Stars come out for colorful Craig Sager service
MARIETTA, Ga. — Craig Sager’s funeral service here Tuesday morning was held in living color, the ultimate contradiction, if you think about it. Garish replaced black and irreverence supplanted somber for 90 minutes.
The NBA announcing maverick, who died Thursday after a three-year battle with leukemia, went out with flamboyance as mourners dressed as if they were attending a Halloween dance.
Charles Barkley wore a bright red shirt. Ernie Johnson Jr. wore multi-colored shoes. Reggie Miller wore a light purple jacket. And Sager’s family and friends and colleagues at Turner Broadcasting paid tribute in bright orange, resplendent blue and checkerboard jackets.
NBA Commissioner Adam Silver wore a dark suit because, well, he is the NBA commissioner. Gregg Popovich, the San Antonio Spurs head coach, wore a gray suit because, well, he’s the dour Pop.
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Most of the rest of the crowd was fit for an art gallery, or grand opening of a circus, or dance by the beach.
Sager, a wise guy’s wise guy, would have been pleased. He was 65 when he died and is survived by his wife and five children.
“He was his own television show,” said Kenny Smith, the former North Carolina and NBA star, who is part of Turner’s popular NBA studio show. “He was different. He wasn’t just TNT. He was Sager-vision.”
Silver sat in the front row of the Mt. Bethel United Methodist Church. Barkley sat in the second row and Smith in the third row. Johnson sat near Reggie Miller who sat near Isiah Thomas. Popovich slipped into the church almost unnoticed and sat in the back left with former Boston Celtics great Kevin McHale.
You get the picture. Sager was a member of the media — a sideline analyst — who was adored by the people he covered, which is as rare as some of the jackets he wore. Former NBA star Kevin Garnett finished an interview with Sager once and looked at the TV guy’s suit and said, “You take this and burn it.”
“It was his ability to connect with the players and not settle for simple answers,” Smith said explaining how Sager resonated with coaches and players. “He made you say the great answer, not the typical answer.”
Randy Mickler, the former senior pastor of Mt. Bethel, was not officiating a funeral; he was more Master of Ceremonies. Before he died, Sager asked Mickler what he was going to wear to Sager’s funeral.
“A black robe,” Mickler said.
“No, no, no,” Sager said. Mickler wore a purplish jacket Tuesday.
Kacy and Krista Sager, two of Craig’s daughters, and Craig Sager II, his son, described the irreverence of their father in the hallowed hall, which prompted Mickler to say from the pulpit in the middle of the service, “The Lord is beyond his shock by now.”
Sager started in TV in of all things a drab trench coat. And he was not really in TV when he became prominent. He was in radio.
On April 8, 1974, Sager, then 22, ran on the field of Atlanta-Fulton County Stadium and met Hank Aaron at home plate with a microphone as Aaron touched home plate after historic home run No. 715 passing Babe Ruth.
But Sager’s mark was made with a big round ball, not a small round ball. He covered NBA games for Turner for 26 years.
“Craig added fun to the league with his suits and his colorfulness,” McHale said. “You looked forward to his interviews, you really did. Craig had a way of seeing things through rose-colored glasses, even in the heat of the moment. It was fun to be around an optimistic guy and we’re all going to miss him.”