BELOVED SPORTS GUY
Broadcaster Tieman dies
Tributes poured in Sunday from friends, colleagues and average Montrealers for sportscaster Randy Tieman, who died on Friday at age 64. Tieman, who worked at CTV Montreal for 34 years until June 2017, ranked with the best in the profession, said Gazette sports columnist Jack Todd, noting his passing follows that of Gazette hockey writer Red Fisher, 91, in January. “In one year, Montreal lost Red Fisher and Randy,” he said. A consummate professional, Tieman treated everyone equally, whether he was interviewing a famous hockey player or a 12-yearold for his amateur sports segment, Randy ’s Rookies, Todd said. “He handled it all the same way, from the pros to the kids,” he said. “The kids always felt really good because they were treated like pros by him. He didn’t come on like, ‘I’m the big broadcaster and you’re some little kid.’ He would just be himself, as he was with everybody else,” Todd said. Mutsumi Takahashi, chief news anchor of CTV News Montreal, said Tieman’s warmth and authenticity made people want to be around him. “He’s the colleague that you run into who always has a fun story and a great smile and a great hug,” she said. “There’s a saying in television that the camera doesn’t lie. And I think Randy’s appeal on the air is that what you saw on TV was exactly who he was,” Takahashi said. “I think that’s why he was also such a wonderful reporter, because whether it was with professional athletes or kids, people would spend 30 minutes or an hour with him and they felt like they’d known him forever. “There was no pretence. He was very, very real,” she added. Born in Exeter, Ont., 50 kilometres north of London, Tieman attended Fanshawe College in London and worked in radio in Ontario and Manitoba before moving to Montreal in 1983 as a sportscaster with CFCF radio. Within months, he had moved on to CTV’s Pulse newscast. A baseball player in his youth, Tieman covered the Expos, but was equally adept at other sports, from hockey to golf. In 1995-96, he defied death not once but three times within 18 months, surviving Stage 4 Hodgkin’s lymphoma, meningitis and a quintuple bypass. Months later, he was back to playing hockey. “The doctors told me to go out and live a normal life,” Tieman told
There’s a saying that the camera doesn’t lie. And I think Randy’s appeal is that what you saw was exactly who he was.
a Gazette reporter in November 1996. “They said: ‘Do what you want.’ So I did. I went out and started playing hockey again.” The bypass left him with long scars from head to foot that had him joking about being a human zipper. “He’d had so many medical issues over the years that he really didn’t sweat the small stuff,” Takahashi said. “He just rolled with anything that came his way and he always bounced back.” Tieman’s devotion to his family was at the heart of everything he did, Takahashi said. “He is a tribute to what families should be. He loved his work and took his work very seriously and he did it well, but you knew where his priorities always were and that was Liane and the kids,” she said. In 1999, they moved to Williamstown, Ont., where Tieman commuted to Montreal to work the 3 p.m. to midnight shift at CTV. In June 2017, the network eliminated the sports department at CFCF-TV and dismissed Tieman, Brian Wilde and Sean Coleman. Sports fans were unanimous in their praise of the broadcasters and anger toward the network. Tieman was philosophical, saying that at 63, his “only regret is that I wasn’t able to do one last show to say goodbye.” He also hosted a radio show on Team 990 (now TSN 690) from 2009 to 2012. Tieman regularly gave his time to emcee fundraisers for cancer and share the story of his successful fight against the disease. His sudden death at home came as a shock to his wide circle of friends and colleagues, said Takahashi, who had dinner with Randy and Liane Tieman after his departure from CTV. “He always made the best of everything,” she said. “If there’s anything that we should all do right now, it’s to go and hug the people we love,” she added. Prime Minister Justin Trudeau was among many to pay tribute to Tieman on Sunday. “For decades, Randy Tieman invited viewers to share in his joy for sports — professional, amateur and everything in between,” Trudeau posted on Twitter. “His love of the game came straight from the heart, and Montrealers felt it. He’ll be deeply missed.” Tieman is survived by his wife of 32 years, Liane, and children Jesse, Dennis, Harry and Gabrielle Tieman-Lee and son-in-law Jason. A funeral for relatives and friends will be held in Lancaster, Ont., on Friday. In lieu of flowers, the family has requested donations to the Jewish General Hospital Foundation-Cancer Treatment.