Randy,
I love it when I see you're part of a discussion. I love seeing
the "inside" information. Even if it's something as
trivial as you got so many World Jai Alai jackets you gave them
away to friends, it's always good to find out what really went
on. Thanks for sharing all the info with us.
I have a question about when Berenson bought Hartford from World
Jai Alai. Obviously he took a lot of top players with him (Remen,
Mendi, Urquiaga, Arriaga II, Gerny etc. from Miami and Pablo and
Jesus, among others, from Tampa). My question is, did Berenson
and World Jai Alai negotiate a deal before hand over which players
Berenson got, and the players HAD to go to Hartford, or was it
open season, and X number of players were free to sign with Berenson?
Did Buddy get to take a certain number of early gamers and late
gamers, like you can take EITHER Remen or Joey and EITHER Mendi
or Rufino? Did you have a chance to to to Hartford under Buddy?
And you are right about Buddy's eye for talent. I learned through
this board that he brought Joey, Cachin, Remen and Camy all to
Miami as teenagers starting on the same day! That's quite a haul.
As for James, when I started attending Hartford a lot in 1983,
I thought he was talented but very erratic. But over the next
five years, he learned not to wildly fire everything as hard as
he could and go for impossible winners and he improved more than
any other player I ever saw, and before the strike I thought he
deserved to be in the feature doubles game over a few others.
