Rich Eisen Reacts to the Death of O.J. Simpson at the Age of 76 | The Rich Eisen Show

shortly before we went on the air news broke that OJ Simpson had died at the age of 76 and um clearly you cannot talk about OJ Simpson without mentioning him being acquitted of uh uh of a double murder in the 1990s that changed absolutely everything in in the world of uh media in our world in the United States of America the way that we view celebrity the way that we view uh criminal cases the way that we view Justice the way that we view everything and I will never forget uh where I was on the day that OJ Simpson was on the run from the police here in Southern California and I will never forget that day as long as I live and uh I was graduating from the Medill School of Journalism in uh June of 1994 on this day when uh my folks um were there for the graduation so was my brother sister-in-law um and we were all out to lunch uh a late lunch for with um uh a fellow colleagues of mine who just graduated from Medill and we were in a bar and um and having lunch and up came the images and it was in the middle of an NBA Finals game between the Knicks and the Spurs yeah and the rockets pardon me the Knicks and the rockets and yeah Nicks and Spurs is when I turned 30 um so I I I will never forget that series cuz and it was of interest in Chicago to be honest you where where I was because everybody thought had Michael not retired they would have been in that series um and the Knicks finally got past the the Jordan list bulls and um there was a split screen and you just couldn't believe the guy who you knew as one of the all-time great running backs in the history of the NFL and you couldn't believe that the guy that you now knew as a sideline reporter for NBC Sports and uh a movie actor the guy from the Herz commercial who trying to make his flight right one of the most famous pitchmen jumping over he was jumping over um chairs in the airport to go make his flight airport that that guy uh was on the Run from the police and why would he run from the police if he was innocent and so we were all grappling with the fact that this guy it it sure looked like he had just killed his wife and a waiter from a nearby restaurant who was friendly with his wife and was returning I guess a pair of glasses as we learned later on wrong place wrong time Ron Goldman may he rest in peace as well Lord it seems like it right with Nicole Brown Simpson and uh I'll never forget where I was that day I think we all if you're old enough you remember yeah I was in a bar in Pittsburgh um walk in and I'm like why is why is the game not on wh what and then we just all huddled around this thing like in disbelief right and he was and and he was on the phone Al callings was in was in his friend was in the car with him and was driving and and and he was saying suicidal things it was crazy it was crazy and the every every news organization had broken in live and on and then the police didn't want to stop him they just kept they kept followed him they just followed him see where he was going and folks were on the freeway like cheering him on too it was weird the fact that people had time to make signs and get to certain locations I was that was especially now that I live here back then California was just like a whatever I didn't believe it was a real place but to think that in this type of traffic people could get to these spots make signs and hold going to go to Mexico and they turned around cuz he wanted to go home first there was a there was money and and and a disguise in there right CL gun yeah it was it was just I was in the eighth grade and a friend of mine was over to watch the NBA finals and remember they went they went small box on the finals and then the larger view was the Chase and then Bob cus is doing the game and going back and forth I it was Marv doing the game and Bob was doing Bob was doing the studio studio yeah but and they threw it back bro call threw it back to Marvin Marv is just like we will update you as conditions warrant pause we're here in the third quarter in Madison Square Garden and it was just weird and wild that and and and everyone started calling everyone else or speaking to everyone else saying did you see what OJ's doing like OJ killed his wife somebody else because again why else would he be running from the law and the crazy thing is when the trial hit they hardly brought up the chase right was one of my memories because I watched the preliminary hearing every minute of it in Lance eo's courtroom and you remember SNL would be doing skits on it and didn't Jay Leno have like dancing EOS on on The Tonight Show and um and that's when the ticker the bottom line ticker was born because CNN kept giving updates on other news because they didn't want to break away from the nonstop 247 coverage of it and that's when um you know um Roger kasac and gret aan susten became famous because they were legal experts to tell us about everything that was going on and and people figured out what DNA was it was our first experience with that right and so um the preliminary trial once I graduated from the Medill School of Journalism I took an internship on at the CBS Evening News in New York City I lived at the 92nd Street Y for the summer and took two trains to Black Rock every day to go to work and answer phones uh on the set of the CBS Evening News with Dan Rather and Connie Chong wow and basic basically my summer was filled with watching the preliminary trial with Lano and uh answering phones of people livid across the country to give me uh to tell me three things one OJ is guilty two OJ is innocent three where is the prices right or my soap opera they were like complaining like why are we covering this thing gavel to gavel Y what where where's the prices right where is my soap opera and I'm like I I would just transfer them to some other line for that cuz the phones were ringing off the hook it was crazy I will never ever the country forget it it really and so just to bring this kind of Full Circle a little bit here is because you cannot talk about OJ Simpson without mentioning the double murder in Brentwood California of his wife and the waiter Ron Goldman you cannot do that unless of course you're the Heisman trust who tweeted out today you know They Mourn the passing of OJ Simpson we extend his our sympathy to his family and again you know there this man did pass away to cancer and and and obviously somebody dying is not something to celebrate but how do you not mention and if you're Reggie Bush and you see that you're like oh he's got his Heisman but you know where's mine because O.J did serve 12 years for something completely unrelated to this that's one thing to say but we have to remember the families affected and in that regard a reporter from NBC News Daniel Arin reached out to Ron Goldman's dad Fred who was by the way the Goldman family was the face of of um the normaly amidst the melstrom of insanity that this is family had lost their son well then the Civil Trial that file followed and the quote from Ron Goldman's Father Fred about the passing of OJ quote the only thing I have to say is it's just further reminder of Ron being gone all these years it's no great loss to the world it's a further reminder of Ron's being gone and I just wanted to mention that to finish our conversation on this subject matter catch the rich eyes and show every single day on the Roku Channel 12 to3 Eastern for free

Channel: The Rich Eisen Show

Views: 138,485

Keywords: Rich Eisen, Rich Eisen Show, sports, NFL, football, CFP, NBA, pop culture, Roku, NFL Network, Chris Brockman, TJ Jefferson, Del Tufo, Super Bowl, sports talk, Football, CFB, College Football, Baseball, NFL Draft, OJ Simpson, O.J., OJ murder, Ron Goldman, Buffalo Bills, Heisman, USC, Trojans, Nicole Brown-Simpson, Slow Speed Chase, White Bronco, Kato Kaelin, Lance Ito, Christopher Darden, F. Lee Bailey, Robert Shapiro, Alan Dershowitz, Johnnie Cochran, Marcia Clark, OJ verdict

Id: 8oSY-Ia_NEI

Length: 9min 21sec (561 seconds)

Published: Thu Apr 11 2024