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I’m sure everyone was spellbound watching the Spurs vs Knicks Finals. I couldn’t believe how four of the five games were an amazing repeat come behind win for the Knicks. What was even more amazing was that in game four when they were behind by 27 or 29 points in the fourth quarter absolutely no one at Madison Square Garden left their seats. They were in there yelling and praying to the very end. You know for sure that if it was a baseball game and the home team was behind by ten runs in the eighth or ninth inning most of the crowd would already be in their cars driving home. But at that game, as dim as the prospects seemed for the Knicks at the start of the fourth quarter… nobody left. It was awesome!
Now you may not think the following is as amazing as I do, but I played in a set of games that was just as crazy and unexpected, at least from my perspective. I can’t quite remember if it was at a Retail Tobacco Dealers Convention, or the New York State Tobacco Dealers convention, or the Cigar Association of America yearly get together—but here’s what happened…
This guy Dick DiMeola, who was at the time the head of Lane Limited, or the Number 2 guy at Consolidated Cigar (the forerunner of Altadis USA), was at the convention and had rented or reserved time on the Tennis Courts at whatever hotel it was at that year. For some reason whatever playing partners he had arranged to play with could not make it. As a result, he was going around from table to table trying to get someone to play with him and came over to where me and my wife LaVonda were sitting and asked me as a last resort to play or he was going to lose his reservation and whatever rental fee was involved.
Now bear in mind that I had never played a game of tennis in my life…. never even watched one. I grew up in Brooklyn. We played three box baseball, stickball, off the wall, johnny on the pony, stoop ball. Basically, anything you could play with equipment that cost less than a quarter. I don’t know that we even ever heard of tennis. I mean, where would you play it? All our games were played off the stoops of houses, or in the gutter when there were no cars passing by.
Well, DiMeola practically pleaded with me to play, and he was someone relatively important to our business, so at the urging of LaVonda—I agreed. A couple of weeks later, I learned from Jim Colucci, another Consolidated guy, that DiMeola was actually taking lots of Tennis lessons and really getting serious about the game. So the following is really more amazing… kinda like the Knicks coming back and kicking ass game after game.
So, picture this in your mind: a) DiMeola is maybe 6’2” and at the time I was maybe 5’9. I’m a couple of inches shorter now as my body seems to be eroding as I age. DiMeola plays the game and takes lessons. He has to tell me which box to hit it into—kind of catty corner and in order to do that I have to bounce the ball on the ground and hit it underhanded to kind of lob it over the fence between us. I might add in here that the scoring for this game is absurd. I think the first point is worth 15 or some nonsense like that and then it jumps to 30 or 40, but basically it seems to be a game where you have to win by two points. You know, it’s thirty years later and I’ve still never watched a game of Tennis.
So anyway, we start to play and I lob shot the ball over the fence and he returns it and I hit it back to him and then him to me… and in a very few minutes I’m getting the hang of this, and DiMeola accidentally returns my shot into the net and I score a point!
Well, this seemed to embarrass DiMeola and he starts hitting the ball to me a little harder, and I keep returning it with lobs shots because it’s the only way I can keep the ball on the court. Then he starts trying to hit the ball to the left and right side of the court trying to make me miss… but I don’t! Instinctively I know where he’s going to hit it before he hits it and I can sense he’s getting F#%king enraged!!!!! Holy Shit!!! Someone who never touched a tennis racket in their life is stomping this guy who takes tennis lessons and is also a half a foot taller with longer reach. How can this be??
Well, I can’t really claim to be a great athlete, but among my non cigar business claims to fame is that I was the Number 2 Handball player in the City of New York for at least three years, and anticipating where the next shot is going in handball is even harder than in tennis because the game is so much faster. (By the way… the same guy… his name was Jimmy Tighe, beat me in the N.Y. City Department of Parks Finals every year. This guy was tall, thin, fast, and his freakin’ arms were like the giant squid in 20,000 Leagues Under the Sea).
Well. The longer we played, the worse it got as he started missing the shots he was hitting to the sides of the court. I wish I could tell you how the day ended, but it was a long time ago and I just don’t remember. But I don’t think DiMeola liked me very much after that! During the Cigar Boom years, when he was in a position to control where the limited supplies of cigars went, he definitely screwed our company over—but always with a smile.
LaVonda, who is a more astute businessperson than me, told me not to mention beating DiMeola to anyone, because it would be bad for business, and so, being retired, and free from any possible retribution this is the first time I’ve ever mentioned KICKING HIS ASS!
Disclaimer: The views and opinions expressed are those of the author and do not necessarily reflect the views of Smoke Inn, its employees, or its affiliates.
