Part of the Cunningham’s Court series — where every story bounces between love, legacy, and the lessons that built the game.

Wondering when those grey skies are gonna clear up?

Sometimes gratitude hides behind a storm cloud. For me, it usually happens during transitions — those in-between moments when I caught the rebound and thought, Now what?

That’s when Dad would appear, ready with the perfect story — the kind that turned my worries into laughter. Like the night he froze on live television.

Forecast: Mostly Humble, With a Chance of Redemption

When I talked to Dad recently to double-check the story (thinking I already had it down cold), he set me straight.

“It wasn’t the weather I messed up,” he said, “It was the sports.”

Say it isn’t so.

All this time I’d pictured him misreading maps and tripping over cold fronts — probably because there’s not way to say sports in a Brooklyn accent. But he could have had a field day by saying “weatha” (silent r) the way he once did.

But the truth was even better.

Dad’s friend Tom Brookshier, who handled sports for NBC news, had asked him to fill in one night. Dad figured, How hard could that be?

He found out.

He’d never written a script, never used a teleprompter, and by the time the anchor said, “And now we go to sports,” Dad froze. He stumbled through the segment, probably squinting at the screen, trying to make sense of the stats scrolling by — (my embellishments, not Dad’s).

He went home to Mom who didn’t know what to say. Do you offer him dinner?

Even Sr. Mary from my school — who adored Dad no matter the score — called afterward and said,

“I just saw Bill on the news. He’s not going back for the 11 o’clock, right?”

But he did.

He’d made a promise, and always a man of his word, the 11 o’clock broadcast was calling his name.

This time, he came prepared.

When he left the studio that night, he wasn’t a legend — just a man who’d faced the camera twice and lived through the embarrassment to tell about it.

Forecast: Clear Skies and Blooper Faith

For years, that story became my comfort forecast.

If Dad — the man who could do everything in sports (except sweep the floor after the game) — could fail publicly and still laugh about it, then maybe I could too.

He told me that story whenever I needed it most — anytime I wanted to disappear under the bleachers.

He wanted me to see that failure wasn’t fatal. It was funny.

We all will fall, slip, and freeze sometimes, and that’s what makes us human.

But he never said that outright. He just let me laugh at him. And that might be the greatest gift he ever gave me.

Forecast: Smooth Sailing From Here

Last month, our youngest daughter, Alexandra, stood at a more intimate podium — her house meeting —  giving her senior speech about, I couldn’t make this up if I tried, making mistakes.

I could only imagine how smooth she was up there. I always wonder how this generation went from drooling to delivering speeches that sound like TED Talks. What happened to the awkward teenage years we had to endure?

But jokes aside, she had something to say, and it hit home, as you can imagine.

She said,

And I thought, Well, looky here — the forecasts still calling for faith.

Because somewhere between my Dad’s sports report and Alexandra’s senior speech, the message stayed the same — no whisper-down-the-lane-distortions here:

You can’t control the storm — but you can sing and dance in the rain.

Legacy Forecast

Legacy isn’t built from the highlight reels; it’s shaped in the bloopers.

It’s the courage to laugh when the camera catches you off guard, the grace to try again at eleven o’clock, and the wisdom to pass the resilience forward.

Because gratitude doesn’t always show up in sunny skies.

Sometimes it arrived in the middle of the storm — disguised as laughter, or a story that gets better every time it’s retold.

And if there’s one forecast I can trust, it’s this: Love always clears the weather.

I’m the kid of the Kangaroo Kid — and this has been another memory from Cunningham’s Court.