His voice guided Blue Jackets fans through the ups and downs for two decades. Jeff Rimer's now sharing stories from his more than 50 years in the booth in a new memoir titled “It Doesn't Get Any Better Than This.” He spoke with WOSU Morning Edition Host Stu Osborne about the book and offered a preview of the upcoming Blue Jackets season.
Stu Osborne: You're primarily known for calling hockey games, but you've also been in the booth for baseball and even boxing. Do you have a favorite sport to call?
Jeff Rimer: It's hockey, (because I'm) originally from Canada. To be honest, I wanted to be a player more than anything, but when I was obviously informed very early that my NHL dream would not come true as a player, I kind of turned my focus and attention very early into someday, one day, broadcasting in the National Hockey League and after 48 great years in the booth, it was time to retire. [I was] encouraged by many over the years to write a book with all the stories that I would have, and I'm really excited and quite honored to have the book published.
Stu Osborne: Now obviously, you talk about your time in the booth calling all these various sports over the years. I understand you also have some personal stories. Was it kind of cathartic to put pen to paper and get those out there?
Jeff Rimer: It was, and to be honest with you, Stu, it was kind of therapeutic because there's one story that I've kind of kept to myself. It's been a motivational tool for me throughout my career, and it's probably a story that I haven't shared with my closest friends. It's going to be quite eye-opening, but certainly I feel really good about getting it out. It's one chapter, and people will be kind of surprised when they see, but at the time they'll really see where my motivation came from. And it was something that was near and dear to me. And I'll just leave it at that.
Stu Osborne: Now I understand you have a Muhammad Ali story back from your early days of calling boxing.
Jeff Rimer: I didn't call boxing other than we telecast one of his exhibitions when I was living out in Calgary. I don't want to get too involved in the story, but put it this way, I used some intestinal fortitude to get the heavyweight champion of the world who by the way had just been stripped of the title. And fought three exhibitions at the Calgary Stampede grounds as a result, and I was able to convince him to do a television interview with me and it wasn't a one-on-one that many people expected at the actual news conference preceding the fight. But the fact of the matter is I was to convince them to come to a small little rinky-dink studio to do a little community television appearance with me. Anyway, we'll leave it at that for those who get a chance to read it in the book to see a pretty entertaining story.
Stu Osborne: Well, I can only imagine I've heard and read the stories over the years. Now we can't wrap up before I ask you about your beloved Blue Jackets. I know you're not going to be in the booth, but you're still a big fan. You're part of the 5th Line now officially. What are your hopes for this upcoming season?
Jeff Rimer: Well, I was fortunate enough last year to be invited back to come back and actually broadcast the game on Feb. 4 prior to the Olympic break. And that was a thrill for me. I keep up to date on this team on a daily basis. I'm still up at 5:00 in the morning scouring the computer, not only for Blue Jackets information, but I'm a news junkie as well. So what I do, Stu, is not only reading the sports pages, but I read the news pages and want to know what's going on.
To answer your question about the Blue Jackets, I think after seeing what they were able to accomplish after the coaching change last year, I think that they can pick up where they left off most of the tail end of the season. It's still a very, very young team, obviously. They've got to get [Adam] Fantilli signed here now. And that's an issue that's kind of hanging over the heads of this organization. I spent time earlier this week with Zach Werenski and, of course, the brouhaha that went on over the summer with him, and I'm glad to say it's behind him now, and he's made it very clear he'd like to sign a long-term extension with the Blue Jackets when he's presented that opportunity. And also there's a question mark of [Kirill] Marchenko. If they can kind of gloss over these still remaining issues, get things settled in one shape or form, I think that they certainly will be knocking on the door for a playoff spot, but they've got to play the way they did that last half of the season to accomplish that, and they are capable of doing it, and I hope and will be watching and cheering as a member of that 5th line to see them get over the finish line and into the Stanley Cup playoffs. If that is accomplished, anything can happen in the postseason, and we've seen it over the years.
Rimer's book It Doesn't Get Any Better Than This is available on Sept. 28.
