Mattingly: Friends of yore would've enjoyed Pearl's Vols

There are several people who have left this earth I wish could see the current edition of the Tennessee Volunteers play on the Thompson-Boling Arena hardwood.

It goes without saying that Ray Mears would be proud.

He set the table for Tennessee basketball and deserves the lion’s share of the credit.

He was the man in the orange jacket, a coach who could “take his and beat yours, or take yours and beat his.”

If I could, I’d take Russ Bebb, Joe Caldwell, Robert E. (Cotton) Jackson, and Bob Rinearson to just one game, individually or collectively, at Thompson-Boling Arena, with Bruce Pearl patrolling the area in front of the Vol bench.

Bruce would have to be very careful, of course, not to venture outside the coaching box. Joe and Cotton were officials, and his staying within the lines would have made both of them very, very happy.

Bebb was the official scorer at Stokely Center and TBA. He was on duty for games ranging from the 11-6 game in the 1973 Vol Classic against Temple to games with Kentucky and others where that was the score before the first media timeout. He saw them all, the good and the bad, even saw games before there were media timeouts. He was precise to a fault with the scorebook. No scorebook controversies for him.

Russ was a Knoxville Journal sportswriter, and that affiliation caused a number of interesting moments during the games. When the inevitable confabs occurred, and the coaches and officials gathered around the scorer’s table, News-Sentinel sportswriter Marvin West, not to be outdone by one of his reporting brethren, was also right there, notepad in hand. It got a little crowded, but it all worked out.

Joe and Cotton ran the shot clock with precision. Each would offer occasional assessments of the officials’ performance on the floor (under his breath, of course).

None of them, Joe in particular, really liked the term “zebras,” a moniker often applied to the officials, and would let any transgressors know their opinion of the term … very quickly and emphatically.

Joe called many of the early year Vol Classic games and was nothing short of outstanding on the court with a whistle in his mouth.

Cotton made his mark as an amateur boxer, while still being an exceptional official. City of Knoxville Recreation Administrator Maynard Glenn called him “Sweet Thing” for no apparent reason, but that was just the way Maynard was.

Cotton once prepped former Knoxville Mayor Randy Tyree for a three-round boxing exhibition against “Big John” Tate in the early 1980s, but after watching Cotton “help” Randy get ready, I couldn’t help but wonder whether Randy should have sparred with Tate, preparing to get in the ring with Cotton.

Rinearson kept the individual scoring tally for public-address announcer Haywood Harris. Known to his friends as “Rino,” he was affable in the best sense of that word. Rino just enjoyed being with people.

He came by our house one night several years ago to deliver something, and, after we had talked, he headed for the door. He spent some time at the top of the stairs, some time at the door, and some time at the car, before disappearing into the night. We really didn’t want him to leave. I’m not sure he wanted to leave, either.

When the end finally came for Rino several years ago, we were sad to see him leave, but what a treasure trove of memories he left behind.

The best thing you could say about him was that you always felt better after you were with him than you did before. It never failed that Rino was the life of the party wherever he was, regaling all of us with story after story, most of which poked fun at himself in one way or another.

When he was a wire reporter, he covered the Clinton riots of the mid-1950s, when a fellow named John Kasper was stirring things up in that Anderson County seat.

Rino once sat next to a newsman in the auditorium at Clinton High School who had propped his feet on the stage.

“Mayor Luallen doesn’t like that,” Rino told the new man in town, who didn’t budge.

Mayor Luallen entered the room and told the stranger, “Get your feet off the stage.”

Rino said something akin to, “I told you so” and asked the gentleman who he was.

“John Chancellor, NBC News,” was the response.

Former Tennessee Governor Ray Blanton said Jake Butcher “entered a room like he was leaving it.” That was bad. Bob Rinearson entered a room like he owned it. That was good.

It was good to have known Rino… to have known them all.

Bless you, Russ, Joe, Cotton, and “Rino.”

Tom Mattingly is the author of “The Tennessee Football Vault: The Story of the Tennessee Volunteers, 1891-2006” (2006), to be published in second edition in 2008, and “Tennessee Football: The Peyton Manning Years” (1998). He may be reached at tjmshm@comcast.net. His News Sentinel blog is called “The Vol Historian.”