the hallowed hall.  Steve was in Dallas to accept his fathers enshrinement, on his behalf.

Today, however, the news is grim, that Steve Sabol, all of 68 years young had a seizure while in Kansas City for a speaking engagement-- the diagnosis is not good, it was discovered that he has a brain tumor and it is on the left side of his brain.

Sabol will go under treatment with radiation, as well as other treatments to try and shrink the tumor, they (the doctors) have not used the words-- " Terminal" yet! However, if they have caught this early enough- with modern medicine anything is possible.

I remember growing up, and the program, This Week in the NFL would come on Saturday afternoons, and it was film footage of highlights from the games played the week before, and that you hoped to catch a glimpse of your team, hopefully winning over a rival or other team, and the slow motion that they developed was marvelous, how the cameramen kept that spiraling football in the frame as it nestled into the hands of a wide receiver, or the running back being able to burst through the line of scrimmage with those powerful-- piston- like legs to churn out the yards... or maybe it was linebackers zeroing in on the running back and destroying him as he came through the secondary.  All caught through the viewfinder of the NFL Films (what Blair Motion Pictures later became known as) Cameramen!

Steve Sabol was one of those cameramen, and he knew what was needed and took it upon himself to hire the best editors, and cameramen, and assistants, to make sure that the product was the best to be put out to showcase the NFL.

It would be a shame if we lost Steve Sabol, his dad is already in failing health at the age of 92, but Steve seems to be vibrant, and still full of life, and willing to talk to anyone and teach anyone the craft that has made NFL Films world renowned for its noir of photography!

My little piece is simple, just wishing Steve good health, and a recovery that will come quickly, and allow him to continue his good work!

Just a thought.