No athletic ability? Then try the back-up plan

   Twenty-some years ago my kids attended St. John Neuman’s Mothers’ Morning Out with Dale Murphy’s kids. One morning, when I realized I was sitting in the carpool line behind his station wagon. I said to my boys, “Look! There’s Dale Murphy!”

   After a moment of silence one of them replied, “From the back he looks just like anyone else.”

   Well, sometimes that’s just the way it is. And sometimes it isn’t.

   Take Jerry Gilbert for example. Gilbert moved to Atlanta in 1954 and bought and sold every kind of business you can imagine, including a golf school and driving range on Phil Niekro Drive in Norcross. 

   Gilbert was just going about business as usual when a scout from a modeling agency approached him from behind.

   “From the back you look just like Arnold Palmer,” the agent said. “How would you like to be his stand in for a series of commercials?”

   “Sure,” said Gilbert, “but how much do I have to pay him?”

   Gilbert soon found himself caught up in a business he’d never dreamed of: show business.

   Many athletes, when they make it big, start doing commercials for major companies. However, their contracts often limit the number of hours they may spend on stage. If it’s just sitting in a locker room joking about how to spell Radio Shaq, no big deal. But when the celebrity needs to travel around the whole country to show all the places Cooper Tires can take you, well, that’s a whole different ball game.

   Palmer couldn’t take the time to do the commercials, so the company paid Gilbert to fill in. Not only did they pay him for his work, but they also sent him to Hollywood where costume and makeup experts enhanced his Palmer persona. Then, he toured with his own filming crew and entourage of staging directors so he could spend a few weeks palming himself off as Palmer. Highlights included Mount Rushmore where he swung his club with an 8,000-foot drop-off behind him. He teed off at Gatorland in Orlando, home plate at Fenway Park, Wall Street and the Grand Canyon. He’s now a professional model and appears in local commercials.

   You know, it won’t be long before Jeff Francouer and Brian McCann will be under contract to sell sneakers or Sea-doos or something. And like Palmer, they may have contracts that won’t allow them to spend all the time necessary to do the filming.

   If any young men out there are reading this, I have a suggestion for all of you: Go to a department store dressing room and take a good long look at yourself in a three-way mirror. Think about whom you might look like. Your body may not have any face value, but someday it could have a really good “pay” back.

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