APRIL 2020 59Birmingham. Though Crane had never coached, he had
the requisite skill set, including bottomless optimism
and patience. Crane says his Dizzy Dean League team
of 16- and 17-year-olds started out 2–6...and finished
25–10. Soon, enough people wanted to play for Crane that
he launched an entire travel program, 31 North, named
for the highway that bisects Birmingham. Players came
from all over the state, and if they couldn’t afford the
entry fees, Crane says, he refused to turn them away.
He’d cover them.
In 2018, though, owing to a shortfall of funds, 31 North
closed down in the middle of the season, leaving players
disappointed and parents irate—and, in at least one in-
stance, demanding a refund. Crane denies a claim that
he was found unresponsive in his car during one tourna-
ment (he says he had been working three straight days
and was exhausted), and he has vowed to form another
team for the upcoming season. Still, when he recounts
this setback, his voice catches and he clenches a fist in
frustration. “Baseball has gotten so expensive,” he says.
“It’s becoming a rich-kids sport. I hate seeing kids not
get a chance to play.”
As for his own setback, Crane is torn. He cops to his
mistakes. No one, he says again and again, told him that
robbing a bank was a good idea; no one made him do it.
“I was always taught to take your ass-kickings.” At the
same time, he feels he has discharged his debt. “If you’re
asking me whether I’m ready for life to get easier,” he
says, “my answer is yes.”
Crane is now 44. He tends to wear a ballcap over his
close-cropped hair, and he still has the compact physique
of a former athlete. He has inched back into freelanceing
in sports television, reacquainting himself with an EVS.
He started working high school football games and has
expanded recently to Pro Bull Riders events, pro soccer
games for ESPN3, motocross for NBC and college football
for CBS Sports Network. He supplements his income by
selling sports memorabilia on eBay and says he would
like to get into motivational speaking.
Some of his most taxing work has been in repairing
relationships that frayed. Crane acknowledges that he
has caused a lot of pain for a lot of people, eroded a lot
of trust. He says he simply tries to follow the guidance
of his probation officer, who has condensed his advice to
five words: Do the next right thing.
Anchored as he was in sports media, aware as he was of
its capacity for storytelling, Crane knows one of his field’s
most durable narratives. One can imagine the highlight
package he’d cut: The dazzling talent gets noticed and ful-
fills—then exceeds—his dreams. He flies high and lives fast,
armored with the same unshakable self-belief and sense of
invincibility that serves him so well in his day job. Then he
makes a spectacular mess of things, suffers, has his moment
of reckoning. Finally, he tries to author a redemptive ending.
And Crane knows this familiar sports arc isn’t limited
to athletes. ¼or linear; his days make for a ledger filled with wins
and losses. He has tried, with varying success, to stay
clean. (He says he has been drug-free for five years.)
He has tried, with varying success, to reconnect with
his two kids and his family. He has tried, with varying
success, to restart his career.
One of his wins came in 2015 when he and his son,
Cameron, then 17, started a travel baseball team outsideSTRAIGHT, JACKETS
Crane (top) says he’s clean—but it’s a
struggle. He’ll always regret that he
didn’t see Johnson don the green blazer.FR
ED^
VUI
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